Elvis’s white jumpsuit with its glitzy bejewelled design went down in history, Marilyn Monroes white dress is part of one of the most recognisable film scenes in Movie history. The Beatles with their famous collarless suits from the early 60’s are probably the most well know of all their styles, even though compared to other suits they would wear, they wore them for only a short time. Lennon himself had a single item of clothing that was and still is, as iconic as the examples I listed above. In the late 60’s John has brought an ex military fatigue shirt, the shirt was perhaps a surprising choice at the time for lennon as he was currently in full swing with his wife Yoko in an “advertising campaign for peace” John was staying in bed for peace, growing his hair for peace, arguing with hard headed journalists for peace and whatever else took his fancy, yet here he was wearing an army shirt.
photos found on google image search)
He is pictured here with the jacket on while he rode a motorcycle with his son Julian. This army shirt was however not the one that became famous from John wearing it! The famous army shirt he wore during a number or events including his live solo ‘one to one’ concert is one of his most famous items of clothing. Maybe only second to his New York City cut off t-shirt!
As well as at the concert he wore the shirt during chat shows and interviews, and while out and about during the early 70’s! While talking about the jacket he said “It’s very funny, I was in the German Airport, I had an American Army mac on and a guy came up and said, I just got out of the Army in Vietnam and if you’d like these clothes I’d love to give them to you, ‘I said alright’, and he sent me all these Army clothes in the post, A few years ago it was.” The shirt is a fatigue utility shirt issued to U.S. Army soldiers circa 1970. Lennon beloved the shirt was from the Vietnam War but he was actually wrong on this, it was actually used during the Korean War. It has the original soldier’s name “Reinhardt” on a patch above the right pocket and U.S. Army patch over the left pocket. The patch on the top of left shoulder is the ‘2nd Infantry Patch’.
(John in the shirt, photo from google image search)
The patch on the right breast pocket is a “Imjin Scout Regiment Patch”. A soldier serving between the years of 1967 and 1994 would receive the patch after 20 patrols in the DMZ (Demilitarized Zone) near the Imjin river in Korea. There were yellow matching Sergeant Chevron stripes on each sleeve. The original shirt was given by John to his then girlfriend May Pang in 1975, he was said to have wrote a love message to May on the inside of the shirt. What not many people know is that John had at least two of these shirts from the same soldier, the other is. Thicker darker shirt with the same US Army patch over the left pocket, but the other patches are all missing apart from the “Reinhardt” patch. However this time the patch is white and not olive green. The soldier who gave Lennon the shirt was Sergeant Peter James Reinhardt, he served in South Korea in 1968. From a solider to a superstar, from Korea to New York City, the jacket had come along way, it even made it’s way into the Award winning film with Forrest Gump.
(John and Yoko, photos found on google image search)
“Well, I don't want to be a soldier mama, I don't want to die”
- John Lennon
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