Stogieman

As with many makers, you will find multiple maker marks over the period 1860-1945... For Godet, you will see: "JGuS", "G", "Godet", "Godet Berlin" and several variations thereof.. While unusual to find a RAO2 in silver-gilt, it certainly looks quite legitimate to me, based on the photos he's showing. Hope this helps!

This is a good place to interject that the backings, although different materials, have the same "narrow" strip that does not meet the edges of the back. The use of blue thread is a new touch.... must have run out of black/FG.... always uses materials that do not glow..... I think we have underestimated the sneakiness factor... Also, note that the Ohio Monstrosity will usually have full backing with tiny stitches (as well as hand-snipped catches)..... two patterns to make you think twice. Not all bars like this are bad.... but it's hard enough to find decent material without having to be suspicious of every piece you see.

And a third:

And another:

Our friend has started using the following two "handles" on Militaria-Web. montecassino fritz11 I suppose we could have 2 guys here, but they are both selling the same crap fakes, original ribbons, plates, note the backing/stitching on these:

Please see the "This Week's Ribbon Bar Fakes" Thread in the Imperial German Awards Forum for an update on this fraud.

I think any box with that black, grained finish, or blue grained finish with any silver lettering should be avoided like the plague. The interesting thing is there's no shortage of these boxes on the net being sold for exactly what they are.. repros. it's what happens after the fact when some clown starts buffing them, sanding them and screwing around that things can start to get very scary for many an unsuspecting collector.

Our friend Buffoon, I mean Baff sells on Militaria Web and other smaller German on-line auction houses...... I will see if I can dig out some of his various aliases.

Interesting thread. I've seen these spanges in 6mm, 9mm, 11mm. and a whopping 19mm. all on ribbon bars. Also, keep in mind there's a 24mm. "Prinzen" spange that was officially produced and mounted on medal bars.

Marcus, I cannot imagine this packet being anything other than real. Show me 200 in the next month and that might change my mind, but if I picked this up at a show, I'd be quite happy with it. IMO, materials, printing, design are all consistent with multiple variations on other/known original packets.

The only good thing I can say about this piece is it was cheap.

Fabulous piece Ralph.... not only a very hard to find medal, but an incredibly rare case.... fabulous find!

with respects to the original bar that we started with.... a Russian friend of Daniel's, who apparently doesn't read this forum, has bid this piece in excess of 300- Euro. How incredibly sad is that?

.... and this just goes to show you the value of joint, world-wide research as well as this forum! very cool and much thanks to Daniel, Glenn & Rick for putting a name on this face!

I'm sorry, but I think you have made a serious error in altering this bar. If you look quite closely, you now have a base-metal (tombak) eagle, not a gilded one like the one right next to it. Since this bar was basicly mint and unused, it was made the way it was, with the full intent of the owner (and maker) that that was a silver eagle. Now this piece is altered from what it was intended to be. I would not recommend to anyone that they do this.

Hi Mike, neat album. I think it's always a pretty special thing when any album turns up intact. Far too much of this type of history is being ripped apart for maximum profit these days.

....... and a nice Prussian General!

A nice pair of Carte de Visites. First up a W?rttemburger with a very impressive rack of awards!

I don't think they're "uglies".... I think it's pretty darn neat to see pieces like this........ just like it is to get those parade-mounted medal bars with the EK2, etc. on backwards!

Here's a friend's rather hard to find Mecklenburg FFK2 on a Non-Combattant ribbon!

Found it!

My Evil Twin might have a scan of this somewhere, sorry for the pix, tough to shoot fire-gilt with my equipment!

Ta-Dah!

Actually, you'd be pretty surprised at what went through, even Imperial! I have pix in my archive of a Mecklenburg FFK2........ with the ?se soldered on the bottom arm! I've had a number of 1870 EK2's with radical tilt to one of the arms.... and they were issued that way!