BACKGROUND: On June 17TH 1936, Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler was appointed to the newly created position of Chef der Deutschen Polizei im Reichsministerium des Innern, (Chief of the German Police in the National Ministry of the Interior), effectively giving him full control of all police agencies within Germany. As a result of this appointment and the restructuring of all the separate German state police into a single national police force new regulations were instituted on June 25TH 1936 to bring about uniformity in dress for all police through-out the country although it wasn’t until April 1ST 1937 that it was fully implemented. The Police were divided into eight assorted branches of service with each branch having a distinguishing truppenfarbe, (Branch of service color), that was displayed on the uniforms including the piping on the visor caps. Personnel serving with the Gendarmerie, (Rural Police), were allocated orange as their truppenfarbe. Of Note: The German Police had no enlisted ranks with the lowest rank being an Unterwachtmeister which was equivalent to the German army rank of Unteroffizier. This NCO’s type of cap would have been worn by the ranks of Unterwachtmeister to the rank of Hauptwachtmeister of the Gendarmerie.

PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION: Nice quality, private purchase, Gendarmerie NCO’s visor cap features a police green wool/rayon blend body, a mid-brown badge cloth centerband and Gendarmerie orange wool truppenfarbe, (Branch of service color), to the crown edge and both the top and bottom edges of the centerband. The front center of the cap has a three piece national tri-color cockade. The front center of the centerband has a stamped, polished natural aluminum, second pattern, police eagle as introduced on June 25TH 1936, encompassed by a vertically oval oak-leaf wreath. Complete leather sweatband. Maker marked to Peter Kupper. Sweat diamond is mostly intact. Couple of tears to the liner material. Roughly a size 54. Shows the expected period use and wear but overall nice condition.