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Evolution of British made M.E.Co. first aid pouch


Fausto
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Hi !

For those guys who love - like I love so much - the more subtle variations on the same item, here some different M.E.Co. made First Aid Pouches... Please note the fastener and the shape of the pouch. First a M1924 pouch with PULL HERE British fasteners (1943). Then, again in 1943, still a M1924 with LTD British fastener and, finally, a M1942 with tipical British button fastener (1944)...

Oddly enough, the M.E.Co. British made .45 magazine pouches followed a reversed way: first round brass buttons (1943) then PULL HERE fasteners (1943) and finally LTD British fasteners (1943-44). And, for some reason, the M.E.C°. 1943 mag pouches with round buttons are more rare than the other types: the exact contrary on what happens on First Aid Pouches...

Hope you enjoy...

Fausto

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craig_pickrall

In all my years of looking I have only managed to find one pouch with a Lift The Dot fastener. The version with the button snap was always fairly common though.

 

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RustyCanteen

Excellent topic!

 

Craig, that redyed pouch is certainly interesting; it's the only British made redyed example I have seen.

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Fausto-

Thanks very much for starting this very interesting and informative thread. I am not complaining here (well, not too much!), but we need more of this and perhaps fewer "What did I just buy?", "Is this real?", and/or "What are your opinions of this _______(fill in the blank)??" threads.

 

Thanks to Craig for his usual great photo study. I learned somthing today.

 

Respectfully,

 

Terry ("Bagman")

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Thanks to you all !

Craig, you're right : the LTD or PULL HERE fastener on British made first Aid pouches are rarer than the round button ones. And, by the way, your M.E.C° 1943 has the PULL HERE fastener which is even rarer (in my opinion) than the British LTD. Maybe our friend Ian (Sabrejet) will tell us some more about this matter from lovely England (pardon! Super lovely Wales !!).

Thanks Rusty... and thanks Terry: you're right. I love so much when someone tries to put together and show to other guys something he's learned or observed in years of collecting.

Now stop to talking... I will try to post some more uncommon British made First aid pouches with LTD fasteners...

Fausto

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Here we go... M&S 1944 with British LTD fastener... A seldom encountered manufacturer in the FA pouches field...

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and now the "monster"... J.& A.H. 1944, round button. Please note the double inprinted (one upside down and one right...) U.S. on the flap... This M1942 pouch is by by far the largest British made pouch I have so far observed. And please also note: no inspector's markings. Probably this ugly pouch was rejected and taken home by some worker as a souvenir (yes, Arturo (artu44), it is your one, now in my collection...)

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Just for fun...

another not seldom encountered British Made FA pouch... This time a large M1942 made in 1945 by Finnigans Ltd. Up today, this pouch and a couple of M1910 canteen covers made by M.W.& S. Ltd. are the only 1945 dated British made stuff I have encountered... And never seen one in used condition... I wonder if 1945 web gear made by British was ever used by US troops...

Fausto

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Thanks Rusty !

Actually I didn't hope that these pouches could be of great interest... So I'm double happy !

Fausto

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craig_pickrall

Fausto, you know there are a few of us that love these variations. This is great stuff as far as I'm concerned. After you get all of yours represented can you do a side by side size comparison please?

 

The Brit made FA pouches were thrown in with other US made versions and continued to be issued for a few years after the war. Keep a close eye out for them and you can spot them in photos done years after the war. I'm not sure if the stock stayed in the ETO or if some made it back to the US or other areas. Same goes for canteen covers. There was a lot of WW2 gear released in surplus sales in the 70's and there was a good amount of Brit made gear in those sales. Most of what I have came out of these surplus sales. There was a mix of both new and used.

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Hi Craig !

Yes, I'll try in the next days to provide a picture with side by side comparison although I'm convinced that this is not so enlightning or explaining in the confused BM pouches field...

Actually, and depending by various makers, in 1943-44 there is a total mix of M1924 and M1942 models, sometimes with visible difference in size between the same model by the same maker, while in 1945 we have only large M1942 ones... In other words: no strict rules in making this stuff. That's also the case of the .45 mag pouches... Why, in 1943-44-45, let the British made obsolete M1910 double fastened pouches, while the M1923 was the standard issue since years? Or why we encounter some M.W.& S. Ltd. 1944 mounted canteen covers of the Model1917, although with the web sewed strap instead of the free leather strap, while in the same year and even in 1943 other British makers supplied the updated M1941 mounted covers, with the detachable hanger?

A mistery to me... but I incline to think a couple of things. First: the official updated drawings were not furnished to the British manufacturers with great attention and, maybe, they got in some case old and obsolete drawings... Second: not so many original drawings on hand at the time in ETO and so - maybe, and again it is only a personal conjecture - some manufacturers simply started their work on accurately stripped FA, or mag pouches, or canteen covers taken at random from the U.S. depots or even taken in the field...

By the way, interesting to know that there are pictures of U.S. troops equipped with BM stuff years after the war...

Fausto

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Here another example of what I said above: neat M1936 suspenders dated 1945... And by the way I must correct myself about the .45 mag pouches: no one encountered with 1945 date, just 1943 and 1944...

Fausto

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