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A.E.F. Service Coats


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This post is not intended to be the be all and end all of posts on WW I era service coats, as more research still needs to be done. It was spawned however, by a recent post that was devoted to finding out more information on the 1917 Rough Cut Service Coat … of which this post may answer a few questions or may raise a few new ones. For anyone interested, the above mentioned post can be found at the other end of this link:

 

http://www.usmilitariaforum.com/forums/index.php?/topic/261656-thoughts-on-this-heavy-thick-wool-ww1-uniform-27th-infantry-division/

 

This post also closely mirrors that of a very informative older forum post also on the topic of WW I Service Coats, written by Gil Sanow:

 

http://www.usmilitariaforum.com/forums/index.php?/topic/6489-the-world-war-i-army-ems-service-coat/?hl=%2B1918+%2Bservice+%2Bcoat

 

As always, all forum members are encouraged to add photos and information that is germane to this post’s topic.

 

A.E.F. Woolen Service Coats

1911 to 1919

Photo No. 01: The combat environment in which the men and boys of the AEF fought, was responsible for destroying huge amounts of Doughboy clothing during the Great War. Quartermaster Corps statistics showed that the average lifespan of a woolen service coat was just 79 days.

This dramatic painting titled Sunday Morning at Cunel, painted by official AEF war artist Captain Harvey Thomas Dunn in 1918, depicts just one of the many ravages that the combat environment was capable of inflicting to the soldier’s body and to his clothing.

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Research indicates that the lineage of the U.S. Army, regulation woolen service coats from the period was roughly as follows:

 

1911 Pattern Service Coats

  • Specification No. 1125, adopted on August 15, 1911
  • Specification No. 1160, adopted on July 26, 1912

1917 Pattern Service Coats

  • Specification No. 1268, adopted on August 26, 1917
  • Specification No. 1285, adopted on December 4, 1917

1918 Pattern Service Coats

  • Specification No. 1356, adopted on August 28, 1918

In addition to the above mentioned “regulation” service coats, two different patterns of British made “contract” service coats were fabricated overseas and issued directly to the Doughboys of the American Expeditionary Forces (AEF). *

 

  • Early in the war in the U.S.A., a hybrid 1911/09 Service Coat that was made from left over stocks of pre 1911 service coats was also worn with some degree of regularity, and an unusually crudely U.S. made service coat which has since been nicknamed “Rough Cut” also appeared shortly after that.

It would seem that neither the British contract nor the hybrid or Rough Cut American made service coats were assigned a specification number. Therefore, the below adoption dates are at best, just an educated guess as to when they first may have been issued.

 

  • 1909/11 hybrid pattern, adopted in the spring of 1917**
  • 1917 “Rough Cut” Service Coat adopted in the late spring of 1917
  • 1917 British contract, adopted in the winter of 1917
  • 1918 British contract, adopted in the summer of 1918

*There may have been a French made 1917 Service Coat as well, as I seem to recall seeing an example posted here on the forum many years ago. However, it may have been service breeches that I saw or I could have imagined the whole thing! If anyone has seen a French contract, not a French tailor made 1917 style service coat, please post any images or information here.

 

**The 1909 Service Coat in wool, Specification No. 1049, was the predecessor to the 1911 pattern service coat. It was adopted on November 3, 1909.

 

1911 Service Coat

Specification No. 1125, adopted on August 15, 1911

Superseded by Specification No.1160 on July 26, 1912

In order to reduce the manufacturing cost of the soldier’s olive drab woolen service dress, the Quartermaster Department adopted an entirely new style of service coat in 1911.

Like the 1909 Service coat before it, the simplified 1911 Service Coat was:

 

  • Made from 13 ounce to the yard olive drab worsted serge woolen material.
  • Lined with light weight, olive drab luster wool serge fabric.
  • Sewn with olive drab silk thread.
  • Although the 1911 coat used the same style of contract label, the label was moved to the inside of the lower right hand pocket. It was also stipulated that the garment’s specification number be added to the label. However, that particular requirement of the new specifications seemed to have been laxly enforced as numerous post 1911 contract labels do not bear the specification number.

