Helmets of the world

The Chezh\Slovak wz32 helmet was in mass usage furing the WW2. It was weared by the croation Ustasha forces, Russian security corps in Yougoslavia, the Finish army and ofcource by the Slovakian army. Ther were 2 variants of this helmet: grey, with two Slovakian crosses and green one, used by the Slovakian AA and civil defence.
In my opinion, this helmet is a Romanain "souvenir" from the Western front (after 23rd of August) and even from the Eastern front. It's possible also, that it was weared by a kind of Romanian auxiliary unit during the war.

This post has been edited by Sturmpionier on December 06, 2006 02:35 pm

Thanks for the info! Very interesting but that doesn't explain its presence in an army depot....unless it was used, along with other wz32 helmets, after the war (just a supposition, of course).
What do you think?

I remember seeing one similar helmet at the fleamarket.....

Well, this is very interesting, indeed. First, I think you must judge whether the green paint is a communist, post war, or original one. If the helmet was repainted, you could clean some of the paint and find the orirginal Slovak paint under it. That could be clue. If the green paint is orirginal one, this means that this helmet is produced for the Slovakian WW2 civil defence. But if the orirginal paint is yellow\grey, so the shell was pruduced for the Slovakain army.

Well, the visible paint, is what you can see in the pictures, meaning some sort of a khaki-green-yelow colour. It was obviously painted in a hurry, some traces being even on the chinstrap. Underneath is a much darker and thicker layer of green paint but it is hard to say if this is the original paint job....

post some pictures with the grenade,please,i have one too(but without explosible and igniter)

k I will put the pictures today.

You might contact to Mr. Radovan Klokochnik from Slovakia. He's a helmet collector and a specialist about the Slovakian helmets. I think, he will help you.
If you want to ask him about your helmet, I'll send you his E-mail via PM.

so where are they?

What is the difference between a ww2 ssh40 and a post ww2 ssh40, I have in my colection 6 ssh40, one is marked with romanian stamps and it was made in the 1950's and the other five don't have such a mark. The other 5 helmets have other marks like: 1-1, 2-G, A-2, 1-2, 1-1217. There is also a difference two helmets have a lether chinstrap and the other 3 have textil chinstrap. The rest is the same.

Sturmpionier: The helmet is Czechoslovak vz.32. It was used most by Czechoslovak army.
Slovak army used this helmet from 1939, but they used it in its original - khaki or grey-geen colour. Only during eastern campaign against soviet union there was need to change it, because there were other armies using this helmet and russians used similar coulour on their helmet... so slovak soldiers painted it... blue stripe 3,5cm thick and white patriarchal cross on side between rivets... see photo (its reconstruction of helmet vz32 used by Slovak army) But later was used onlz the blue stripe - without white cross...




ANDI: try to put down the "green" colour, it seems not as original one... use nail polish remover, but carefull!!! there can be original colour underneath it..

This post has been edited by Iver on August 02, 2008 02:34 pm