filfoster

My personal thanks to all who contributed. I think this has been 'nailed down'.

1 hour ago, oamotme said:

P.F.,

Thanks for the clearer picture  - I think my ID's are correct. By the way the 'collar' is not a 'collar' rather it is the Royal Victorian Chain and I believe the neck badge is the Order of the Bath (Military Division) to accompany the lower breast star.

Regards,

Owain 

Thanks, that seems the proper identifications.

P.F., thanks for this picture. This seems to follow the medals suggested by Oamotme, no?

oamotme: That's impressive!  I can't make them all out but that's the answer for now. Thank you. I will have to research that Imperial Service Order. Haven't seen one and want to know more about it. I'll get me Spinks out.

Thanks, Japan X. These are much better. I am confident that the collar is the GCVO but the upper neck order could be a Grand Commander of the Order of the Bath or a Guelphic Order.  I'd guess the former.

Medal bar?  I can guess a few. I see a St George/St Michael and Victorian Order, and perhaps a Star of India; Probably a Military Bath at the far left. AT this date, near the right, he'd have 'pip, squeak and Wilfred', the WW1 trio, wouldn't he?

No takers? Really? Poor George V!

OK, I suppose this will be 'duck soup' for our British members.  What Orders, specifically neck decorations/collars, breast stars and medals does George V wear on his Fleet Admiral and Field Marshal rigs?

I'm guessing the neck gongs are the Military Bath GC and the collar is the Victorian Order, but who can see well enough to know for sure?

The breast stars here are the Garter and the Military Bath GC; On his Fleet Admiral uniform he often wore the Star of India star and another breast star I can't make out.

The medal bar appears to have some very odd/rare things.

ErWeSa: Thank you. This is helpful. Still not sure what the head piece is made of, e.g. what 'gold fittings' refers to. Headpiece?

White gold or yellow gold? 

This photo is of Eddie Rickenbacker's surviving uniform blouse from the First World War. Let's assume it's real and of the period as it does not include his MOH awarded when one of his EIGHT Distinguished service crosses was upgraded to the MOH in 1930. As I understand it, the rules for subsequent awards are as follows:

The ribbon itself represents the first award; a bronze oak leaf represents a single subsequent award and a silver oak leaf (here, the look like French Croix de Guerre palm leaves) represents FIVE subsequent awards.  Here, Rickenbacker's tailor or someone has really gone outside the box.

He wears TWO DSC ribbons (OK, maybe allowable for the many awards of this medal....but...the first ribbon shows a single Bronze leaf and two silver ones. That'd be 12 awards for that first position ribbons, right?

The second ribbon bears four silver leaves which would be 21! counting the ribbon itself. So he's showing 33 awards?  I'm sure that's not what he intended so....

It's most likely that the photo gives a false view of the colors of the leaves and that they're all bronze, which would then square it except the second ribbon would technically make the total display for 9 awards. I'm guessing that's what's going on.

Does anyone have a better picture of this uniform or at least his ribbons?

The more I study this photo, the more it seems that the camera has played the trick because the undeniably bronze leaves on the Croix de Guerre also look the same silver-ish shade as the DSC ones.  

Well, Ok. As Emily Littella (Gilda Radner) used to say on SNL: "Never mind..."

Marcon1:  Thanks for this. The batons at Fort Benning and West Point are his Feldmarschallstab and Reichsmarschallstab, respectively, the formal batons. 

These museums don't have the Reichsmarschall interimstab or his field marshal interimstab.   So, we're left wondering where these are now.  It seems unlikely that they were destroyed because they were obviously of importance and would either have been taken from him in person or from a place he was known to have been, like Carinhall (blown up at his own order) or one of his apartments.

Photos show he had it or perhaps the Reichsmarschallstab with him when he was captured by US troops in Bavaria at the end of the war: (see him holding this 'bag' in the photo):

It's in the cloth bag he's carrying unless that's the Reichsmarschallstab, which, given the wide grip he has on it, seems more likely. Still, It's hard to imagine he'd left it behind in Carinhall or wherever he skedaddled from.

The most likely event was that an enterprising GI relieved him of it and it's been out of the public eye since. Odds are that it's still out there somewhere, ditto his Feldmarschall interimstab.

I hope a few of this forum's members will join us in this fun quest. This artifact is one of the most valuable and significant objects of the Third Reich. Imagine its value today!

Marcon1:  Yes, these are the best ones I've found, too but the coloration of the head piece just isn't clear enough. If you had to bet on it,  I'd guess it's platinum and not gold but I've seen gold head piece replicas that look pretty convincing.  My working opinion until something better surfaces (optimist that I am!) is that it was platinum. (Silver or aluminum would have been too pedestrian for the Reichsmarschall!   Consider that the silver-colored accents to his Reichsmarschallstab were platinum).

Whereabouts of the original?  Would it surprise anyone if some GI's surviving family have this gadangus hanging in the family room or the downstairs 'man cave' with little idea what it is?

"Grampa said it was some big shot's. Looks like a band drum major's baton or a little pool cue stick, don't it?"

Bump...no color photos of the stick baton of the highest-ranking military officer in the Third Reich?  Hard to believe but obviously very hard to find!!