 

The 1911 Service Coat’s external appearance differed radically from the Army’s earlier service coat designs:

 

  • The “standing rolling” collar found on the 1909 Service Coat, which had been pierced for two collar discs on each side, was replaced by a “standing” collar that now only required one grommet hole per side to accommodate the single collar disc that had now been prescribed for wear, one on each side.
  • The “choke bellows” style of pocket was replaced by flat, rectangular shaped patch pockets.
  • The pointed cuffs were replaced by plain cuffs that feature two rows of stitching placed approximately three inches from the bottom edge of each sleeve.

 

Photo No. 02: This photo illustrates the primary external differences between the 1909 and 1911 pattern service coats.

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Photo No. 03: The easiest way to distinguish the 1911 Service Coat from older or later patterns is by the two very visible lines of stitching sewn approximately one-quarter inch apart that encircle the cuff of each sleeve. The cuff stitching is barely discernable in this poor quality image of the 1911 Service Coat that was borrowed from the 1911 dated Quartermaster specifications for this coat. The cuff stitching however is quite visible in this photo of an MP wearing the white on blued denim Military Police brassard that was taken circa 1917.

 

Right hand photo courtesy of the John Adam-Graf collection

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1911 Service Coat

Specification No. 1160, adopted on July 26, 1912

Superseded by Specification No.1268 on August 26, 1917

To further reduce the manufacturing cost of the 1911 Service Coat new specifications were issued by the Quartermaster Department in July of 1912.

 

The 1912 pattern service coat was identical in every respect to the 1911 pattern except for the fact that it was now made from a softer, heavier and less expensive 13 ½ ounce to the yard olive drab melton wool material.

 

Photo No. 04: Apparently, at that time there were very few textile mills in the U.S. that were cable of producing the type of woolen serge material required by the Army in 1911. However, there were numerous American textile mills that were capable of turning out melton woolen material. The 1912 specifications opened up bidding for government contracts to a broader range of suppliers. The result of the competitive bidding between the various manufacturers was that the price of olive drab wool went down, and it became both cheaper to buy and easier to obtain.

 

This 1915 dated 1911 Service Coat is made from the less costly melton woolen material. Note the standing collar and the two rows of cuff stitching. The inset of this garment’s contact label shows that it was the product of a 1915 dated contract.

 

Photos courtesy of the U.S. Victory Museum Collection

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Photo No. 05: Here two American Doughboys circa 1917 (right) and either 1918 or 1919 (left) wear the 1911 pattern service coat, which is identified by the double row of stitching seen on the lower cuffs.

 

Photos courtesy of the John Adam-Graf collection

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Photo No. 06: Photographic evidence indicates that the 1911 Service Coat was worn all the way up to the end of 1917 and well into the Occupation of Germany in 1919 as indicated by this photos of 3rd Army troops wearing a 1911 Service Coat at right and a 1917 Service coat to its left.

 

Photo courtesy of the John Adam-Graf collection

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1911 Service Coat Anomaly

Photo No. 07: Collectors often come across an irregularity, such as the 1911 Service coat on the right which has been manufactured with sleeves that featured the old fashioned pointed cuffs, which was a residual feature from the 1909 Service Coat, Specification No. 1049. The most common reason for this type of inconsistency was that most manufacturers’ of Army clothing assembled the garments as if they were automobiles on an assembly line.

 

If the new specifications called for new pockets or new sleeves, all of the older “parts” from the previous specification that had not yet been used would be incorporated into the first production run of the new garment until the supply of old parts had been completely exhausted. Therefore the first 100 or even 1,000 units of a new specification stood a pretty good chance of being a hybrid pattern that combined parts belonging to both the canceled and new specifications.

 

For comparison, on the left is an early production 1911 Service Coat made as its designers intended it to be. This coat’s smooth even color, indicates that it was probably manufactured before 1917.

 

Right hand photo courtesy of the John Adam-Graf collection

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1909/11 Hybrid Service Coat

No known specification number

Its estimated time of adoption was the spring of 1917

This pattern of coat appears to have been in service on a limited scale until the end of the war

As a result of its rapid growth, the Army experienced an acute shortage of olive drab service dress during the early months of 1917. Presumably any remaining stocks of obsolescent and obsolete Army clothing that was olive drab in color were pressed into service until such time as America’s textile manufacturers were able to catch up with the Army’s voracious need for woolen clothing.

