Opinions gentlemen please

[dr greg]

I have doubts about this:
http://cgi.ebay.com.au/ITALIAN-LEAT...740573467?pt=AU_Militaria&hash=item3a614d851b
however Fiocchi is an old Italian ammo firm so maybe....and the seller makes no outrageous claims.

 

[Tomasso]

Fiocchi is an old Italian ammo firm so maybe...

Actually, Fiocchi is also an old Italian manufacturer of fasteners. I have their snaps on several of my Italian made jackets purchased over the last twenty five years.

 

[Italian-wiseguy]

As far as I know after having read many italian sites on Regia Aeronautica, italian pilots were never issued leather flight jackets before or during WWII.

In the '30s and '40s they were issued a cloth, mouton-collared jacket with removable liner; that came in various yet similar models (I'm beginning to create a mental chronology of the models but, to my knowing, there's no "aficionado" who has tried to clarify the matter yet).

I've seen photographs of italian pilots with private purchase leather jackets (quite rarely) but these were nothing like this, and similar to what everyone expects a flight jacket should look
Anyway, who knows...

Italian pilots of the Aeronautica (Air Force) are currently issued also a leather jacket, which again doesn't look like this one but is very similar to those used by RAF and Armé de l'Air pilots: internal elastic waistband, pen pocket on the left sleeve and all.

Ciao!

 

[Philalethes]

I think the item has been reposted here.

Perhaps this is a naive question, but if the jacket were made for Italians, would not the name read "Fiocchi Italia," instead of "Fiocchi Italy"?

 

[Italian-wiseguy]

That's not naive and absolutely right.
Fascism actually banned foreign words from common usage (with alternate success...), let alone official use. So I find really unlikely that during wartime they used "Italy", unless they began pressing that on copper studs before and then they simply passed unnoticed. But I confirm, unlikely.

I searched for Fiocchi: there is one Fiocchi brand that makes ammunitions for sport weapons (hunting etc.) and another that makes studs, zippers, fasteners and the like; it's stated in the site that they began at the turn of the 20th century.
http://www.fiocchi.it/

My personal opinion: it's a postwar private purchase jacket. The seller had probably some doubt about the jacket's use (the holes for the insignia etc.), showed the jacket to the former pilot he knew, like he says, and the pilot answered like "I don't know, I've never seen anything like this, but maybe they gave these to some of the bomber guys..." which explains the seller's claim.

That's only my opinion, anyway. Then again, the jacket looks indeed kind of strange.

Ciao!