Ulsterman

Yeah! I saw that just last week. I've also found some great and obscure regimental histories and some Really good Napoleonic stuff. Maddeningly, googlebooks seems to think that anything after 1920 is copyright protected and provides mere snippets of some stuff-like the Reichsgerichtbesetz and the Fuhrer decrees etc. etc! There's even the Reichsheer patent lists of all officers-unavailable!! :banger: :banger:

Club rules discourage comments on current auctions. After the auction is over though, comments are welcomed.

Jaw-dropping as I did not expect only 40 out of 900 eligible for the 25 year cross. I figured on closer to 300. The youth of the party was noted often. Speer in an interview with Donahue (!) once said he was the second oldest person in the Berlin party HQ in the 1932 elections. The Parteistatistik book shows that of the membership before Jan. 1933, 41% were between the age of 21-30. In Jan., 1933: 61%! was under the age of 40. It was a young party. Also, I find reference to Bavaria supplying 21% of all "altkampfer" cadres and that Hesse-Nassau was particularly underrepresented in party cadres (The German Dictatorship: 1969-which i think draws on Lerners' "The Nazi Elite" (1955)).

Any chance the 32 refers to the artillery regiment?

Huh?? It says "NSDAP Dienstauszeichnung" (in the Decrees). Do you refer to the Volk. Beob. "medal awarded to dead cadres" ? :unsure:

Apparently what it says is "the party service award", the implication that it would be the highest class-the 25 year. Merely heresay at this point, but it certainly sounds like the sort of thing they might have done. It might also be that the awards were merely authorized, but still in abeyance for the duration.

Well, I found a maddeningly tantalizing reference to pp, 114-116 in "Verfungen,Anordnungen Bekanntgaben (1943) edited by F. Eher to some sort of NSDAP Dienstauszeichnung regulation change in Jan. 1943! NSDAP Chancellory decrees regarding the medal are numbered: 24336,26215, 14906,24544 and 25455. Now if someone could only get to Ann Arbor to actually look and see what they say!! :banger: :banger:

Don't know, but I can find out . I wonder if any state National Guards allow the wear of this medal.

IF that was the final cutoff date, that would again SEVERELY restrict the number of NSDAP 25s that were ever possible-- thus further explaining why REAL ones are so incredibly rare. That is an understatement! Just to recap chaps: Given that there were only 22,250 Gold Party Badges and that NSDAP # 100,000 was given out @ October/November of 1928..........and if the 1928 NSDAP entrants were NOT given the medal.......and recipients HAD to be a party cadre (even in an affiliated organization)......then an awarded 25 LS is (at a most generous estimation) about as rare as a Blood Order and probably much rarer! Joe W's female medal must only number in the very low hundreds! Two other factoids: 1. NSDAP LS medals were noted in Wehrpasses (which surprised me) and 2. According to Patzwall, the last Blood Orders were handed out in May, 1942. Another discussion that just boosted world-wide medal prices I expect. Deutschbauers" NSDAP # was 545.

:Cat-Scratch: ......... would the French Gentleman in question perhaps allow his pics to be shown here? I think he is on facebook, non?

Neat! rare bar too. Very,very nice.

You know, it is now official; I am senile. We discussed this at length and in detail- twice- a mere 7 years ago! I did learn something new though-awards are confirmed as of Jan. 1942 both by documents and newspaper accounts. But nobody has seen a NSDAP LS document anywhere I can find after that date (as you said above). Apparently the party allowed the 25 year cross to party cadres killed either in bombing raids or in military service as honor awards. This was decreed in April, 1944. Also interesting to trace the history and price of this ribbon bar. Started at Weitzes' in 2002, landed upon your kitchen table via Stogieman in 2003 and has now ended up with Andrew. The bar is taking on a history in and of itself.

REOs were awarded to the Captains of companys that won the Kaisers' annual shooting prize (one per Corps).

Yeah-this is a mystery with many loose ends. I have assumed that calender years of service/membership counted towards earning the LS medals, not months. As I recall RR stated that Altkampferzeit time counted double. Even with a calender year accounting, the earliest the 25 year crosses could have been handed out is 1941. I have a rather comprehensive NSDAP Party #/entrance date compilation from disparate sources as well as year end #s. So party membership dates can determine total potential persons/cadres eligible for the medal. I note that many "famous" Nazi bars have only two NSDAP LS medals on them-including the (in)famous Himmler bar so often seen in books. Please correct me if I am wrong here: 1925=2 years 1926=2 years 1927=2 years 1928=2 years 1929=2 years 1930=2 years 1931=2 years 1932=2 years 1933=1 year (I had originally supposed credit for two years, but the evidence doesn't seem to show this) 1934=1 year 1935=1 year 1936=1 year 1937=1 year 1938=1 year 1939=1 year (awards created) 1940= 1 year (Initial bronze and silver medals handed out for party members to 1928:confirmed by documents) 1941=1 year ( "class of 1929 medals awarded:with cut off eligibility dates as of Oct. 1941: confirmed by documents) 1942=1 year (class of 1925 awards of 25 year cross:Last year of documentary evidence that LS awards were made) 1943=1 year- I suspect that Hitler suspended the crosses in January, 1943 ("Verlust am Ehrenzeichen" p.116 in VB) 1944=1 year In reviewing some SS files of Miller I see that even older NSDAP members from 1928/29 did not get the 25 year cross, or at least it wasn't in their files. I also note that Austrians didn't get LS medals either.

