Rare WWI US Army Personal Body Armor Breastplate

An example of the attempt to develop personal body armor for the combat soldiers of the American Expeditionary Force. This is a multi-piece breastplate that was designed to provide armor protection to the wearer from the upper shoulders down to the groin. The armor retains French horizon blue paint over its US issue green paint. The armor plate is approximately 30 inches long in overall length. The armor is comprised of four separate plates which run from the upper chest to the groin. The top plate is designed with backward=directed arcs which loop over the wearer’s shoulders for wear. This was a modification from an earlier design that was nearly identical except that it did not have the integral shoulder harness on the top plate but, instead, it had been designed to be fastened to a back plate by over-the-shoulder leather straps. The top three plates on this torso armor are connected in the back by a leather strap which runs down each side of the interior and which is riveted to the plates. As a result of both use and age, that leather connecting strap on the interior right side has torn through between the top plate and the second plate. Additionally, this same strap has detached from the fastening rivets that connected it to the third plate. Therefore the three upper most plates are entirely connected together only on the left side. Furthermore the groin plate was held to the third torso plate by two sets of leather cords riveted to the plate. Three of the four rivets remain in the groin plate but the leather cords have deteriorated with time and are gone. The rear rubber padding has deteriorated with age.