Paul L Murphy

I'm afraid I do not know the date when Hirata stopped making them. I believe it was only for a few years right at the start of the order's existence.

The lid lining is named Hirata, which is the name of the private company that made some of the earliest insignia. I have never seen an example of their case before. This is incredibly rare, no wonder it fetched that type of price.

A nice one, and getting hard to find.

Les, Many thanks for all this information, I am hanging on your every word since clearly you know (and love) your subject. Regarding the cross straps, there were two spare cross straps in the collection but they do not seem to go with the Sam Brown so I have kept them on their own. Basically I got the whole lot from an old collector of police items who had lost interest in RCMP and wanted to swap them for Japanese uniforms and badges. I was aware at the time that a number of the items were unofficial but took the lot. There is a small moth hole in the stetson. It is now in a sealed wardrobe with insect repellant ! The sweat band has gold blocked letters saying RCMP as well as the maker's name. The leather band has RCMP and two serial numbers printed on it on the inside. Does this help date it at all ? :cheers:

The 1870 version was used until 27 February 1951.

Les, Many thanks for sharing your knowledge. I look forward to hearing more of your comments, and hopefully seeing photos of the items you have in your collection. Paul

I will chuck my hat into the ring and give my support to General William Slim, an amazing leader of men.

The right hand medal on the 3rd row is the 1909 India General Service Medal.

Sorry to disappoint but they had a standard tally. It says Dainippon Teikoku Kaigun, which is Greater Japanese Empire Navy.

If it is only a ribbon bar, rather than the medal bar, then you cannot tell the class of the order since the ribbon does not change.

Plenty of Japanese ORs and NCOs had the Red Cross Medal, it is often seen in photos being worn by these ranks. The annual fee was very affordable at the time, I do not think it was as high as 300 yen. Also if the group has a 7th or 8th class Sacred Treasure or Rising Sun then it was definitely not an officer group since the lowest class they received of these orders was the 6th class.

Japanese Order of Merit Second Order means that he held the Second Class of either the Rising Sun or the Sacred Treasure, it is not a seperate order.

Topic pinned. You have waaaayyyyy too much time on your hands :speechless1:

I am attaching photos of a badge I recently acquired. I know that it was worn for a long period of time so I would be grateful if the more knowledgeable among you regarding these items could advise to which era this piece belongs. Thanks in advance. http://gmic.co.uk/uploads/monthly_05_2010/post-1487-127524956803.jpghttp://gmic.co.uk/uploads/monthly_05_2010/post-1487-127524957492.jpg

Showa era. The person from whom I bought it knew the identity of the original recipient and would only tell me that it was a WWII era award, he would not disclose the name. There are photos of it somewhere in this forum and also the OMSA databse.

I sold one a few years ago that had a replaced sash and box (the star and sash badge were the only original parts) and I got in excess of $50,000 for it.

The details around the face and the chains seems poorer than in my example. Is it known how many different companies made this ?

Here is an example of the cap badge they wore.

To put things into perspective, the highest number I have seen on a 1900 War Medal certificate was 34,845 so it cannot be considered rare with that amount awarded. For comparison, the highest number I have seen so far for the 1894-95 War Medal is 253,508, for the 1904-05 War Medal it is 1,262,963, for the 1914-15 War Medal it is 136,512, for the 1914-20 War Medal it is 310,037, 1st National Census Medal is 108,348, 2,600th anniversary Medal is 220,898, Capital Rehabilitation Medal is 24,351, China Incident War Medal is 3,201,849, Korean Annexation Commemorative Medal is 38,069, Manchurian Incident War Medal is 589,024, Meiji 25th Wedding anniversary medal is 821, Showa Enthronement Medal is 363,953, Taisho Enthronement Medal is 135,578 and Victory Medal is 193,132. I have never seen a cert for the 1874, GEAW, China Incident Commemorative Medal or Constitution Promulgation Medal. These numbers are based on keeping a record of every cert I have handled or identified over the past ten years so they should be a good indication of relative scarcity. :cheers:

Well I have the 1900 award document as well as the medal, na..na..na naaa naaaaaaaa :cheeky:

Well done Brian, you got a nice medal at a good price. :beer:

$406 for a cased 1900 War Medal, $96 for a cased Russo-Japanese War Medal The world has gone crazy in both directions ! I can find you at least twenty cased 1904-05 medals for every cased 1900.

If this goes for less than $400 then you have got a bargain. $500 + would be a fair estimate of price. These have come down a lot thanks to the internet, I remember when I could sell these on ebay (8 years ago) for nearly $1,000 !

If you are based in London I suggest you try to get over to the Firepower museum in Woolwich. They have a good reading room and might be able to help track him down.

The highest bid placed was for 390,000 ($4,300). His reserve price is 1,000,000 ($11,100) yen which is not realistic for something with a replacement ribbon. Even for one in its original box etc that would still be too much (unless these have nearly doubled in price in the past five years).