 

Because of the clothing shortage, during the summer and autumn of 1917 it was not uncommon for the raw recruits at a training camp to be seen at drill wearing a curious mixture of civilian as well as obsolete and current Army issued clothing. The history of the 30th Infantry Division’s 30th Field Artillery Regiment, whose men, instead of being trained for war, were actually constructing Camp Sevier in North Carolina, mentioned the lack of regulation Army clothing with some degree of bitterness:

 

Supplies of all kinds, except food, continued scarce. The rough work of clearing up forest proved to be very hard on army clothes. Men tore their uniforms into shreds. Overalls lasted only a few days, shoes were ripped and snagged and the bottoms burned off around the brush fires. Hats lost their shape and leggings were frayed and torn. The Division Quartermaster … had 30,000 men to care for and not enough equipment for half that number … Winter came on and there were no winter clothes. The winter was bitter cold before the men could be furnished with winter clothes and a fourth of the winter was passed before the winter overcoats arrived … There seemed to be no lack of warm winter clothes, fine heavy overcoats, and good shoes at National Army camps, those camps de-luxe where the selective service men lived luxuriously in steam-heated barracks, but those articles were lacking in at least one National Guard camp where 30,000 of the finest soldiers the world had ever seen lived under canvas through the worst winter the South had experienced since 1898.

 

History of the 113th Field Artillery: 30th Division, 1920, History Committee of the 113th F.A., page 23, 24

In fact, the clothing shortage was so severe that according to the eyewitness, account of the newspaper correspondent, Heywood Broun, blue woolen clothing left over from the Spanish American War was being worn by African American stevedore regiments in the base port of France where he disembarked from a troopship in the summer of 1917:

 

The French were also interested in a company of American negroes specially recruited for stevedore service. The negroes had been outfitted with old cavalry overcoats of a period shortly after the Civil War. They were blue coats with gold buttons and the lining was a tasteful but hardly somber shade of crimson.

 

With General Pershing and the American Forces, Heywood Broun, 1918, page 19

To augment the Army’s woefully inadequate supplies of woolen service coats, based on surviving examples, it appears that leftover supplies of 1909 Service Coats were upgraded to the 1911 specifications by having their “standing and rolling” collars removed and replaced with a 1911 style “standing” collar.

 

Photo No. 08: In this before and after comparison of the regulation 1909 Service Coat, which called for four collar discs on the collar (left) and a modified 1909/11 Hybrid Service Coat (right), it is obvious that the body of the coat and its sleeves are nearly identical, while the collars are completely different.

 

Left hand photo courtesy of the Dragoon collection

Right hand photo courtesy of the Aurel collection

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Photo No. 09: This photo clearly shows a 1909 style service coat with choke bellows pockets and a 1911 style standing collar. On all of the modified coats that I have seen the collar conversions looked to have been professionally done. It is not known whether the coats were converted at the factories where they were made or if they were modified at an Army clothing depot or if the work was done by regimental or company tailors. Nevertheless, the woolen material used to fashion the new collar was in most instances, was a close but not an exact match, and the majority of coats seem to have a contract date of 1909, as does the contract label in the inset, which hails from a different 1909/11hybrid service coat than the one depicted above.

 

Left hand photo courtesy of the National World War I Museum

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1917 Service Coat

Specification No. 1268, adopted on August 26, 1917

Superseded by Specification No.1285 on December 4, 1917

After America had entered the European War on April 2, 1917, the Army’s need for olive drab service coats grew, and grew, and grew as more, and more, and more recruits and volunteers flooded into the training camps.

 

In order to meet the ever increasing demand for woolen service coats, and to help speed up production, new specifications for a slightly simplified version of the 1911 Service Coat were adopted some four months after America declared war on Imperial Germany.

 

The cut of the 1917 Service Coat was described thusly in a post war report whose topic was concerned with the durability of the articles of clothing that were worn by the first members of the AEF:

 

Because of the necessity for conserving wool to the greatest extent possible, our uniform coats during the World War were cut on patterns, which though they did not depart materially from the formal general cut of the coat, were made on economical lines.

