Huguenin pilot wings.

[Kilroy56]

Dear Forum, 

I have been fortunate to recently acquire these Swiss made pilot wings.

I understand they are not commonly seen...

[manayunkman]

Never seen this before.

 

Thanks for posting.

[Kilroy56]

https://www.ww2wings.com/wings/usaaf/pilot/pbhug.shtml

[rathbonemuseum.com]

Great find and yes, uncommon maker for US wings. If you search the wings section for the maker Huguenin, you will see that they made other ratings as well and there are some biographical examples that US airmen acquired while interred after crash landing in Switzerland.

[Kilroy56]

Thanks a lot for the tip.

I have of course browsed the Forum wing section and read the mentioned posts with the greatest interest. 

[pfrost]

Those are some great wings, although I have always considered them from the post-war/Cold War era (at least this version of the pilot wing). During the war, the ~1500 aircrew who ended up in Switzerland were not allowed to wander the countryside; they were generally carefully locked away (in a variety of internment camps) for the duration. There are some interesting stories about the relatively poor treatment Allied airmen received at the hands of the Swiss at the Wauwilermoos Internment camp (for example (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wauwilermoos_internment_camp)). Although this was a penal camp, the Swiss were VERY diligent about protecting their neutrality, and the act of trying to escape from Switzerland could land you in deep trouble and the penal colony.  I also understand that the belligerents were kept well away from each other--I doubt that they would have let German and US/UK internees mix and mingle. However, I have read that the Swiss shared a somewhat more cozy relationship with the Germans (historically, militarily, culturally, language, and geographic locality)--especially with some questionable banking practices between the Swiss and Nazi's thrown in!

 

The Swiss frequently tried to shoot down Axis and Allied airplanes that strayed into Swiss airspace, and if they caught you, you were there for the duration of the war.  Switzerland, caught between the two warring sides, was also somewhat struggling economically.  I doubt that even if they could step out on the town (even for a beer), they had the resources to buy "frivolous" stuff. My deep belief is that IF they were given an opportunity, they would buy food, not pilot wings.

 

For those reasons, I suspect many of the Swiss-made insignia that you see were actually picked up by guys stationed in and around Germany during the post-war occupation and not from WWII guests of the Swiss. Assman, for example, made USAF wings for occupation forces, and Assman wings look similar to these, with the "pelican beak" pattern.  I also believe that Huguenin was located close to the French border in the Western part of Switzerland. Certainly, Huguenin-made watches seem to have been available to other countries during (and likely before and after) the war, including Allied airmen.  So maybe I am wrong.  But...

 

Still, that is a pretty cool and rare wing.

Thank you for sharing.

[Kilroy56]

Patrick is correct as ever.

 

 

Wauwilermoos  was indeed a miltary prison. Airmen who tried to escape or broke rules were sent there. Conditions were harsh : cold and dirty cells , insufficient food , isolation and abuse.

But  most of the 1742 aircrew who ended up in Switzerland  were sent to relatively decent camps like those in Davos or Adelboden where  conditions were similar to civlian internment : decent housing , organized activities and even a bit of freedom of movement.

 

 

Dating aviation badges manufactured by Huguenin is not easy. The company went bankrupt in 2022 and permanently closed its doors . A large part of the tooling , dies and stamples were acquired by the "musée d'art et d'histoire de Neuchatel ". Unfortunately to this day , in spite of the curators'  efforts  nothing related to US aviation wings has surfaced.

Anyway , it seems that  production was limited as these Swiss made wings are rarely found , making them desirable items.