A short history of camouflage uniforms

Copyright Henrik Clausen 2003

The purpose of this text is just to make a short overview of the history of camouflage uniforms.

The beginning

I'm sure camouflage or "low-visibility" clothing has been used throughout history one way and another, but if you look at the armies around 1900 most wore very colourful uniforms. The British were beginning to dye their uniforms khaki during war.

World War 1

The First World War began with for example French troops wearing blue coats and red trousers... But when the trench warfare began this quickly changed and all major armies adopted low visibility uniforms.

Most armies began getting interested in camouflage - the US Army formed the "Camouflage Corps" (A Company of 40th Engineers) where artists worked on camouflage concepts. The American painter Abbott Thayer who had studied nature's own camouflage a lot was loosely connected with this unit.

Marc Connelly writes the following account in his book "The Most of John Held Jr.":

When we entered World War I in April, 1917 (Ernest) Haskell was commissioned to help develop the new science of camouflage. I remember the astonishment of John, Hal (Burrows) and myself one day that summer when Haskell, on leave, told us the remarkable achievements of the Camouflage Corps.
"We can paint battleships in such a way that at sea they seem invisible a mile away, or even less. We're also devising camouflage of artillery concealment and even uniforms. Come over to my flat and I'll show you a raincoat a Heinie can't recognize two hundred yards away.
Haskell left his living room a moment and reappeared wearing a doughboy helmet and raincoat, both painted with a dadaistic confusion of reds, greens, yellows, blues, and browns. He stood about 6'2" and now gave the appearance of a nightmarish Pierrot. While the rest of us stared at his weird appearance, John stretched out his hands like a man groping in the dark
"My God!' John cried, "Where's Ernie?" (Source: http://www.bpib.com/illustrat/johnheld.html)

The Americans didn't enter WW1 until 1917 so the other warring parties had similar units by then. The French formed in 1915 their "Service de Camouflage" and the British Camouflage Service was formed in 1916 as part of Royal Engineers. No camouflage uniforms saw any substantial use and the artists of the mentioned units were primarily used for hiding postions from aerial reconnaisance etc.

The French soldier (and painter) Louis Guingot creates the first camouflage uniforms that are produced by "Magasins Réunis" in Nancy. Apperently only 5 were produced - the pattern was called "Léopard" (a photo of his design can be viewed here: http://www.ec-lorraine.com/ginguot/camouf/guincam.html)

Between the World Wars

The Italians introduced their famous pattern in 1929. It was first used for tents etc. but from 1937 paratrooper smocks were produced in this pattern.

The German Army began producing their camouflage ponchos in "Heeres Splittermuster 31" in 1931, and Waffen-SS began experiments with camouflage uniforms. In 1938 a patent was obtained for helmet cover, pullover smock and face mask. Most (if not all) Waffen-SS patterns were developed by Professor Otto Schick - these designs were based on his studies of sunlight through trees.

Hungary introduced its first official camouflage in 1938 - it was based on the Italian 1929-pattern.

World War 2

The Germans began as mentioned above developing camouflage patterns before WW2 and during the war they introduced a long range of different patterns (as well as used eg. Italian camouflage). Many of these patterns have been copied and used after the War by a large number of countries.

The Allies did also develop camouflage uniforms. The Americans developed the "duck hunter" spotted camouflage and the British the Denison smock (which in the beginning was handpainted - but later screenprinting was used)

Post World War 2

Many camouflage patterns were used in the WW2, but after the War the numbers in use exploded! Many countries introduced patterns that were based on those used by the Germans or Allies. A number of Eastern Bloc countries introduced copies of German "rain drop" patterns (Czechoslovakia did already have a large military industry running and used German tanks, fighters etc. after the War).

The American ERDL (US Army Engineer Research & Development Laboratory) developed the leaf pattern which in 1981 became the woodland pattern (enlarged). The leaf pattern was heavily used by US troops in Vietnam after 1967.

The French made the "horizontal lizzard" and the Portuguese the "vertical lizzard" - I assume they are based on the brushstroke patterns of the Denison smock and similar uniforms. Apparently the French lizzard was in Southeast Asia developed into the "tiger stripe" pattern that are still very popular with many Asian armies but is also very much associated with US Special Forces ("Green Berets") in Vietnam.

The US woodland pattern (and the ERDL leaf pattern) is a very widespread pattern today - another is the British DPM (Disruptive Pattern Material) developed by Army Personnel Research Establishment (APRE) and first taken into wide-spread use around 1970. You'll meet these patterns in a lot of countries - either as original items, copies or as the basis for local patterns.

During the mid-70ies the German "Flecktarn" ("spot camouflage") was developed - and this pattern has been adopted by a number of countries: Belgium (Air Force commandos), Denmark, Germany and Japan. France did test the pattern but it was rejected - so did the Dutch Army.

Another pattern very popular these days is the "pixel patterns" (like CADPAT and MARPAT). You can to some degree argue that they are like the Flecktarn-pattern - just with smaller dots ("pixels") - and at some distance they are hard to tell apart.