Slouch hat made from melted milk bottle by Italian POW - Cowra

This slouch hat was previously displayed in another museum or collection. When purchased, the item came with two stickers regarding provenance. The first indicated who the donor was - Jack A. Hunter - and that the hat had been made for him by an Italian Prisoner of War at Nowra [sic]. This should have read Cowra.

John Alexander Hunter was born in Outtrim, Victoria on 26 January 1899. He served with the Citizen Military Forces with service number N273648 from 15 July 1941 until 28 April 1943. He then enlisted with service number NX168620 as a driver with the 2nd Australian Ambulance Car Company at Cowra on 29 April 1943, aged 44.

J.A. Hunter is listed as being one of the guards at the Cowra internment camp.

The second name mentioned is that of 'Snow' Bedwin of Soldier's Point, who presented the item to the museum. Alwyn ‘Snowy’ Bedwin married Dorothy Hunter (daughter of Jack Hunter).and they lived at Soldier’s Point.

Thousands of Italian prisoners of war and civilian internees were held at the Cowra Prisoner of War Camp Site (No.12 POW Group) in New South Wales during World War Two, starting with the first arrivals in October 1941. It is not known who made this slouch hat, or whether it was gifted to or purchased by Jack Hunter.

According to the Cowra Regional Art Gallery, Italian prisoners generally maintained an excellent, cooperative relationship with their Australian captors and local farmers, and were given access to workshops, tools, and materials. The trench art and heritage objects crafted by Cowra's Italian internees included woodwork and handcrafted Items (chess sets, toys and games, picture frames); fine art and sculptures (altar panels and homeland sculptures), and metalwork and daily artefacts (miniature tools and engraved scrap metal).

At least one obviously worked with glass to create this slouch hat. Given that there are still remnants of the company details on the glass bottle, it was most likely produced using the bottle slumping technique which would have required a standard glass/pottery kiln. The heat would firstly be raised slowly (to prevent cracking) and then increased to roughly 700°C to 730°C (1,300°F to 1,350°F) and held for 10–20 minutes until the bottle collapsed flat under its own weight. It could have been melted down over a specific ceramic mould inside a kiln to reshape the glass. The temperature would then be slowly returned to room temperature before removing from the kiln.

How the colour was turned from clear into olive green is unknown. However, the person who made it was a glass artisan or craftsman familiar with techniques such as kilncasting and glass fusion.

The letters 'MILK CO. LTD' can be seen on the flat brim of the hat. If the milk bottle was sourced locally, this is likely to represent The Dairy Farmers' Co-operative Milk Co. Ltd . which was a massive co-operative absorbing smaller regional operations and was heavily involved in supplying high-priority contracts for the Australian military, including the Cowra Military Camp and the Cowra POW Camp.