Chris Boonzaier

Your guy was defending the approaches to fort Vaux from the Germans. It would for me be about the most desirable bit of battlefield I could imagine for a CdG in my collection.

I am such a TEASE ! (What a nice find by the way!!!!)

Hi, they were right here. Maybe a couple of thousand meters South East. Hope that helps Chris ;-)

"What do you think is on the back of this? It often represents the ultimate possible destruction of any traces of a soldier." It be a trick question mes Amis.

I think there are no fakes of these. I do however take issue with the claims that these were dropped over German lines as some folks seem to think.

Absolutely bombastic. Would love to see a photo of him. surprising he has not made it into the history books. A Kiwi Lt. Col must be worth a page or two. I knew a couple of Kiwis in the Legion, including Caporal Dick "The ugliest man in the Legion" (Which I think was unfair as we had an Italian named marsilli in our mortar section that was really the ugliest)

Ahhh.... I am not sure if you are onto me.... Pte. G. Smith R.A. would have been a likely victim..... C'mon Guys... its Friday... have a few glasses of your favourite tipple and I am sure someone will get it.....

I would say, to get a medal with the same as this has on it... many NAAFI and Army Pay Corps soldiers "are no more"...

What do you think is on the back of this? It often represents the ultimate possible destruction of any traces of a soldier. A big E-Kiss to anyone who gets it right.

A sure symbol of poor toilet training

P.S. later (in1918) the 39th also became a Gas Battalion and and the end of June 1918 the 94th - 96th also became gas troops.

Hi, Can noone help on this? Thakns Chris

Hi Pionier Regts 35 and (later) 36 were the gas Regts, in 1917 they were disbanded and Pionier battalions 35-38 were formed. Best Chris

Super! Do you have a Xerox of it??? That was exactly the conclusion I had come to, although no modern book (English or German) has made these distinctions. At some stage it changed... in 1870 a white ribbon was for a non combatant, for 14-18 it changed somewhere along the line and we have more than just "EK for fighting man" and "EK for non fighting man" We have 1) EK for bravery in the field 2) EK for merit in the field 3) EK for military merit at home (for soldiers?) 4) EK for merit at home (Official + Civilians) with white ribbon. Now we need the EXACT statutes.....

Good! Good! Good!!!!!! Do you have a xerox of the page?!?!?!?!!? I am opening a bottle of wine as we speak.

It is not really "Europe in the great war" The major thrust is not collectors, to a certain extent not even pure military history. Very many people there are into local research (Their family, their village etc.) as such it concentrates mostly on British troops in Brit sectors. There is of course a lot of other stuff. All in all a great forum. I think it is our celestial twin forum....

Indeed. The battalion were specialized in managing Gas canisters. Few pioniers did as it was to become mainly an artillery thing.

I do have a third one somewhere.... also mowing down bunches of Germans. I almost bought 10 for EUR600 some time ago.... but the price of research would killed me ;-)

Well I tell you one thing .... they certainly have more women than we do... so they must be doing SOMETHING right????

The Backs...

I like the things.... but I prefer the "He killed 50 Krauts with a canopener.." kinda citation ;-) Some of the Russian ones are great. 1st citation is the medal on the right of this one. 2nd is on the left.

I have docs to lots of strange units, but this one has a funny smell about it....

OK, then at least I can sort out the citations with the medals. I guess I can live without knowing where the guys came from. Whats the first guys name? Thanks Chris P.S. I will move this to the Soviet forum as it has changed course...

Any guess which of the citations belong to this guy? (2nd one was for saving a life?)

This was the other one.....