An original World War Two US Marine Corps officer’s khaki summer service cap by Berkshire Caps, with the quatrefoil worked across the crown in matching khaki soutache. Khaki cotton cover over a corded khaki band, black leather visor and chin strap, black finished Eagle, Globe and Anchor. Size 7. The plain visor, without gold oak leaf embroidery, places it in company grade configuration.

Khaki was the Marine Corps in hot weather, and hot weather is where the Corps spent the years before Pearl Harbor. The summer service uniform was what officers wore in the Caribbean stations, in the Philippines, at Pearl, and above all in China, where the 4th Marines held the Shanghai International Settlement from 1927 until November 1941 and the Legation Guard stood watch in Peking. Both commands were swept up within days of the war’s opening. The Peking Marines went into Japanese captivity in December 1941, and the 4th Marines, withdrawn to the Philippines, were surrendered on Corregidor in May 1942. When the fighting moved into the Pacific the khakis stayed in service behind the line, worn in the rear areas and on the staffs while dungarees went forward. This is the cap in the photographs from the world that ended in December 1941.

The labels inside are what make it traceable. The crown lining carries the mark of Berkshire Caps, an American commercial hatter whose work turns up on officers’ headgear across the services in this period, printed THE BERKSHIRE, trade mark registered, distinctive in style and construction. Stitched to the frame beside it is a woven certification tag reading GARMENT MFGD. OF U.S.M.C. APPROVED MATERIALS, the maker’s declaration that the cap met Marine Corps standards. That tag is the whole story of officer kit in a sentence. Officers bought their own uniforms on the open market rather than drawing them from stores, so the Corps controlled the cloth and the pattern instead of the purchase, and firms like Berkshire built to that standard and said so on the label. A paper tag on the frame still carries the size, 7.

The construction rewards a close look. The body is a woven cane frame, plainly visible inside, light and open to the air, ventilated further by eyelets in the cover. The visor and chin strap are black leather, the strap secured by two black Marine Corps eagle and anchor buttons. The sweatband is brown vegetable tanned leather, punched in a decorative pattern of graduated holes and finished at the rear with an orange grosgrain bow, straight out of civilian hat making. A faint violet inspection stamp survives on the reverse of the sweatband.

The quatrefoil itself is the oldest thing on the cap. Tradition holds that officers laid rope across their covers so Marine sharpshooters in the rigging would not fire on them from above. The National Museum of the Marine Corps rejects the story on every count, and dates the ornament instead to the late 1850s, when it entered Marine uniform regulations from a French fashion. Marine officers have worn it ever since.

CONDITION AND DETAILS

Size 7 on the maker’s tag, approximately 22 inch / 55.9 cm head circumference
Khaki cotton cover sound and even, light soiling with a small pale mark on the left side of the crown
Quatrefoil complete and secure across the crown
Corded khaki band sound
Black leather visor glossy, with light scuffing to the outer surface, no cracking or delamination
Chin strap present and supple, both eagle and anchor buttons present, keeper intact
Black finished Eagle, Globe and Anchor secure, with wear to bronze on the high points of the globe and the eagle’s wings
Green ventilation eyelets present and clear
Cane frame intact, cap holds its shape
Brown leather sweatband complete and supple, decorative perforation crisp, rear grosgrain bow present
Faint violet stamp on the reverse of the sweatband, not legible
Berkshire Caps lining label present and fully legible
U.S.M.C. approved materials certification tag present, partially rubbed but readable
Paper size and lot tag present on the frame

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