 

The Medical Service of the United States Army in the World War, 1926, page 620

The most obvious difference to the 1917 Service Coat was that it was now made from a heavier 16 ounce to the yard olive drab melton wool material. The only noticeable external change to its style was that the cuff on each sleeve now had only one row of stitching near its bottom edge instead of two.

Minor styling variations can be found on the 1917 pattern service coats. This however, can largely be attributed to the many different contractors that were involved in their fabrication.

 

In addition, the increased consumption of wool needed to fulfill the demand for woolen clothing made it necessary for the Quartermaster Corps to relax the rigid standards that it had rigorously been maintained prior to 1917. Beginning in the summer of 1917, lower grades of wool were combined with finer grades, with varying degrees of success, in order to maintain the necessary weight and warmth required by the revised 1917 specifications. The result of the sub-standard wool and premium wool mixtures was that the pre-war service coat’s fineness of texture and appearance had been replaced by a coat whose texture was rough and whose color was all too often uneven.

 

Photo No. 10: Although this 1917 Service Coat has been made from a coarser, lower grade of wool, and despite the fact that its contract label bears Specification No. 1268, it has clearly been made in the older 1911 style as its sleeves both bear two rows of stitching around each cuff.

 

Its contract date of December 1917 reveals that that this coat was manufactured on the cusp of the change from Specification No. 1160 to Specification No. 1268. This explains why it was made from the heavier and coarser weight of wool that was called for in the new specifications. But it was in all likelihood made to the pattern of the technically now obsolete 1911 Service Coat, because the contractor was probably still awaiting the arrival of the new patterns and instructions for the newly minted 1917 Service Coat.

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Photo No. 11: The inset is a close up view of the contract label from the above 1911/17 Service Coat. Next to it is a Doughboy wearing a proper 1917 Pattern Service Coat with the specified single row of stitching near the bottom edge of each sleeve.

 

Doughboy photo courtesy of the John Adam-Graf collection

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1917 Service Coat

Specification No. 1285, adopted on December 4, 1917

Superseded by Specification No.1356 on August 28, 1918

Specifications for the 1917 Service Coat were revised in December of 1917. The only change that was made to this specification was that a cheaper mercerized cotton thread was substituted for the more expensive silk thread that had been called for in all the previous service coat specifications. Otherwise, in every other respect, the Specification No. 1285 Service Coat was identical to that of the Specification No. 1268 Service Coat.

 

Photo No. 12: This 1917 Service Coat’s contract label proclaimed that it is of the Specification No. 1285 variety, which had been assembled with mercerized cotton thread. Note the single row of stitching on the lower cuff of each sleeve.

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Photo No. 13: The inset shown here is of the contract label from the above coat. It displays the manufacture, contract number, contract date and the specification number of the garment. The background photo is of a Doughboy wearing one of the two U.S. made patterns of the 1917 Service Coat, as identified by the single row of stitching seen just above the bottom edge of each cuff. Note that he also appears to be wearing a camouflage painted helmet … or perhaps it’s just a photographers’ studio prop?

 

Doughboy photo courtesy of the John Adam-Graf collection

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1917 “Rough Cut” Service Coat

No known specification number

Its estimated time of adoption was the summer of 1917

This pattern of coat appears to have been in service on a limited scale until the end of the war

No Quartermaster specifications for the so called 1917 “Rough Cut” Service Coat have been located. However, a number of examples have been found with contract labels that have no specification numbers, two labels however, have surfaced bearing very curios specification numbers. They were:

 

  • Specification No. 1160 for the second pattern 1911 Service Coat
  • Specification No. 1176 for the 1913 pattern enlisted men’s Overcoat

 

The earliest known contract for the Rough Cut coat was dated July 19, 1917 (Frankel Bros.) and the latest was dated February 8, 1918 (Nathan A. Fischer Co.). Those dates give us an approximate time frame in which the Rough Cut service coat may have been fabricated … give or take a month or two. It does not however, explain the use of specification numbers that had been assigned to an obsolete service coat and to the pattern of enlisted men’s overcoat that was issued at the time when America declared war … but more about that later.

 

Although there is no proof available, evidence suggests that the 1917 Rough Cut Service Coat may have been the result of an undocumented emergency measure that was enacted sometime during the summer of 1917, when military clothing of all types was scarce.

