filfoster

Thank you to Dan and Lukasz! So we have now: 1. Jubilee medal for the Order of St. George 2. Military Merit Order 3rd with swords 3. Ludwig Order 4. Cross for Medical Volunteers 5. Luitpold 1909 70 year Jubilee medal 6. 1910 Agricultural Jubilee medal 7. Bavarian 1866 campaign cross 8. Prussian 25 year service cross 9. Prussian Centenary Medal 10. Princely Schaumburg-Lippe military service medal 11. Ducal Anhalt Golden Commemorative medal 25th anniversary of reign 12. Queen Victoria Golden/Diamond Jubilee medal 13. Austrian 1908 Signum Memoriae Medal 14. Austrian 1908 Jubilee medal for Foreigners 15. Austrian F J 1848-98 Tapferkeit 16. 1896 Russian Nicholas II coronation medal

Lukasz Gaszewski: Thank YOU! I very much appreciate your help. I suspect the 1910 Agricultural Jubilee medal, while not particularly valuable, will be hard to find. Can you can ID any of the other unknown ones? ONLY 5 more to go! Is #12 the Queen Victoria Golden/Silver Jubilee medal? #14 is also definitely an Austrian medal because of the Franz Josef bust on the obverse. Which one? So we have now: 1. Jubilee medal for the Order of St. George 2. Military Merit Order 3rd with swords (and crown?) 3. Ludwig Order 4. Cross for Medical Volunteers 5. Luitpold 1909 70 year Jubilee medal 6. 1910 Agricultural Jubilee medal 7. Bavarian 1866 campaign cross? 8. Prussian 25 year service cross 9. Prussian Centenary Medal 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. Austrian Bravery Medal 15. Austrian F J Tapferkeit 16.

Bump, as they say.

No guesses for the #4 medal?

The Napoleonic wars campaign medal also resembles the medal in the 4th place. There is no reason I know of that would suggest Ludwig III would have received or worn this medal:

It is not a common medal to find on ebay or on the usual medal vendor sites.

I hope some of the experts on this site can help fill in the missing blanks. The most puzzling mystery is the medal that appears in the #4 position in my initial post, and the #3 medal in the photo of him wearing Prussian uniform. It has rounded ends to the cross arms and is a similar shape but larger than the 1866 campaign medal that appears further on, on both bars. There is no medal in the precedence list that corresponds to this shape. For reference, my precedence shows, after the Ludwig Order: Military Merit Cross for Peacetime Merit Cross for 1870-71 Lifesaving Medal Ludwig Medal Merit Cross for Voluntary Care of the Sick Prussian Iron Cross 1916 Ludwig Cross Jubilee Medals The Merit Cross for the Voluntary Care of the Sick is the only one that corresponds to the shape of the #4 medal but this decoration seems very unlikely. It's not impossible, as I know King Edward VII of England wore two Red Cross medals on his bar, the Prussian Order of the Crown 3rd class with Red Cross device, and the 'Geneva Cross' French medal. The photo is a 1914 example but I think it was instituted before the war, 1901.

Any idea what the #4 medal is?

OK, let's fill that in. Agree it's there in the photo where he's in Prussian uniform (Mostly Prussian decorations, Hohenzollern collar, Black Eagle star, etc.. You can just see the small tilted crown on the bust.

In which position?

So, as of now (bold type for ones I feel pretty confident about): Particularly puzzled by #4: Nothing in my order of precedence reference looks like it. This must be something not mounted in the order of precedence. Women's and nursing orders are between the Ludwig Order and the Jubilee medals. 1. Jubilee medal for the Order of St. George 2. Military Merit Order 3rd with swords 3. Ludwig Order 4. 5. Luitpold 1909 70 year Jubilee medal 6. Luitpold 1905 Jubilee medal 7. Bavarian 1866 campaign cross? 8. Luitpold 40 year long service cross 9. Prussian Centenary Medal 10. 11. 12. Hanoverian 1866 Langensalza battle medal 13. Victoria Golden/Platinum Jubilee Medal 14. Austrian Bravery medal? 15. Austrian F J Tapferkeit 16.

#7. Liutpold 40 year service cross?

REVISITING: I hope another copy will come to market, offered as a copy instead of a real one.

Sandro: Thank you.

Yes, he's an interesting historical person. That's why I want to replicate his medal and ribbon bars and perhaps his dress uniform.

I hope these medals and orders were recovered. Were there ribbon bars in this collection that presumably were not included in the stolen items, likely because they did not have medals and so seemed of less value? Are they currently on display?

