Australian Made WWII A-2

[33-1729]

Notice the Australian Made WWII A-2 has a military styled label "V505 1943", with "V" being a wartime code standing for Victoria as the place of manufacture, pointing to government involvement. It has a collar stand construction made of possibly cowhide using a khaki twill lining.

Understand these may have been made by Staggs or Lasicas for the USAAF stationed in Australia rather than for the RAAF.

Has anyone pinned down who made them, how many, and for whom?

 

[Smithy]

Andrew on here (Andrew from Oz) has one. If you do a search there's a thread on it.

In relation to another Aussie remake, he has a very nice pair of 1936 Pattern flying boots but in rare brown leather rather than black. IIRC these were made in Vic too, in Melbourne.

 

[Smithy]

BTW (and I'm no A-2 expert) but I remember hearing that some Aussie A-2s were made in Brissie?

Although obviously V505 suggests a Victorian manufacturer.

 

[Smithy]

Sorry for the flurry of posts but a quick search here revealed that there was some thought here that V505 may have been Stagg, a Melbourne business which went bust in 1988. Hopefully Andrew pops his head in here or also Andrew (Roughwear), they'll be able to add more.

 

[falcon_ib]

Very cool, what other differences do Aussie made A-2s have with American A-2s?

 

[Smithy]

Here's a few threads with pics, third link is Andrew's jacket...

http://www.vintageleatherjackets.org/threads/australian-made-v505-a-2-jacket-1943.19495/

http://www.vintageleatherjackets.org/threads/v505-maker-a-2-photos-and-info-anyone.1282/

http://www.vintageleatherjackets.org/threads/v505-5thaf-22nd-bg-2nd-sq.11174/

 

[falcon_ib]

Thanks for the links Smithy, some really unique jackets. Would LOVE to see a repro come out someday.

Evan

 

[33-1729]

Contacted the State Library of Victoria to see if they would be able to identify the V505 maker. In short, "no". They have a lead, but more like a needle in a haystack, for the adventurous in Australia. Excerpt of their response is below...

Unfortunately I have been unable to connect any of the listed odes to any factory, product or tender that might suggest a manufacturer. Given the apparel is of a military nature it would most likely have been requisitioned or tendered out by the Commonwealth Government but the codes do not appear in any relevant context in the Commonwealth, Victorian or NSW government gazettes.

None of our reference works on Australian military uniforms give any indication of individual codes of any description.

I have no doubt there will be a list of relevant codes somewhere in the National Archives of Australia but how you would go about finding it is somewhat of a puzzle. It is not indexed (but relatively few such documents would be) individually and various searching doesn't reveal any blindingly obvious series of documents.