REGAL UNIFORMA COLECTOR

Ed, I pulled up your different websites and Forum and I saw that you and I are both OMSA members. I always respect a true fellow Phaleristic and researcher of orders and medals. I will buy you another round. Perhaps you had a bad medals day at the convention ?

Ed, I am not being trying to be a smart ass nor did I want you to cut and run and to ignore this thread. You are a senior member of this website Forum. I am sure you're a walking book of knowledge for all of us to get acquainted with and a specialist in your field. However, as Club Host, you really should help new members navigate through the website. As it stands, I still do not know how to properly post a photo here and I definitely do not want to post any more photos if I am going to get blasted by the Host. So lets have a beer and move on. OK ? and let me know how to post photos.

Well Club Host Ed...since this is my first attempt at posting a photo on this Forum, I would appreciate a helping email or something to that affect on how to properly post on your Forum. Instead, it sounds like whining to me. Not very interesting for a Forum. The use of an Image Hosting service is the only way I have posted photos on websites for years and it is the only form of downloading images that certain military Forum website accept. Your "Help" category at the top bar of this Forum really is no "Help" at all as it does not give directions for posting photos here. So I am at a lost to any other way of posting photos here at GMIC. Personally, if you want to hear complaining, my pet peeve is when someone can't seem to use the spell check even when it has been provided. If you don't want me to post any more photos, let me know and these will be the only contributions I will make here. Otherwise, stop complaining and help me out. If I am not mistaken, this Forum is here for the collectors and I'm sure your readers and members don't want to see a bunch of whiners.

Another photo of enlisted mans straps, cadets, and military schools.

Hey everyone ! Let me introduce myself. I am a collector of Imperial Russian Shoulder Boards. My collection consists of approximately 850 pieces dating from the Crimean War through WW1 and the Russian Civil War. Here are a couple of photos of some enlisted mans straps in my collection. I am always seeking to purchase original examples. Not the fakes you always see on Ebarf. Anyone with original shoulder boards interested in selling can contact me at : pagoni@sbcglobal.net

Some more irony : I wonder what kind of collection Putin has ? A lot of KGB during the Soviet days and former KGB today have very large Imperial Russian militaria and art collections. Collecting these items was a communist status symbol. Where do you think they aquired their pieces from.

The Irony is... the theives will go to great lenghts to smuggle the items out of Russia. These pieces end up at the auction houses which are heavily attended by the rich Russians who fly out of Russia carrying their American Express cards and buying up everything they see at inflated prices and taking the artifacts back into Russia. Amazing. The government has strict export regulations on atiquities, but no regulations if you want to go the other way. If they bothered to look, they will see that many of the items coming across the borders are the pieces stolen only a few years earlier. Irony !

"The event in the Hermitage is not an isolated incident, but part of a pattern," Boris Boyarskov, the head of the Culture Ministry's department in charge of protection of cultural valuables. Boryaskov said about 50 to 100 thefts are registered each year in Russian museums, and although outright robberies are less frequent now because of new security measures, inside jobs are increasing. Commentary : Hey everyone. This is nothing new. The Hermitage has been looted on an on going basis going far back to the Soviet days of when Gorbachov was in office. When the Great Soviet empire collapse, these curators were not paid by the government for over a year. The basement inventories that nobody saw quickly went out the back door. Over the years, there has been more than the 4 or 5 million reported stolen over this last incident taken. Probably they will never know for sure how much was actually stolen as it involved many curators and employees over the years. The records are probably gone as well as it was the curators and museum staff that did most of the looting and they probably destroyed any inventory trace. Haven't you ever wondered were all the Imperial Russian militaria came from over the last 15 years on the market ? Why many pieces are in mint pristine condition ? Why some pieces still have numbers inked or painted on them. You can't really believe that just because communism fell in Russia that the greater russian population started to pull these items out from the attics and walls of their homes and put them up for sale, or did you ? Let me remind you, during the 1920's-1940's, the NKVD in Russia would of had you shot for being in posession of even a tattered pair of Imperial shoulder boards. If you were lucky, Stalin spared your life and sent you to the Gulag to die as slave labor instead. I first encounter a Hermatage theft back in the late 70's or early 80's when I was offered an Imperial Russian Tunic stolen from the Hermitage and flown into this country via New York by an Aero Float Pilot. He wore it under his pilots uniform. KGB was waiting for him in New York and escorted him home were he was promptly arrested upon stepping off the airplane. These thefts have been ongoing for years.

If that where the case, the crown would have also been removed

The brest star you need in hand to determine if it is genuine. What I do not like about it is the red and white enameling looks very clean and bright in the photos and the pin looks like it has sand scratches in it or is that the reflection of the carpet. Also the back has a lot of swirl marks in it. Keibels pieces were pretty much flawless of such swirls and sand marks as I recall.

