BACKGROUND: The Luftwaffe utilized a wide variety of pants including the evening dress pants, the standard, straight legged, long pants, drill and field pants, tapered "keilhose" pants, assorted specialized pants designed for specific branch of service personnel and both mounted on unmounted personnel’s breeches. Unmounted Officers were permitted to wear breeches similar in style to the riding breeches worn by mounted personnel but not including the dual-ply, reinforcement panel to the seat, crotch and inner thighs as found on the mounted breeches. Unmounted Officers breeches were the prescribed or optional type of pants for wear with the Service Dress, the Undress Uniform, the Reporting and the Parade dress uniforms. Of Note: Officers and certain senior NCO ranks were responsible for purchasing their own uniforms and as a result were allotted a clothing allowance through the Luftwaffe’s Verkaufsabteilung, (Air-Force Sales Department), system. The Officers and certain senior NCO’s could choose to purchase their uniforms from the armed forces clothing depots or to privately purchase garments of higher quality. Although enlisted personnel were issued their uniforms from government supplies they were also permitted to purchase privately tailored uniforms although the price may have been restrictive.

PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION: Slightly mottled, coarse, Luftwaffe blue/grey, wool/rayon blend, construction breeches feature a vertical, four button French fly with an additional button positioned on the waistband and an internal, horizontally extended, button holed strap with a corresponding internal button. The exterior horizontal waistband has seven, evenly spaced, vertical, fabric belt loops. The breeches have two, slightly, diagonally angled, slash front pockets and a small, diagonally angled, slash watch pocket positioned to the right side of the fly. The forward, bottom edge of the right waistband has a small, horizontal thread loop stitched in place, designed to secure a watch chain. The reverse of breeches have two, horizontal, slash pockets with scalloped button down flaps, two short, vertical, tapering darts and dual, horizontal, fit adjustment straps with corresponding, blued magnetic, sheet metal gripper buckles to each. The breeches feature very exaggerated, outward, ballooning at the thighs, as was fashionable at the time, and taper inwards down to the cuffs with two, short, vertical, tapering darts to the reverse center of each. The cuffs each have a long, vertical, outside seam slash which extends upwards to the knee with four vertically aligned closure buttons positioned above a small, overlapping, fabric flap with an additional three button closure to each cuff. The interior waistband is lined in ribbed blue/grey rayon while the internal pocket bags are in a white cotton/rayon blend material. The waistband lining has four, evenly spaced, suspender attachment buttons and two, vertically extended, blue/grey fabric tabs with a single button to each at the reverse center. The breeches have no visible size or manufacturer’s markings. The breeches are in overall very good condition with minimal age and usage toning and a couple of pinhead sized moth nips. The buttons are the molded tan and grey bakelite types and all appear to have their original stitching. The breeches are roughly size 36" waist.

GRADE ****                             PRICE $350.00