Picked up this private purchased plate carrier from a navy sarc corpsman. I believe the proper name for the vest is the tactical assault gear hard plate carrier. He purchased it over 10 years ago and used it as a training vest. He personally wore this vest during the special operations training pipeline to become a navy sarc corpsman. He wore it for 3 years during his training, he spray painted it during the end of his training. Believe it or not this carrier was originally coyote tan not coyote brown. After 3 years of training it turned into a coyote brown color. The mag pouches are Blackhawk double mag pouches that hold 2 m4 mags in each pouch so a total of 8 mags. The ifak pouch is S.O.Tech and the radio pouch is tag. The 2 double mag pouches and the ifak pouch have been spray painted along with the vest. The radio pouch looks almost new must have been added later. I won't say his name, but he 1st served with the 3rd Recon battalion then 1st Marine raider battalion. 

That is very nice. I was with 1st squadron 2nd ACR Bindlach Germany a long time ago. 

The Army was woefully short on scabbards in late 1940-41 during the mobilizations process.  They were so short the M1917 bayonet was authorized as a stop gap scabbard.

The evidence you cite of several hundred buttons surviving wasn’t actually published when I wrote my initial article and remains unpublished until you write your post going through the actual examples. What was available was quite sketchy indeed until Bazelon’s book cited above. He had published the Spies’ card in the 70’s but the photo was quite bad at the time. That card to my mind solves the problem and it was a great contribution that new full-color photos came out after I wrote the article, and he has not fortunately asked the site to remove my clips of them. Like I said above, I wouldn’t have written this article at all if the new book had come out earlier, but such accidents are constantly occurring in history, so why not here? Thanks for contributing your knowledge of surviving examples. Often experienced collectors know things that haven’t been published and sometimes the knowledge dies with them.

Will do, Mike. I should’ve studied this further before I signed in I guess. all my extra $ get spent on my 5 decade firearms habit!!😎😄 Recreational gunfire has always been my primary interest, even above American history. Thanks for the heads up.!😀 BTW, how do you go about embedding a YouTube video into the post?  embedded videos avoid the dad gum commercials, which is only getting worse.😡 PTRN

They used them to power lights radios etc... They would dig a hole several feet deep and run them down in the hole. Its a little harder to pinpoint where the noise is coming from that way and protects them from Shrapnel. Ground bursts.

Hi Folks:  Saw this jacket in an American thrift store in Germany and took pictures.  German civilian "US patched" armor jacket.  just wanted to share FYI

People could have anything engraved on a buckle, for a price. Just pay the guy and pick it up later. Get to the Big P.I., order your buckle, grab a couple of beers, a steak, maybe a rub and a tug and pick up your buckle. I've seen a lot of buckles that weren't military themed. Check postings in this thread. Examples; Boy Scouts, Hollywood Stunt Men, other masonic, sailing, monograms, etc., just to name a few. That's the beauty of these buckles.

While this site is primarily about militaria collecting, there is a section dedicated to Historical Discussions.  Scroll down the main page until you find it and try posting there.  That section doesn’t get as much traffic as it should. Try kicking up some dust there and maybe you can get something rolling. Without knowing the history, these relics we collect would be meaningless bits of metal, cloth, or wood.  I for one have been a history buff at least since my early teens, way over 50 years ago (eeeks! that long? I feel old now). I came onto collecting for the thrill, to me, of having small slices of history in hand. So I learn something history related first, then I get a bug to have something that was there.  The artifacts are themselves history in solid form. Unfortunately, lately I’ve been forgetting a little of what was in the old noggin.  I have been to Gettysburg twice. Once with the family that created me, about 1975, and again about 15 years ago with the family I created. Personally, I found all the monuments visually interesting, but they kept getting in the way of my mental picture of what went on there. I much preferred the Antietam battlefield for getting a feel for the history of the place.  I for one am glad you found us here and hope you conclude that joining wasn’t a mistake. You aren’t alone in your interest in the history side of things here.  mikie