Prussian 3rd Guard Field Artillery Regiment Tunic and Pickelhaube
Above: The pickelhaube is marked " 4 GR", "3 G.R.", "IIIB", "1903", "RB", "B.A.G. 1902" and has all good original parts including the chin strap and cockades. It has a gilt guard eagle with a silver guard star. Everything fits well together, only two holes behind the plate and looks like it has been the only plate ever on the helmet. There is the ghost of the guard eagle on the leather. No other ghost of a plate. There is a vent on the spine, which is not normally correct for a pre-war field artillery pickelhaube. There is a field/foot artillery ball top with a base that fits and looks to be the only base that has ever been on the helmet. No ghost of an earlier different spike/ball base. The ball top is removable for a parade horsehair plume. One of the markings is "G.R" which can be Grenadier Regiment but Guard Grenadier and Foot units this could apply to are the Garde Regiment zu Fuss 3 & 4 and Garde Grenadier 3 & 4. For these the marking should be "G.R.z.F." or "G.G.R.". As Colonel J’s web site suggest, G.R. seems to simply stand for Guard Regiment with this pickelhaube. There are marks to both G.R. 3 and G.R. 4 so this cannot apply to Guard Foot Artillery Regiments because there were not units with these numbers. This narrows the possibilities to the 3rd and 4th Guard Field Artillery Regiments. The B.A.G. mark, which is "Bekleidungs Amt Garde" and the guard eagle plate without a second set of holes also indicates the pickelhaube was issued to Guard Regiments. The RB mark is a mystery to me
All images, research, and text are sole property of Ralph Lovett.