 

Based on the available circumstantial evidence (which isn’t very much), I’ve come to the conclusion that because the Army urgently needed service coats, the Quartermaster Corps authorized the manufacturer’s who were initially contracted to make overcoats to temporarily produce service coats instead.

 

 

Regardless of the when and why, Quartermaster clothing inspectors certainly allowed the Rough Cut coats to pass inspection despite their many irregularities!

 

 

 

1. The fact that all of the Rough Cut coats were produced from a very heavy weight of woolen fabric that was at least equal to the 30 ounce to the yard olive drab melton wool that was called for in the 1913 dated Overcoat Specification No. 1176.

 

2. Coincidentally Specification No. 1176 just so happened to appear on one of the Rough Cut coat’s contract labels.

 

3. A number of contract labels found on the Rough Cut coat names Frankel Bros. as the contractor. I suspect that Frankel Bros. were originally contracted to fabricate overcoats.

 

4. All of the coats were unlined; they were likely made that way because the weight of the woolen fabric was already of sufficient warmth.

 

5. All of the seams were not turned under and sewn as required by all previous service coat specifications. This was likely because the weight of the wool prevented the material from being turned under or because it was determined, if they were turned under, that the finished product appeared too bulky or clumsy. Therefore, that specification was likely waived.

 

Photo No. 14: Two examples of the 1917 Rough Cut Service Coat made from a very heavy weight of wool are shown here. Construction-wise their external appearance is similar to other more conventional 1917 Service Coats. It is only the presence of the raw unfinished hems and their bulky nature that identifies them as being “Rough Cut”.

 

Left hand photo courtesy of the New Romantic collection

Right hand photo courtesy of the ChaseUSA11B collection

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Photo No. 15: The basic characteristics of the Rough Cut Service Coat, which was also sometimes referred to as “Blanket Cut”, because it was fabricated from such a heavy weight of woolen material are:

 

  • The unusually heavy weight of the woolen material.
  • The coat was unlined.
  • Every seam except that of the collar and cuffs was not turned under before sewing, which gave the unfinished edges of the coat a ragged and slightly frayed appearance.
  • Many examples have an unusually thick welt or seam where the sleeve joins the body of the coat.
  • Many examples have much rounder lower pocket bottoms, which were also often found on the 1917 pattern overcoat with a shawl collar.

 

Left hand photo courtesy of the John Adam-Graf collection

Insets courtesy of the ChaseUSA11B collection

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Photo No. 16: The Rough Cut coats interior however, is very different from the regulation pattern of the 1917 Service Coat. This example has been faced around the collar and at the pocket tops with olive drab luster serge material, which was the Army’s standard overcoat and service coat lining. It also bears a contract label dated September of 1917. That coat’s label at center, is flanked by two others, one of which bears the 1913 pattern overcoat Specification No. 1176

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Photo No. 17: Two images of Doughboys wearing what appears to be the 1917 Rough Cut Service Coat.

 

Photos courtesy of the John Adam-Graf collection

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1917 British Contract Service Coat

No known specification number

Its estimated time of adoption was the summer or autumn of 1917

This pattern of coat appears to have been in service on a limited scale until the end of the war

Because of the delays in obtaining woolen clothing from America, it became necessary for the AEF to place orders abroad for various articles of clothing that were urgently needed.

 

At the time of posting, no information as to when this practice actually began has made itself available. However, AEF Quartermaster documents show that by April of 1918 large amounts of clothing of all types had been ordered from both France and Great Britain, including 1,440,000 British manufactured “tunics” made from English tartan drab No. 5 woolen cloth. One does not to stretch one’s imagination too far to presume that the above figure may have represented the purchase of 1917 British Contract Service Coats, as the same document had already mentioned that 100,000 “suits of British uniform clothing”* had been purchased.

 

*The “suits of British uniform clothing” were very likely the 1907 Pattern Service Jacket and Trousers that were regulation issue to the British Tommy. It has been well documented that the AEF purchased and issued British uniforms to American Doughboys during the winter of 1917- 1918 and beyond when there were not enough regulation U.S. Army garments available in France. Since the “British manufactured tunics were listed as a separate line item, it is believed that that the “tunics” were in fact, 1917 British Contract Service Coats.

