"The Purpose of the Pickelhaube Helmet" Topic

"Germany's Pickelhaube helmet, distinguished by a lone spike jutting straight from its top, became a symbol of Prussian militarism in the early 20th century. At first glance, the distinctive spike seems to have served no practical purpose—indeed, use of the helmets on the battlefield was abolished during World War I. This raises the question: what was the "point" of the Pickelhaube in the first place?

Introduced by the Prussian military circa 1843, the Pickelhaube was originally proposed for use by cavalry troops. The helmets, made of pressed leather, were developed as an updated solution to the conical shako hats worn by Prussians during the Napoleonic Wars. Napoleonic-era shakos offered virtually no head protection and were cumbersome to wear in wet conditions, as they easily soaked up rain. The Pickelhaube, therefore, was greeted as a practical modern invention. The new "leather helmets" or "helmets with spikes" gave soldiers' greater head covering and visibility. The helmets did not fall off easily…"
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Amicalement
Armand

From the History Net website.

The US Army adopted them for dress uniforms after the Franco-Prussian. I have seen Colored infantry photos of them wearing dress uniforms and the spike helm.

Well, of course the white chicks loved our sexy Pickelhaubs!

Even more than that improvised Baseball bat named Gretel you can see on that picture of me further below.
Not to be mistaken for 'Lucille'.
That is the name of the one they gave that great evil guy in 'The Walking Dead' as his prefered weapon of head destruction.

Back then Uncle Sam new that, when he wanted you for the Army.
About the time US soldiers wore those soup bowls that perfidious Albions called helmets.
By the way, were they lend-leased to their impoverished cousins in the colonies that saved them their nether regions from guys like me?

…
With the courtesy of Tango01, …ehrm…
No, sorry.

With or without the courtesy of Harry R. Hopps, the US Army division of propaganda and diversion, Wikipedia and hundreds if not thousands of other people and organisations whose names are forgotten.

But you can probably see it in person at the library of congress.
Or online in case it is overrun by patriots.
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I knew there would be a highly specialised monography on the rather obscure historical phenomenon of US military copycat culture before 1914.

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Did any nation go to war in 1914 with an effective helmet that stayed in service for the duration?

Some argue, more or less everything changed during WWI.
They call it 'The Great Catastrophe' for a reason.

After a war, other nations tend to copy the victor's uniform components. I have a photo from a newspaper of Bill Clinton reviewing troops in Colombia who are wearing pickelhaubes as part of their dress uniform.

I don't think any of the armies prior to WWI anticipated the need for protecting the head from shrapnel. The Balkan nations had been at war in 1913, and I believe they all still wore kepis, fezzes and other soft caps. It was the widespread use of artillery that resulted in lots of head wounds, which in turn lead to use of helmets. Just like the use of poison gas lead to use of gas masks, which couldn't get a good seal if you had one of those big, bushy mustaches, so guys trimmed them back to Charlie Chaplin/Adolf Hitler type mustaches.

Grelber

The design of the spike-topped Prussian helmet adopted in 1843 was poached, allegedly, from a prototype being considered by the Czarist authorities that was based on a leather helmet worn by Russian heavy cavalry during the Napoleonic wars. The similarity is evident. The finial spike served as a mount for a full dress plume and ventilator. On the Russian version adopted, briefly, a couple of years later, the finial took the form of a stylised grenade.

In the 1840s, advocates of clothing reform in the British army examined the new Prussian uniforms, and recommended replacing the unwieldy shako with a leather helmet but of more neo-classical form. As we know they were not successful. About the same time in India, Lumsden of the Guides did make a trial of a leather helmet modelled on the Prussian, which he found hot and heavy. Nevertheless, we see officers of Irregular Native Cavalry regiments depicted wearing similar leather helmets in the years before the Sepoy Mutiny and some seem to have done service in the field, where they may have been more suited to cavalry work.

As we also know, the British persisted with various forms of shako for another forty years, until 1878 when a cloth-covered cork helmet was adopted. Despite being topped with a slender brass spike, the new headgear bore no relation to the Prussian helmet.

The full dress helmet adopted by US Cavalry regiments in 1872, and by the infantry in 1881, was not made of leather nor was it topped with a spike, but rather a finial mount for a horsehair plume.

We all know that the Pickelhaube was designed specifically to use your head as a battering ram when all else failed. We all know that Prussians were hard headed. Why else would you have a spear head in your head? :)

Interesting – and I have read about how the shako was an improvement over the tricorn

The ceremonial dress for Canadian regular forces infantry actually still is a spiked white Worsley helmet

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Legionarius, Michael Caine memorably demonstrated the use of an early pickelhaube in more or less this fashion in the film ‘The Last Valley" set in the Thirty Years War.

I knew it!!! If you dig deep enough, you'll find what you want!

I too dug a bit deeper and found some interesting theories regarding the origins of spiked helmets:

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Didn't every Viking wear a horned helmet?

@Arjuna
For a man who has been interested in military headgear for 35 years, Peter Suciu's articles tend to contain a remarkable number of errors. That one is no exception.

Thanks!.

Amicalement
Armand

@42flanker

That may well be, since I'm in no way an expert in military headgear nor military gear as a whole.
I probably could do a crash course with the help of Wikipedia and half a dozend books I could scan in fast mode, but I have to admit I am not that interested in this thematic.
That does not mean I think it is a stupid one.
The short research I've done about it yesterday gave me a certain fascination with, from my perspective, a rather obscure part of history.
There are a lot of interesting cultural details and implictions involved in such topics.

But since I am myself prone to obsession in detail in other topics of our hobby, I rather shy awy from another abyss I could be missed in.
;-)

Interesting as always wondered, now I know it was a useless fashion statement.

As a wee lad, I was disappointed to discover it's purpose had nothing to do with spearing pickles.

Ha!….

Amicalement
Armand

No, but it does help to get them out of the jar.