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, including the Feuerschutzpolizei, (Fire Protection Police), 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 to bring about uniformity in dress for all police through-out the country. One of the new uniform regulations was the introduction of new style shoulder insignia and the introduction of specific Truppenfarbe, (Branch of Service Colors), to identify the assorted branches of Police service with green being allotted to personnel serving with the Schutzpolizei des Reiches, (National Protection Police). Police personnel wore the shoulder boards in matching pairs to indicate the specific rank with the base being in the appropriate branch of service color. Of Note: The July 1936 pattern Police shoulder boards for certain ranks underwent minor modifications in December 1939, July 1940 and April 1941 which also resulted in minor rank designation alterations. These modifications also resulted in a somewhat confusing, overlapping wear of insignia. The shoulder boards for the police rank of Meister remained unchanged from 1936 to 1945. 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.

PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION: Slip on shoulder boards featuring dual, outer edge, bright silver/aluminum Russian braid with evenly spaced, interwoven chocolate brown "V"s, encompassing dual, inner, chocolate brown Russian braids interwoven with dual bright silver/aluminum Russian braid with evenly spaced, interwoven chocolate brown "V"s. Mounted on a red rayon truppenfarbe bases.