 

Externally, the 1917 British Contract Service Coats closely followed the pattern of their U.S. made counterpart. However, all of the British contract service coats were made from a coarser grade of woolen material; they were unlined and many featured a double row of stitching around their lower sleeves. That stitching was merely a coincidence; it is in no way connected to the 1911 pattern service coat. A closer look at the British contract sleeve stitching actually reveals that there were three rows of stitching, one near the lower edge of the sleeve and two more above that.

 

Photo No. 18: Both of these service coats are nearly identical examples of the 1917 British contract Service Coat.

 

Left hand photo courtesy of Bay State Militaria.com

Right hand photo courtesy of the New Romantic collection

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Photo No. 19: The interior of the 1917 British Contract Service Coats were vastly different from those that were made in the U.S. As mentioned they were unlined, but they did have facings and an interior pocket made from a cotton twill fabric. The coat’s internal chest pocket was designed to hold a British style field dressing. In addition, all British made garments were stamped in black ink with the initials ‘W’ & ‘D’ and the broad arrow symbol of the British War Department, along with a number that presumably represented either a contract or a contractor. A linen card stock label bearing the coat’s manufacturer, date and size was also sewn onto the interior, but this tag almost always disintegrated after being laundered once or twice.

 

Photos courtesy of Bay State Militaria.com

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1918 “New Model” Service Coat

Specification No. 1356, adopted on August 28, 1918

This pattern of coat appears to have been in service on a limited scale at least until the end of the Occupation of Germany

In January of 1918 a board of AEF officers met to discuss changes that were to be made to the service dress that had been worn by the first contingent of AEF personnel that had arrived in France six months earlier in June of 1917.

 

During the French winter of 1917 – 1918, which had been one of the severest on record, a number of faults in respect to the garb that Uncle Sam had issued the Doughboys came to light. The primary shortcoming of the first pattern 1917 Service Coat was explained in the board’s findings:

 

The woolen coat which was issued in 1917 was made of a 16-ounce melton, with a luster serge body lining and a Silesia lining for the sleeves.* In the winter of 1917-18 the weight of the coat proved to be too light for comfort, and in January 1918, the chief quartermaster recommended that the cloth be made of a 20-ounce melton. The serge lining of the coat was not desirable in active service in the American Expeditionary Forces, and it was recommended that the lining of both body and sleeves should be substituted by thoroughly shrunken cotton drilling of an olive drab-color and an 8-ounce or 10-ounce weight.

 

The Medical Service of the United States Army in the World War, 1926, page 620

*The Silesia lining mentioned above was a smooth twilled cotton fabric that was in most cases striped. It is sometimes referred to as “bed ticking”, because it resembled the striped ticking fabric that was used to make pillows and mattresses.

 

In addition, the 1917 Service Dress did not meet with General Pershing’s overall approval, especially after he’d seen the smartly dressed troops of Europe. The recent findings of the AEF’s uniform board provided Pershing with just the opportunity he needed to create a smarter, more tailored service coat for the enlisted men of the AEF.

 

In addition to being made from a heavier weight of woolen material and having an olive drab cotton drill lining instead of the previously used luster serge lining, the 1918 Service Coat, which was labeled as the “United States Army Model”, and sometimes called the “Pershing Coat” because of the commander in chief’s hand in its design, was:

 

  • Made more form fitting in order to give the wearer a slimmer appearance.
  • The underside of the shoulder straps was now faced with cotton instead of wool.
  • The four patch pockets were eliminated and replaced with four “cut in” pockets. Thus effectively eliminating the unsightly bulges that had so offended Pershing’s sense of military spit and polish when those pockets happened to be filled with an assortment of articles.

 

When all was said and done, it was claimed that each of the overhauled service coats saved two-thirds of a yard of wool and the American taxpayers $1.68 per garment without any sacrifice being made to either warmth or comfort.

 

The War Department agreed to both Pershing’s tinkering, as well as the uniform board’s findings, and specifications for the 1918 Service Coat were issued in the summer of 1918.

