Ulsterman

Thanks!!! Any chance anyone has one of the old exams lying about? I'd love to see some of the questions: "Please state in less than 500 words, why Chairman Honecker is both brilliant and modest". "In 500 words, what are the greatest achievements of the 5 year plan?"..."Describe American and Western Capitalist evil-doing since 1900. Please give examples and dates".

can you enlarge it?

Nice photos!

What was the 'Gutes Wissen' badge awarded for?

I doubt it is original. There are too many "common" medals with too many odd inconsistencies. It is however, a hypothetically possible combination. The only thing that really initially sounds alarm bells to me is the Bavarian arbeits medal. However, those ended up with all sorts of people. I tend to think of them as going to skilled mechanics or Rotary club types, but I have seen them to all sorts. The Bremen medal is also rather odd, but the roll exists and we may be able to trace this chap via that roll. The firemans' cross I believe was awarded to volunteer firemen as well and I have photos of Bavarian village firemen (specifically Jewish men) wearing this medal. The HKx was awarded apparently to some DRK men and women in the front lines, although I have never seen the regulations for it. Possibly the DRK/BRK was amalgamated into the imperial army de jure at some point. This is an unknown point and would explain the HKx. But then again, so could enlistment for a length of time with a substantial wound. It would be odd if he was in feldgrau that he got a Ludwigs' cross and not a BMVkx3. This is the bar of a lower ranked professional/hard core volunteer Bavarian Red cross official. But- the ribbons look odd- some are new, others faded-

Hmmmm...that almost screams navy technician/Beamter to me. Note the bar is post 1938- and he has earned his Luftschutz medal by then (probably for teaching at a civil defense school or coordinating duties. the chap below was owed an Austrian and Bulgarian WW1 medal and is notable only in that he has an HK -not an HKx. I suspect a similar career trajectory though- except your chap was aboard something that got shot at and was in Finland during the War of Liberation.

Ailsby claimed he knew the officer- but nobody else seems to. Ailsby grew up in the same area as my Nan and I asked her about him and the german POWs in the area- many of whom she knew also. She had a mind like a steel trap for gossip and who-knew-who and did-what. She said she'd never heard of either of them. I suspect that the story Ailsby told was like many others that he told.

Fantastic little group.

ok- that is kind of cool.

very cool. Did your ancestor get the Laganzalza medal?

very cool- and IR 74! a premier regiment too ! A Kaiserschlacht award perhaps?

Nice! Do you ever see the National Guard year books at all?

very cool! Man, look at the quality. It would cost $120 to make that today.

VERY interesting thread!!!!! Bravo. Of course, if one could find documentation...I wonder how many of the Guards actually owned private purchase LoHs in this style? Maybe it was de facto ownership- not de jure.

Grrrr....you know, if they can still make fake medals this well, it really is a shame that they can not make better versions of the actual awards they still hand out- like the Bundeskreuz usw.

It happened- no EK2-quite a bit- esp. in the navy...but rarely for officers.

Medals to officers are worth more and your chap there was one of a very few officers who survived the first months of the war all the way to 1918. There are probably no more than 150 groups out there to a medical officer like that. Jr. medical officers in the British army tended to be in the front lines -often field dressing stations were staffed by an MD officer -and the British medical officers (comparatively) suffered high casualties. If we had his name we could tell you more- and so could the chaps the the trenches on the web site. They love groups like this.

Hmmm...I seem to recall an Allgemeine SS officer with the RVO. Any chance its him wearing his a la suite uniform?

Ummmmm...I suspect the chap Arnim contacted was Kelly of Kelly's Reproductions Inc. - who lives @ 4 towns over from Stogie. Kellys' contracts with the in-famous Austrian seller for repro medal bars and (I believe) Gerst- as he has the same sorts of ribbon bars on display now at the show in Lowell. He has masses of reproductions for sale at @$1 each- but if one rummages through the dross, sometimes one finds something original amidst the junk (like Pakistani or Jordanian medals).

Yup- but Arnim is either over confident in his own historical knowledge or a pot- stirrer. No Arnim, not many people can "field strip" a REAL original TR ribbon bar and remake it. One potentially could-but in the same way that I could possibly wake up on a desert island with a naked Megan Fox: it isn't easy and reworked bars have to be done by craftsmen these days, as the orginal materials have not been made @ 15 years and it takes real skill and enormous amounts of time. Most fiddled bars have "tells" and now-a-days there are a LOT of cautious people out there....if you don't like it...then one walks away with ones ' money. Objects at rest tend to stay at rest; this is a law of physics and old ribbon bars. Ribbons that were folded tended to crease and become dessicated. The last originals were made @ 70 years ago, so almost NO original bars have fresh ribbons or devices anymore. Even in humidity controlled bank vaults the ribbons get a slight "wear" to them-because of the chemical content in modern air and seasonal humidity. Most of us here have handled hundreds of originals. One gets a certain' feel" for originals- whether it be by the patina, the ribbons, the smell, rust bits and whatever. Also, I personally own @ 30 pictures of period ribbon bars in wear that are "wrong"- some catastrophically wrong. I have seen @ 50-100 more on the various forums. Many of the "wrong things" had a certain logic to them (including regulation changes in 1942/43). Stogieman got into ribbon bars LONG before most of the present collecting community (and photos too) discovered the value and historical significance of ribbon bars. That was explained at great length by Rick Research in his posts on the WAF -and I witnessed the EXPLOSION in prices thereafter. Gone are the days when I could pick up the bar above for a mere $10-because few people-including most dealers, did not know "the story" and could not identify a Bavarian ribbon from a Argentine or VFW one. Stogieman NEVER assembled nor fiddled with ribbon bars. He maintained an impeccable reputation because he got paid for doing so (this is the Bill Shea/Detlev model) and took GREAT pride in selling his wares. He has integrity. He was also very careful and when he got burnt and either sold the item as a repro or destroyed it. I seem to recall him tossing a fake one into the garbage in the old Lowell VFW show @ 10 years ago (but maybe that was Rick R.). A Stogieman bar was/is a guaranteed original bar - and one paid a premium thereto. Also many of his bars were vetted./inspected by Rick-who also researched them. Rick R. doesn't care about money at all, but he does care about history- very much-. Rick is also honest to a fault. His life and lifestyle are testimony to this. In case you do not know, Rick R. is the hands down world expert on these things- and has been researching them for 65 years. So Arnim- just in case you were not trying to instigate a fight/lob a petrol bomb/ slander Stogie-now you know the background. If you were intentionally trying to defame someone- your days here are over. We don't put up with that here.

Hmmmmmm.........says WW1 NCO turned Jr. Lt. pilot to me....and thence into the Luftwaffe. Hmmmmmmm....I think I know who to ask. The combination is wierd, but so odd that I think it argues for original. (Devices I know nothing about-Stogieman?Stogieman?). Hmmmmmmmm.....

Oddly enough, I think this chap has the civil SM:

wow! The plastic back is rare!!! Otto V. Hapsburg was a man I admire very much. His obit. in the Economist was brilliant:" always right and ahead of his time".

Senior Vice president? the pendant is neat: Freedom, Charity, Loyalty. @ 1890-1920s. $25? I see them a lot in flea markets.

IR 76 of course- and some of the Guards regiments. Maybe IR 116?