joemiller

...and to feed You a bit more....

Here are the award numbers actual known today. Still not completely done.

I counted the awards mentioned in the FIVE DIFFERENT ROLLS for THREE states, took the sum, but what is most interesting is the last column. It shows the awarded pieces. Number is of course much smaller because of all that combined awards.

Best regards

Daniel

Daniel, I forget what Rick said you were going to do with the merit medals of the three duchies, so this may be a dumb question. Do you have totals for the Gold and Silver Merit Medals for the three duchies?

I have wondered for a while how there could be a sword bar for the Saxe Coburg Gotha Merit medals which has the date "1914". The dated sword bar was re-instituted until May 22, 1915. Did the government go back and issue a 1914 bar? And if they did I would assume there were very few of these issued. This picture is one which was recently on Ebay.

FINISHED Sachsen-Meiningen today.

The rolls unfortunately STOP for these in June 1915, so how many (and even IF any) more were awarded cannot be know at this point. It is possible that a missing volume of Meiningen's Ernestine rolls, which DID exist

may still be there, misplaced or stuck in the wrong box.

Gold Medals X = 81

Silver Medals X = 264.

These numbers must be taken as PARTIAL pending actually searching the Archives for the Lost Roll.

With completion of these rolls, all three Saxon Ernestine Duchies awards for WW1 have now been transcribed.

We will, at some point, be RE-ISSUING Erhard Roth's existing volume on Sachsen-Altenburg in the same format Daniel and I are using with the current batch, including additional information, adding names and making corrections to the exact transcription done by the late Herr Roth. There are also notes in the Altenburg Rolls, which I have, concerning deaths and returns which will make that Second Edition worthwhile even for you lucky few who have his 1st edition. But that is a secondary priority to doing Rolls that have NOT been done.

Next Stop--

LIPPE DETMOLD.

Rick, thanks again for all of your hard work. Since the swords awards by these duchies, according to Hessenthal and Schreiber, only were reauthorized for World War I in March of 1915, that really underlines your statement that these numbers have to be taken as partial. As you had posted previously in answer to one of my questions, the majority of these silver and gold sword awards for the merit medals of these three duchies appear to have been given out by Saxe Coburg Gotha. Altenburg appears to have given out way less than 100 gold medals with swords and less than 300 silver medals with swords. Meiningen based at least on the numbers you have found is probably on a par with Altenburg. Coburg Gotha seems to have awarded silver X's in the thousands and gold X's in the hundreds.

I also have two(!) award documents for two sisters, with the same(!) number in the left bottom corner.

Is this normal?! What use shall these numbers have, if they're not unique?

If you can post a scan of one of these documents I would appreciate it. Also if you ever know where to get a spare bow ribbon I would pay a lot for it. Thanks.

Solomon, I would love to get a copy of your article on the Lippe-Detmold Military Merit Medal. I can offer you the use of that picture of my Military Merit Medal without swords if you need it for the article.

One book that I have on Saxe-Altenburg indicates that approximately 15,000 Bravery Medals were issued. That Bravery Medal was minted in several different types of metal after its original founding in 1915. The first was bronze, the next was a bronzed war metal, and the last was in zinc. On Ebay there is a bronze Bravery Medal and the seller writes that only 550 of those bronze ones were issued. If that's the case then while the Bravery Medal was fairly common, the Bronze early war version should be quite valuable if there were only 550 out of 15,000. Can anyone confirm that this is the case?

Deruelle, this cased award is too beautiful, thanks for the extra images and for the explanation.

Joemiller, thanks for the images, now I know how the merit medal look like. Is it the same

way it looks also for the other Saxe duchies ( only with different typing and maybe image ? )

The other two duchies medals are smaller in diameter (Saxe-Altenburg-33mm and Saxe-Coburg Gotha-30mm). Altenburg only had plain swords for World War One awards and Coburg-Gotha had dates on the sword bar that varied but followed the format of 1914/5. I have examples of these other states merit medals.

This is the reverse of the Silver Merit Medal of Saxe-Meiningen with sword bar. Note the silver content mark on the back of the sword bar.

I collect mostly merit crosses and merit medals, but I do have a Saxe-Meiningen Merit Medal with the sword bar for 1914. It is one of my favorite medals and I think the sword bar is a lot rarer than the pricing guide would have you believe.

That may well be the only one most of us are ever going to see.

You are going to be a VERY happy camper when the roll gets published.

Rick, thanks for all your work on this project. I have the O'Connor book and he showed between 150 and 160 of the Silver Merit Cross with swords. This one I have was at a gun show and the seller didn't know what it was so I jumped on it. I wish I could find one in gold with swords to make the pair. Probably too greedy, huh?

Here is the reverse of the medal. Easy to see from this side how someone might call it a miniature of the War Merit Cross.

Since Rick is typing his fingers to the bone on Saxe-Meiningen and he was interested in the Womens Merit Cross, I thought I would add a picture of one in my collection. I got this one several years ago very cheaply because it was billed as a prinzen-sized War Merit Cross from Saxe-Meiningen. There was no picture so I took a chance. It came on a noncombattant ribbon not the proper bow ribbon, but I could never find a replacement. Note the triple "C's" and the lack of crowns between the arms. Also it is only 30 mm, not 39 mm.

I hope you don't mind if I add this first version of the Military Merit Medal (no swords on the obverse)

The back of this first version has the diemaker's mark along the bottom reverse, "G. Loos Dir" That is not on the World War One version of the medal.

This model (1910) was produced 25 times by Godet, and was 12 times awarded. (Model 1909 awarded 6 times / Model 1916 awarded 18 / made 19)

"This order was awarded for merits around the Prince and his country."

I hope you don't mind if I add this first version of the Military Merit Medal (no swords on the obverse)

Here is the back of the silver merit cross.

Since Rick mentioned them, here is my silver merit cross with swords.

I am hoping that the SEHO rolls from Saxe-Meiningen will help us to determine just how difficult the gold and silver merit medals with the sword bar were. This one one of my favorites

I would appreciate one of each of these books. We are all going to benefit from this work for years to come.

That is a very nice medal. Once I learn how to upload pictures, I'll upload one of a White Falcon Merit Cross with Swords