It looks good to me other than the 56 mark. That is different than usual. However, it is stamped in there and clean looking. What other characteristics do you see here that would make you think this was a reproduction ? The gold 2 tone yellow and pink are correct. AK marks are correct. Enameling looks a bit shiney. Need to see it in hand to tell if enameling is new. However, the green and white enamelling are of the period. Overall, I think this piece is good. The brest star is obviously garbage.

"The event in the Hermitage is not an isolated incident, but part of a pattern," Boris Boyarskov, the head of the Culture Ministry's department in charge of protection of cultural valuables. Boryaskov said about 50 to 100 thefts are registered each year in Russian museums, and although outright robberies are less frequent now because of new security measures, inside jobs are increasing. Hey guys, this is nothing new. The Hermitage has been looted on an ongoing basis going far back to the Soviet days of when Gorbachov was in office. When the Great Soviet empire collapse, these curators were not paid by the government for over a year. The basement inventories that nobody saw quickly went out the back door. Over the years, there has been more than the 4 or 5 million reported stolen over this last incident taken. Probably they will never know for sure how much was actually stolen as it involved many curators and employees over the years. The records are probably gone as well as it was the curators and museum staff that did most of the looting and they probably destroyed any inventory trace. Haven't you ever wondered were all the Imperial Russian militaria came from over the last 15 years on the market ? Why many pieces are in mint pristine condition ? Why some pieces still have numbers inked or painted on them. You can't really believe that just because communism fell in Russia that the greater russian population started to pull these items out from the attics and walls of their homes and put them up for sale, or did you ? Let me remind you, during the 1920's-1940's, the NKVD in Russia would of had you shot for being in posession of even a tattered pair of Imperial shoulder boards. If you were lucky, Stalin spared your life and sent you to the Gulag to die as slave labor instead. First encounter I had is when I was offered an Imperial Russian Tunic during the Soviet days stolen from the Hermitage and flown into this country via New York by an Aero Float Pilot. He wore it under his pilots uniform. KGB was waiting for him in New York and escorted him home were he was promptly arrested upon stepping off the airplane. Guys, when you have had 3 generations of living under communism, the taste of capitalism makes for a lot of corruption.

The only thing that looks original is the thumbwheel.

There was more than one maker of this medal. Variations are going to exist.

I don't recognize this piece. The eagle looks like czarist made stamped piece. The brass oval base however old looking does not look czarist. Don't know if it is a period piece or one made in immigration.

Interesting. The badge is genuine. Has the correct stamping characteristics. The threaded post is also correct in thread size. What may fool some collectors is the texture of the reverse side. This texture makes the badge look like it is cast. In actuality, the manufacture used a very crude piece of brass sheet metal with a lot of mil scale on the back of it. Notice the gold gilting on the back side. Worn off on the front, but visible on the rear. A nice stamped badge the way it ought to look.

This is an interesting piece. Officer pilot hat belonging to a former Czarist pilot now in the service of the Lithuanian Army. Circa 1917-1918.

George, Your grandfathers pilot wings are a beauty and very rare. Trivia : The smaller shoulder board insignia was nicknamed by pilots as "The Black Fly".

It is a shoulder-board of the 1st Ussuriyski Railroad Battalion, pre-1909. In 1909 special symbols were introduced for many troops, and thus "shifrovki" (monogramms) on shoulder-boards become more simple. After this change, the shoulder-boards of this battalion should look like 1.Y. with a special symbol of railroad troops above - crossed axe and anchor.

You are correct. Most were destroyed. It was not a good idea to have these items during the 1920's -30's in Soviet Russian. The NKVD would have shot you just for keeping such things. You would have been considered lucky if Stalin spared your life and you were sent to the Gulag insted.

What I see from the photo is the back side of the badge. The top arm and center circle has a pebble look and pitting to it. The other 3 arms of the badge are smooth and the bottom arm shows signs of horrizontal scratch lines which to me looks like the badge was sanded prior to being buffed out. This is because the fakers want to hide any signs that the badge has been cast.

I don't think so. The reverse wire attachments do not appear to have been disturbed. I think it was a manufacture goof. Remember, even though these badges are rare, they made thousands of these for the enlisted man. How many enlisted men and NCO's where in the regiment and how many wore a badge ?

It depends. There were several makers of this badge. Variations to be found. Study each badge as a case by case.

This badge is original.

This badge is a reproduction. It should be a stamped badge. This one is cast and polished. Has a textured and pebble look to the back side. The mounting pins for the cypher attachments look new and when you receive the badge, you can see that the ends of the wire has been freshly cut exposing new metal. Also look at the edge of the badge. There are no extrusion lines from being forced cut through a stamping machine. The edge of the badge is smoothed out from sanding and polishing from a buffer. Like buffing out your car. The backing plate has a bluish huge color to it which also suggests that it was made recently. The fakers of Russia are using metal files to file down the edge of a badge trying to duplicate the lines created from a stamping machine of the period. However, their file marks are all over the place. No straight line cuts. Probably too much vodka as they are laughing all the way to the bank. Well Chris, Hope I did not scare you away from collecting Imperial Russian.