Thanks for the photo. It's hard to see more than the facing badge. 

My tentative opinion is that the handle/cap is made of Platinum with gold or platinum (the Iron cross) badges.

Still hoping for a color photo with detail. 

Bayern: Thank you.  I do have the Mollo book and the illustration, as a drawing, even if based on a photo, is inconclusive of the color of the Reichsmarschall Interimsstab baton head. The formal baton, or reichsmarschallstab, for instance, was very different in composition of materials (ivory shaft, vice velvet covered for 'ordinary' marshals or grand admirals, platinum vice silver, etc and the diamonds) compared to the lower rank generalfeldmarschallstab batons, that his Interimsstab for that rank, Riechsmarschall, might have also had significant differences. I am hoping this post will elicit a response with a photo or reference work that gives details of the reichsmarschall Interimsstab on the metals of the headpiece and its badging. The badging itself may be different: was one of the eagles a Reichsmarschall eagle, clutching crossed batons?

Surely there must be a color photo, rather than a drawing or painting or contemporary article that describes this.

Marcon: Thanks, but no, that's only a 'regular' Heer generalfeldmarschall interimsstab. The higher rank Reichsmarschall interimsstab was different (see my prior post, please).

....Even the wonderful reference "Mythos Marschallstab" has only two, incomplete black and white photos of it. 

Not a reference or color photo anywhere of Goring's Reichsmarschall interimstab.  What happened to it?  What does it look like, besides the ivory shaft?  Is the head gold or platinum or silver or aluminum?  What devices are on it? What metal are they?

Lots of photos and palaver about the Reichsmarschallstab but nada on the interimstab.  Not even a good color photo on Google. 

Anyone?

Only the Austrian and the Bavarian 1866 medals are real. The others are all available on ebay or from German vendors online. The frame is sheet brass, with bent wire 'pin' and soldered hinge and clasp. That is then covered with wool and the gongs are sewn on at the proper spacing. The ribbon is then sewn on and then a backing of wool is sewn to the reverse. It works, most of the time.

For the good of anyone else trying to duplicate Scheer's decorations at this time, it is possible to cobble up the currently available BVMO officer's cross:

OK. Here's what I think the ribbons are on the photo below.   It can be clearly seen that the Bath ribbon is wide, compared to the other ribbons, which I think confirms the misplacement, transposed with the Victorian Order shown in the top left spot. Odd that the old film shows the dark blues as lighter color but the VO, Egypt and Khedive Star ribbons confirm it.

Please ignore the bottom photo; it shows my prior work which incorporated a too-wide Khedive star ribbon. The correct ribbons are in the upper photo.

Moderator, can you delete the bottom ribbon photo? The edit function doesn't seem to work for that. 

OK, here's my reproduction. It's a hot mess - too many gongs on a bar that's as wide as the real one, by my calculations, but I lack the artifice of Leopold's tailor. Anyway, the 1870 ribbon/bars obscure the ribbons for the Iron Cross 2nd, Bavarian 1866 cross and the Mecklenburg-Schwerin 1870 cross. There's probably another Turkish medal I missed as well but this is as close as I can get.

Evidently not, per the precedence posted on the wehmacht-awards forum.

Should 6 and 9 be switched, the Bavarian campaign medal preceding the Prussian one?

My default opinion on Jellicoe's ribbons at this moment is that in the photos taken of him after his promotion to full admiral in August, 1914, his uniform has:

top row:  Victorian Order  + Order of the Bath (mis-placed)  + Egypt campaign

2nd row: 3rd China War + Prussian Red Eagle  + Khedive Star

These ribbons represent several very odd and interesting circumstances.

1. The transposition of the VO and OB ribbons

2. The inclusion of the Prussian Red Eagle ribbon, albeit a relatively high -2nd Class with swords- valor award, of a belligerent nation

3. The absence of the Sea Gallantry medal ribbon, which is a rather rare and prestigious medal. This jacket, in the collection of the UK National Maritime Museum still excludes this ribbon.

4. The inclusion of a Khedive Star ribbon, which is not insignificant but not rare, nor likely to get him free drinks at the bar.

It's unlikely anyone at this date knows why these ribbons were worn in this order. I'm not giving up hope but even if the UK National Maritime Museum responds (unlikely), it's a stretch to imagine their expertise can explain this.

JapanX:  Yes, this is the same jacket.  The Red Eagle ribbon is still there, 2nd row, far right. The top row has the Bath ribbon now preceding the Victorian Order.  We just need someone to confirm that these two ribbons were reversed (an error by Jellicoe, his tailor or his valet) in the first photo above. 

I have sent an email enquiry to the UK National Maritime Museum to see if they know anything about the ribbons in their earlier configuration but so far, no response. If any forum members know anyone there, perhaps you might put in a word?

This jacket still exists in the UK National Maritime Museum collections. I have sent them an inquiry. The jacket today includes ribbons affixed after Jutland, but the color photos clearly show a Prussian Red Eagle ribbon, so that mystery is solved. Why he didn't remove it is still a conundrum.

I will share any response I may receive from the museum.