well, I remember the summer of '73 well. Have you seen "Life On Mars"? I bought a Bavarian artillery pickle in horrible shape for $5-which was two lawns' worth of effort (with a push mower)!

Nope-Paul and Garys' latest article in "The Military Advisor" on Luftwaffe band units. there's a thread in luftwaffe.

Here is a cloth one from @ 1941-45:

Great piece. Most were hard won indeed. Yeah-but back in 1962, $15 was half a days' wages for most folks in the USA.

Heeey! Isn't he the famous chap in the latest bender article?

weight? dimensions?

no clue. i thought maybe the birth of Darwin, but nope-6 weeks off.

Oh-ho! He might well be tracable! Noncom. EK2 means medical and with a combat campaign medal- hmmmmmm!

Cool- Interesting he got the PrKvK. Wrtmbrg. Regimental/Brigade commander in 1918?

Yeah- I estimate @ 1,500-2,000 TOPS with this combo! Enlisted WW1 Wurtembergers who ended up as civil officials-maybe a score at most. Many of the early NSDAP were Bavarians (30%). Fewer than 50% of the party members were veterans in those days too! 15% of the early party's loyalists was female by the NSDAP Chancellery memos and in addition, while many were young (in 1933 40% were between the ages of 21 and 30), there was "wastage" over time: death, resignations, purging (esp. 1934-35), emigration...... whatever. NSDAP memos in the late 1930s refer to this as @20% cadre loss and that was before the bombings and war began. By December, 1925 (almost the cut off date for the 25 year medal) the NSDAP had issued membership cards up to #27,117. By December 1926, they had issued party card #49,750....but estimated it had only 35,000 active party members. By July, 1928 Party# 92,345 was issued....to a man who got the bronze and silver LS in 1940. The NSDAP was however, heavily over-officered and there clearly were many "part-time office holders" who were older members. There was fudging, but Hess's clarification letter of 1935 made it very clear that the NSDAP was not a part-time "hangers-on" association. The party was professionalized and those who didn't have the education/skills were purged/demoted/retired/pushed off into other assignments (DAF). I suspect part-timers qualified for the medals, but can not prove it. Cadre status was determined at the Gau level although the paycheck originated in Berlin. many NSDAP cadres also simultaneously held lucrative civil government jobs-Mayor, Vice Mayor, Treasurer, provincial chamber of commerce Director etc. etc.. As an indication though, in 1940, the NSDAP internal census found that only 4% of its party cadres (@450,000 people) were "Altkampfer", that is, members who were in before Jan. 1933......and of those, the men who were really hard-core, wilderness years members: probably fewer than 1% (4,200). An additional number died in 1939-44. Like Rick said, maybe only HUNDREDS of 25 LS medal owners at best. I guesstimate @1,200, but that is just a guess. It is still a minuscule number of people. The people who had all three NSDAP LS medals held serious civil power of some sort in the Third Reich. One unanswered question is how membership/leadership of affiliated organizations counted towards awards. H&S state that service in affiliated organizations counted, as did "honorary" service. Many NSDAP officials were members of the SA or DAF/NSKK etc. before they were party members because it was cheaper. Also, I still do not know if females were cadres. Certainly they were officers in party organizations, but party officership is unknown-doubtful though given Nazi ideology. If I remember correctly, the cut off date for awards was in October prior to the award year. Recipients were determined at the Gau level and awards were handed out in Jan. (Jamie Cross article in the MA) with Urkunden issued later-usually in April or even later. It would be interesting to see any awarded for 1945, but I doubt they were. Service in the Austrian party apparently did not count towards the medals.

Yup- It is insanely rare! It is almost as rare as a Blood Order....and under-priced when sold I reckon. The chap who wore this on his party uniform had to have been in in 1925/26/27 and it has to date from the final years of the Third Reich as Germany crumbled into smoke and chaos. I have never even seen any documents or references anywhere (and I have looked!) for LS party medal awarded after 1942! Not many Nazis only had this series of LS medals and of those, @5- 8% were women. How many survived the great uniform bonfires of 1945? Not many at all.. ...and now you have one! A famous one too. Congratulations.