GdC26: The photos are very helpful but I still will need help with some of the later (righthand) gongs. As to the URL link, I am very sorry this appears to be a notice of a theft. The medal bars appear to be Prince Leopold's. I can tell because I have copied the topmost one with help from the members of this forum. See:

#13 A medal from Hesse or Saxe Coburg, looks like Carl Eduard profile.... #14 Austrian Siignum Laudis? No crown so could be another Austrian medal of 1866? Gosh no, gentle fun. I am never seldom intentionally rude. Still plenty of blanks left to fill and correct my errant guesses.

#4, out of precedence order (but he's king right?) Bavarian 1866 war cross. Kinda 'in you face' for the Prussians, no? #12 Hanoverian 1866 Langensalza battle medal?

Thanks, PF and Dave Danner. Can anyone help fill in the vacant slots in the initial post? I can guess at a few but my eyes and references aren't up to a certainty for most of the vacancies.

Yes, ccj, I think you're right. No, I didn't mean to imply that he did get either one pre-war, because to my eye, these two awards are NOT apparent on pre-war photo with the medal bar at all and so I'd say he doesn't wear them. They are 'conspicuously absent'- not there at all - when he might have gotten at least a Max Joseph at any time: he's the King after all, and could have given it to himself or some toady could have put him in for one. He fought AGAINST Prussia in 1866 and so would certainly not have gotten a Prussian valor award then and I don't see that he fought in 1870-71, so no EK of any degree for him from that war either. He's obviously wearing an EK 1 in your photo which seems to be a WW1 era picture. I can't tell from the black and white photo if there's an EK2 ribbon on the bar. I am primarily interested in the pre-war medal bar but if anyone can decipher the above war time photo, that would also be appreciated. Another project. ..."Wikipedia", that august reference source, says he held the Max Joseph Order Grand Cross but again, I don't see the knight's cross, the lowest degree, on his pre war medal bar, which would have been the usual convention, even if he'd only received the higher degree. His brother Leopold had it in its proper order. In fact, Leopold's medal bar begins in almost the same sequence but had the Max Joseph at the #2 space.

....and making moral judgements about long past historical events and people is au courant in our culture just now. Even though I'm pretty old (be 70 next year) I'd like to get in on it while I still can.

Please. I hope you're kidding. It's intended as a humorous phrasing. Who knows what I'd have done? Probably the same thing. These folks are long gone and I am only trying to get some help with a project. I obviously have an interest and respect for these events and people or I wouldn't be bothering with it at all. If anyone wishes to thrash me over any of my posts, please PM me and we can set a date and time off the board. I hope readers will appreciate my admittedly wan attempts at humor here. I would sincerely appreciate any help anyone can give to identify some of these medals. By the way, I understand that after being badly wounded in action when he was young, Ludwig III decided he'd had enough of military glory and I cannot criticize him for that.

I have mixed feelings about this thread. I join the majority of posts condemning this man's fraud. I would also admit envy that he can produce such excellent copies of very expensive and hard to find medals and orders. I myself make reproduction bars for my own uniform displays but they would not fool anyone and are never offered for sale. The medals I use are only those that are commonly available online. This fellow has some very rare stuff and I am envious that he has them at his disposal. Ironically, this thread also confirms the wisdom of being satisfied with copies sold as copies, the better quality ones, anyway. There is too much risk of being taken by charlatans like this guy. If you buy a copy as a copy, you know what you're getting.

Before Ludwig III, last Wittelsbach King of Bavaria ran away skedaddled after WW1 (He never formally abdicated, did he?) he swanned around in some pretty cool threads. His medal bar was wunderbar! I count 16 medals, so it's not a huge project, not like Kaiser Wilhelm's 21 gongs or Wilhelm I's 20, mostly older medals not found as repros. I can guess at some of them but would like to recreate it and can't make them all out. Can anyone help me? Conspicuous absences: Military Max Joseph order; Iron Cross 2nd. I know the breast stars: St. Hubertus, St. George and Military Merit Order , Grand Crosses Bound to be a 1905 Jubilee medal and a long service medal too somewhere on there. 1. Jubilee medal for the Order of St. George 2. Military Merit Order 3rd with swords (and crown?) 3. Ludwig Order 4. ? 5. Luitpold 1909 70 year Jubilee medal 6. 7. Bavarian 1866 campaign cross? 8. A Hanseatic city cross? which one? This is probably wrong as the photo seems pre-war. 9. Prussian Centenary Medal 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. Austrian F J Tapferkeit 16.