“Air walker” badge

Most of the cap badges anyone could buy. This must have been especially the case with patriotic badges. It is less likely that for example the beautiful enamel badge of the 1st Hussar Regiment would have been pinned on by civilians. Of course, we know that many badges were bought not just for wearing, but also for collection already during the war. Moreover, the first badge auctions took place, as we learned from a Dutch auction catalog from 1917.

Of course, wearing the badges is a different issue. Nevertheless, not only the insignia of the units appear on the soldier’s caps either. In addition to monarch portraits and patriotic insignia, we can see in wearing photos front, Christmas insignia and many other badges which were not specifically related to any troop. The current post shows an “air walker” badge. More precisely, not even one of the insignia typical of the air force, since there is no relevant inscription on it. This small badge depicts an aerial vehicle, an airplane.

Several types of insignia depicting airplanes were made. Sometimes specific type of machine can be recognized quite well. Thus, for example, the famous experimental flying structure of Bleriot or Etrich’s Taube can be easily recognized on badges. This wearing photo apparently shows a wartime construction, a single-seat fighter. I did not recognize the model, the representation seems overly stylized to me. The propeller, for example, is definitely oversized. Photos depicting the wearing of the 4-5 types of aircraft insignia are very rare. Returning to the wearing, since there is no airborne troop marking badge on the collar of the soldier, it is almost certain that it belongs to a different troop, yet he wears this aircraft insignia.