redeagleorder

Hi all,

First of all, I do realise that this is a bit late, however I made allowances for postal delivery times. So, what ODM's did Santa deliver this Christmas to you to greet 2012!?

In my case, Santa delivered nothing to me as I had to pay for everything . Even postage wasn't free, as Santa charged me for the use of his sleigh .

Okay, to start this topic off I got an Iron Cross 1st Class with the maker's mark KO, as well as a Lippe Detmold Military Merit Medal. See what you think and please post your own recent purchases.

Regards,

Matthew

It seems that things are looking that way. But you must admit that Lippe-Detmolditis is particularly contagious. Of course, if I do become infected by this fever the blame is partly yours, for providing us with such a good website on lippe-detmold and its medals :cheeky: . Anyway, thanks for the information about the leopold medals.

Regards,

Matthew

Thank you all for your help. From the evidence and the things i saw on 223 squadron, it certainly seems to fit like a glove. Thank you all for your help with this matter.

Regards,

Matthew

Really great bar, im sorry to hear about the prussian service award. However, the job you have done with this bar is really great and it was totally worth the effort. By the way, could you tell me if the silver and bronze medals of the order of leopold were awarded for civil or military merit?

Thanks,

Matthew

Where on earth did you lay your hands on that bar?????? You must have been so pysched when you saw it

Matthew

Didn't win it . It went to some other lucky guy. Anyway, I will keep my eyes peeled for one. Solomon you wouldn't like to sell me one of yours, would you :cheeky: . Just joking.

Regards,

Matthew

I probably could provide the details, but as I stated I am Maltese and so was he, so does Ancestry still work. Alternatively, will writing to the defence ministry work?

Thanks a lot,

Matthew

@ QSAMIKE: They are, but we think that his medal was awarded post war, as he stayed on in the army in the Royal Signals Regiment. Therefore it doesn't help me that much find out which war-time RAF regiment he was in.

@Paul R: The clasp, as already stated, is the North Africa 1942-43 clasp.

Regards,

Matthew

Hi all,

Usually i'm more active over at the German forum, but i've been doing some research at home lately and found my grandfather's medals, as well as a set of miniatures also worn by him, and three medal bars of various sizes. The six medals that he had are the 1939-1945 star, the africa star, the italy star, the 1939-1945 war medal, the defence medal and the long service and good conduct medal. His ID number and name is only on the long service and good conduct medal. Apart from that, the only other outstanding feature is the bar on the africa star, which reads North Africa 1942-43. From what i've read this was awarded to the royal navy, air force and 18th army group headquarters. My grandfather was Maltese, and according to my father he enlisted in 1940 and fought in Sudan, Abyssinia, Eritrea, North Africa and Italy up to Caserta and Naples. I was wondering that if from his medals and this information any suggestions could be made to which regiment he was in. My father always says that he was in the royal air force, although he was definitely not a pilot. The bar on the africa star seems to support this. Any help would be greatly appreciated, and please see the pics below to see his medals.

Thank you very much,

Matthew

Hi all,

Thank you both for your input, speedytop, see what you mean about the dots, and on closer inspection I see them too. I also think i've found ou the reason for the difference between the medal I was comparing it against. The medal shown here is a typical Weigand made one, while the medal i was comparing it against was one of sixteen privately made pieces by Sy and Wagner, rather like the mecklenburg strelitz tapferkeit cross by Godet. With this information i fully intend to bid on it, so wish me luck !!! Will let you know how it goes in a couple of days.

Regards to you both,

Matthew

Hi all,

thank you both for your replies, however i think i wasn't clear in my last post. What I meant was that Solomon's example has the dots, while the one i am showing doesn't. If anyone else has another example of this medal, could they please show it so that we can compare.

Thanks for your help,

Matthew

Just a little something i noted. The letters on the obverse of this medal are different from those on the example displayed at Solomon's website. Most particularly, the two dots on the top of the U in FURST appear to be missing. As far as i know the only manufacturer of this medal was Carl Busch, so what is the explanation for this discrepency?

Thanks for your help

Matthew

Hi Christophe,

Just to let you know, the weight of the medal is 26.2 grams, and it is maker marked with Weigand F. on the obverse and E. W. on the reverse. Does this match with known original medals? If anyone else would like to add their opinion to whether this is original or not, please do!

Thanks for all your help,

Matthew

PS: Christophe you are right, once these medals get a hold of you they never stop! I only have 2 lippe detmold medals, the military merit cross and the military merit medal with swords, but lippe medals are so beautiful that I am thinking of focussing my collection on them.

Hi Christophe,

Thanks for your help. The medal in question has a diameter of 32mm, and a height of 48mm, not including the ring. I've asked about the weight, but the seller hasn't answered yet. Just out of curiousity, how much would this medal actually cost if it were genuine?

All the best,

Matthew

Hi all,

Just saw this medal up for sale, cannot believe my eyes. Any opinions to whether it is original or not? And was this medal awarded for civil or military merit?

Thanks for your opinions,

Matthew

I believe this medal bar to be a fake, based on the gold baden merit medal and the bavaria cross, which has the belt buckle fully enamelled. Any opinions?

Matthew

Just to add something new to this thread which i don't believe has been mentioned before. A bavarian MVK 2nd class with swords and crown mounted above it on the ribbon, not attached to the medal itself. Is this a modified normal crown or something else? (By the way, was it normal for an MVK or any other military merit medal equivalent to the EK to be mounted before, because the majority seen are behind it?)

There is one thing i'm not clear about, was the merit medal awarded for military or civil merit, or both?

The iron cross, both second and first class is a common award, found easily on ebay or medal dealer sites like that of Helmuth Weitze or Jorg Kalies (just search these names in google and it will bring up the website) About the others try looking at the above mentioned dealer sites.

Hope that helps,

Matthew

The second gold type, awarded from 1872 to 1918

Hi all,

Not to hijack this thread or anything, but does anyone know how many gold merit medals of mecklenburg schwerin were awarded, and what would be a reasonable price to pay for one?

Thanks for your time,

Matthew

Errr, at the risk of sounding stupid, could you explain to me what is wrong with that medal bar. All I can say from the description is that he is really going for the whole hog to prove that he is 'well-qualified' !!!

The irony is that if these medals are original , he would have gotten more for them if he had sold them separately. It seems that many people are on to his game.

Yes, i did see this medal bar on ebay for sale when i was having a look-see a couple of days ago. What struck me first about it was the fact that if you count them there are awards from prussia, mecklenburg-schwerin, mecklenburg strelitz, lippe-detmoldt, anhalt, lubeck, bremen, hamburg, brunswick and finally hesse. This is a total of 10 different states represented on this bar , not to mention the different countries like WW1 germany, Nazi Germany, Bulgaria, Austria-Hungary, Finland etc...

Also, correct me if i am wrong, but with the amount of awards that I am seeing here, he should have had a higher grade award, such as a house order of hohenzollern or a Red Eagle fourth class.

In my humble opinion, this leaves this bar with three possibilities:

A: This belonged to some super guy who fought in a host of places, but if that is true then why doesn't he have higher grade awards?

B: This was the Kaiser's secondary bar for when he lost his normal one

C: It is a fake, an assessment which i am sure most of you will agree with me about. The only question is, is this a fake bar made up of genuine medals, or a completely fake creation? Considering the fact that it is made up of awards which relatively don't cost that much, i am inclined to think that some of the medals may be original. However, i'll leave this to those more experienced then me to verify.

Wow, that was longer than i thought it was going to be,

Matthew

Thanks to both of you. I'll give those books a good look.

Matthew