Pickelhaube: German Infantry Attacks, 1914 (XX0108)

The Pickelhaube Goes to War — German Infantry in the Advance of 1914

These men are running through open summer grass in extended order, packs on their backs, an officer with drawn sword out in front, the regimental number 9 painted on their helmet covers. It is the opening campaign of the First World War, and this is the last moment in which a European army would attack looking like this.

The helmet that gave the war its first image

The Pickelhaube — the spiked leather helmet introduced in Prussia in 1842 — was never designed to stop anything. Its spike had a ceremonial and visual purpose, its boiled-leather shell offered almost no protection against shrapnel, and in the field it was covered by a cloth Überzug carrying the regimental number, exactly as shown here, to reduce visibility. By 1916 it was replaced entirely by the steel Stahlhelm. The Pickelhaube is therefore a precise dating device: an infantryman wearing one is a soldier of the first two years of the war.

Field grey, and the end of colour

Germany adopted feldgrau in 1910, ahead of most of its rivals — the French infantry still went to war in 1914 in red trousers. The change was driven by the range and accuracy of magazine rifles and machine guns, which made conspicuous uniforms lethal. Even so, the red piping visible on collars and trouser seams survived into the field uniform: the transition to genuine camouflage was gradual, and 1914 caught the German army halfway through it.

The Gewehr 98 and its bayonet

The bolt-action Gewehr 98, chambered for the 7.92 mm cartridge, was among the finest military rifles of its generation — accurate, robust and effective well beyond the ranges at which most infantry combat actually occurred. Its long barrel and fixed bayonet made it unwieldy in the trenches that were about to appear, which is why the shorter Kar98 eventually superseded it. The soldiers here still carry it as designed, for the open-field battle their doctrine expected.

An officer leading with a sword

The sword raised at the centre of the composition is not a weapon in any practical sense by 1914; it is a signalling device and a mark of rank, visible above the heads of running men. It also made its holder unmistakable to enemy marksmen. German officer casualties in the first months of the war were disproportionately heavy, and the practice of leading visibly from the front was abandoned within a year.

Six weeks that set the shape of the war

The advance through Belgium and northern France in August 1914 covered enormous distances on foot in summer heat, outrunning its own supply lines and railheads. When the advance was halted on the Marne in September and both sides began to entrench, the war of movement these men were trained for ended — and the conditions that would define the next four years began.