In all we developed four models which seemed to have merits recommending their adoption. The first distinctive American helmet was known as model No. 2. The Ford Co. at Detroit pressed about 1,200 of these helmets. The helmet, however, was similar in appearance to the German helmet, and for that reason was disapproved by the American Expeditionary Forces.
Helmet model No. 3 was of a deep-bowl type, but it was rejected when the Hale & Kilburn Co., of Philadelphia, after a great deal of experimentation, found that the helmet was too deep for successful manufacture by pressing.
Model No. 4 was designed by the master armorer of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It was also found too difficult to manufacture.
Helmet No. 5 was strongly recommended by American experts, but was not accepted by the General Staff. It was designed by the armor committee at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in conjunction with the Engineering Division of the Ordnance Department. Hale & Kilburn undertook to manufacture these helmets, which were to be painted, assembled, and packed by the Ford Motor Co. at its Philadelphia plant. Various component parts of the helmet were sublet in experimental quantities to numerous manufacturers.
The No. 5 helmet, complete, weighed 2 pounds, 6½ ounces. It combined the virtues of several types of helmets. It gave a maximum of protection for its weight. It was comparatively easy to produce. This helmet, with slight variations, was later adopted as the standard helmet of the Swiss Army. The latest German helmet, it is interesting to note, was approaching similar lines.
We also produced helmets for special services—one with a visor to protect machine gunners and snipers, and another, known as model 14, for aviators, it being little heavier than the leather helmet which airmen wore in the war and twenty times as strong a defense for the head. A third special helmet, known as model 15, was for operators of tanks. It was provided with a neck guard of padded silk to stop the lead splash which penetrated the turret of the tank. The Ordnance Department turned out 25 of these in 10 days and sent them by courier to France for a test.
The Germans issued body armor only to troops holding exposed positions under heavy machine-gun and rifle fire; but such use was distinctly valuable, as was shown by captured German reports.
The Engineering Division of the Ordnance Department developed a body defense including a light front and body plate, these together weighing 9½ pounds. One lot of 5,000 sets was manufactured by the Hale & Kilburn Corporation. The linings of these plates were of sponge rubber, and they were made by the Miller Rubber Co., of Akron, Ohio. All of these sets were shipped abroad for testing; but the report was not favorable, as the American soldier did not wish to be hampered with armor. He had learned to wear his helmet, but he had yet to be convinced of the practical value of body armor.
We developed a heavy breast plate with thigh guards, weighing 27 pounds, which stopped machine gun bullets at 150 yards. An experimental lot of these were completed in 26 days by the Mullins Manufacturing Co., of Salem, Ohio. These were also shipped abroad for test.
A few defenses for arms and legs were prepared which, although light in weight, would protect the wearer from an automatic-pistol ball at 10 feet. About 70 per cent of the hospital cases in France were casualties caused by wounds in the arms and legs. These defenses, however, were rejected on account of their impeding to a certain degree the movements of the wearer.