To my utter surprise, the small piece “What drove pith helmets extinct” has generated quite the reaction. It means that pith helmets are still lurking in our collective mind. To this day, they remain bipolar symbols of adventure/oppression and discovery/exploitation. Let me take you through the 4 examples I own.
If you want to go deeper, the Wikipedia page is a good springboard to plunge in the intricacies of designs, periods and usage. In over a century, pith helmets came in any colour, material, shape or form, united by a few basic components. They had any nationality, from Malagasy to American.
The following 4 pith helmets speak of a period. They are symbols. That makes them instantly recognisable.
Boer War era pith helmet
This pith helmet is a classic shape, widespread by the end of the 19th century, a replica from the Boer War era. I bought it at a Comic-Con on a steampunk display. Adventure. The original design was a riff on the classical (wider) colonial pith helmet, originally in white to reflect the sun better. It has a narrow edge, possibly to allow better side to side head motion and cut dead angles, when sabres and mass melee combat were still a thing.
The Boer War helmet started seeing use for the Anglo-Zulu war, until the turn of the century, hence it’s colloquial denomination. It is also often referenced as the Kitchener design, confirming its unmistakable Victorian flair.
This colour scheme, now universally known as khaki, has an interesting story on its own. Khaki was generalised as a standard military colour towards the end of the Anglo-Zulu wars, when soldiers systematically dipped their helmets in muddy water, either to use the primary of the helmet as a portable aircon, or to make it less visible in the distance than white. A chance side-effect or a deliberate camouflage? We will never know for sure, but it illustrates perfectly the intended operation of these helmets: dipping the dome in water, and letting the air in to dry, thus naturally cool off the soldier. At any rate, how best to sketch a classical 19th century adventurer, than to pair this helmet with facetted aviator goggles, an ammunition bandoleer and a khaki outfit?
Wolseley pattern pith helmet
The next design is again basically military. The Wolseley Pattern pith helmet was the official 1930s British military colonial helmet, standard dotation for all tropical units. That included as well the famous 8th Army, the Desert Rats of Montgomery, who fought back the Afrika Korps of Rommel from Egypt to Tunisia.
This piece is special, coming straight from a 8th Army backpack, and given as a gift for lodging in Ghent in 1944.
This classic shape is as evocative as the Kitchener, but says more Tarzan-Weissmuller than Allan Quatermain. We are not that long ago anymore. The design, and how I got it, speaks volumes about the slow obsolescence of the pith helmet after the 1940s. Armies and civilians moved to the more practical slouch hats, such as used by the Australians, already worn in the Burmese jungles. It had proven to be quite sufficient against the sun. Even for Europeans.
Pith helmets moved on from solution to symbol in the military, remaining to this day in certain units as a symbol of exotic postings. The armies had started in WWI ditching folklore outfits and colours for rusticity and practicality. Parade ground was parade ground, and fighting did not need close-order and drill marching anymore. Then design went. Exit combat jacket, copper buttons, and leather straps. In with battledresses, zippers and fabric pouches.
And so the Wolseley pattern helmet, like the Kitchener before it, was shelved in traditions and military folklore, like fourragère, sabres and other ceremonial daggers.
French colonial pattern pith helmet
The French colonial pattern helmet is the mainstay of the French colonial design. Its design may slightly vary in bulk, thickness and slope of the done, from round to squarish.
This one is a replica I bought at a weapons’ fair. The specific shape has special memories for me, both from my family, my father, and French history. It is the occasion, as well, to delve some more into its history and symbolism.
The French were apparently among the first to use this specific, wider design, adapted from a local Filipino hat, the salakot. They deployed it in 1878, especially in South East Asia. Further than a formal uniform, it became a uniform and a symbol: this French pith helmet was the colonial helmet. The word salakot does exist in French. That is the official designation, no-one ever uses it.
You may think it is a fit of honesty, but French people will call it simply “colonial helmet”, whichever size, shape, colour or function, military or colonial. It may not be the same universal symbols the English have, but blame that on the Victorian Empire.
Vietnamese BoDoi (soldier) helmet
Ever further that the other 3 designs, this design speaks to anyone. The Vietnamese BoDoi helmet is the standard military Vietnamese Army helmet, worn by the NVA, North Vietnamese Army, before re-unification in 1975. You may have seen it in news reels, veteran souvenirs brought back from Khe Sanh, bought at Tan Son Nhut airport, or worn by the Vietnamese Army today. Maybe you saw it in a Chuck Norris MIA movies, or other Vietnam War movies, like We Were Soldiers Once. Its shape is still a common sight on worksites in Hanoi.
Rattan versus steel. BoDoi Vietnamese helmet versus M1 American helmet. Ingenuity, rusticity and frugality against industry, technology and money.
Tried and tested in some of the toughest terrains in the world, the Vietnamese pith helmet has all the traditional features we come to expect: a rattan/pith underlayer, deep kaki or light green cloth covering, a folded cloth headband, a leather interior sweatband, side holes and a ventilation cup on top. Hey come as well in plastic and metal versions for worksites as far as I saw them in the street.
This one has a special place in my personal story. It was brought back from Vietnam by my father in 1979. It had been gifted to him by an official in Bien Hoa, HCMC, while working on the Tan Mai paper mill. That factory, these local engineers, these people, that country, they would forever be the climax of my father’s career. He would go on repeating the story, the memories, … French was already hardly spoken anymore, and yet they had kept that design on purpose: they were the masters in their own country now. He witnessed first-hand that passion, energy and dedication to reconstruction. He never forgot and would always travel back with extra suitcases of medications (and jeans). When he handed this helmet to me, it was like passing on a crown. That is another story.
Colonial, tropical, pith helmets are symbols beyond their stated function. They say, they show, they sound colonial. Pith helmets are oppression, suppression, exploitation, and more. They are.
But pith helmets are also shapes that bring up, to me, as much the Mekong delta than the Katanga savannah.
The pith helmet. A design for the ages.
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