 

Photo No. 20: The streamlined 1918 Service coat at left is worn by a Doughboy serving with the 3rd Army in Germany circa 1919. At right is an example of the U.S. made late war service coat bearing the shoulder insignia of the Tank Corps.

 

Left hand photo courtesy of the John Adam-Graf collection

Right hand photo courtesy of Advance Guard Militaria.com

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Photo No. 21: The inset at top is of the olive drab luster serge wool material that had been used as the lining for all of the earlier service coat specifications mentioned in this topic. It had a shiny appearance similar to a satin-like fabric. For this reason, it is often erroneously described as “polished cotton”, which it was not, as it was a woolen fabric. Underneath is the new olive drab cotton twill material that replaced the luster serge as the lining on the 1918 Service Coat. The lowest inset if of the striped cotton Silesia lining that was used to line only the sleeves on all previous pattern service coats. It too was replaced by the cotton twill lining on the U.S. made 1918 Service Coat.

 

The Doughboy behind the linings is wearing the U.S. made 1918 Service Coat. The U.S. made 1918 Service Coat is easily identified from its British made counterpart by the prominent right and left hand seams that run diagonally from the waist at each side, up to just beneath the collar discs.

 

Doughboy photo courtesy of the John Adam-Graf collection

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1918 British Contract Service Coat

No known specification number

Its estimated time of adoption was the spring or summer of 1918

This pattern of coat appears to have been in service on a limited scale at least until the end of the Occupation of Germany

British clothing manufacturers were also contracted to fabricate the new U.S. Army Model 1918 Service Coat. The British contract coat differed significantly from their American made cousin. A British contract coat can be distinguished from those of American manufacture by the fact that they were cut and sewn to a slightly different pattern and because they were unlined.

The most obvious external differences were:

 

  • An extra row of stitching above each pocket flap.
  • Two additional vertical rows of stitching, one on either side of the coat’s front that was parallel with the inside edge of the pockets, running the length of the coat from the bottom of the collar to the bottom of the coat.
  • The coat also lacked the prominent diagonal seam on either side of its front which was found on the American made service coat.

 

Photo No. 22: Here a 1918 British Contract Coat is worn by a 1st Division Doughboy circa 1919. At right is a diagram created by forum member Gil Sanow, which depicts the British contract coat’s stitching and seam pattern.

 

Left hand photo courtesy of the John Adam-Graf collection

Right hand photo courtesy of Gil Sanow

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Photo No. 23: A larger shot of a British made 1918 pattern service coat and the British War Department acceptance stamp found on its interior.

 

Photos courtesy of Bay State Militaria.com

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Photo No. 24: Comparison of a U.S. made 1918 Service Coat (left) with that of a British made 1918 Service Coat (right). The arrows point out the prominent seam on the American made 1918 Service Coat, as well as the additional row of stitching just above the pockets on the English made 1918 Service Coat.

 

Photos courtesy of the John Adam-Graf collection

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Miscellaneous Service Coat Details

Photo No. 25: three types of buttons were used on the service coats whose specifications appear in this topic. From left to right they are:

 

  • The rimless 1902 pattern regulation bronze button that was used from 1902 to approximately 1912.
  • The rimmed 1912 pattern regulation bronze button that was used from 1912 through to the occupation of Germany in 1919 and beyond.
  • The wartime 1918 vegetable ivory regulation button, which was authorized for use on service coats in order to conserve metal and because it was found that fragments of metal buttons sometimes caused wounds received on the battlefield to become infected.

 

In general, the rimless bronze buttons were used on early pattern service coats up to and including the 1912 specification of the 1911 Service Coat. The rimmed bronze buttons are found on the majority of 1917 and 1918 dated service coats, while the vegetable ivory buttons are found less frequently, but they appear on every pattern of service coat that was produced during the Great War. Because the buttons were reused and could easily be transferred from one coat to another, it is not unusual for a service coat, regardless of its specification date, to bear any of the three types of buttons.

 

Under the buttons is the basic cuff configuration found on the service coats mentioned in this post. From left to right:1909 Service Coat (pointed), 1911 Service Coat (two parallel lines), 1917 Service Coat (one line), 1918 U.S. made Service Coat (one line), 1918 British made Service Coat (one line that is slightly higher).

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