Ulsterman

ah drat! Looks bigger.

I am astonished. The Stahlhelm were disbanded/amalgamated in 1935/36 and his uniform- as an "SA reservist" was supposed to be retired by 1941. I know nothing about Finnish medals. Does it have to be from 1941? Could it have been a 1st class military award from 1918-1920?

Ah! The Order of Polish Restoration should make him easy to identify!!! my money is on A. Florescuo C. Iaptew.

WOW!!!!!! Now THAT folks is a treasure!!! My neighbor at uni. was the great grandson of an Iranian tribal chief. On his mantelpiece he had a photo of his granddad standing with his warriors in front of a pile of heads! The Shahs of Iranian spent a LOT of time consolidating their power with their "modern" military forces in the 1800s and God alone knows what this medal was awarded for! If only it could talk. The gold alone must be worth @ $2,500.

I've posted it before- ex- Stgieman collection....taken @ 1960. What a life this guy must have had!

whew! with a clasp! Nice!!

That explains the Silesian eagle. I wonder what type of EK2 he got.

Yeah! Can't be kotze because no LS medal. Who was this masked man?

OK- Hugh- you have convinced me-after squinting with a magnifying glass #1 is definitely a Legion of Merit and the dark stripes with the shading on the proper sides make #5 an American campaign....ergo #6 would have to be an European campaign, as you say (because of the 6 overseas stripes- and note NO WW1 stripes).

No-but I just ransacked my silver books. .... not Souval...he was "RS".

cool! Were the sports badges a "day award" or a permanent decoration?

Hmmmmm... I love photos like this. Given his age and that he has the medals we can see a couple of things are almost certain: 1. He is supposed to have the American campaign ribbon, because it was authorized for wear to anyone who served 6 months in the American theater AND then went overseas; it's probably behind his hand AND 2. I would be VERY surprised if that ribbon before the "old army" ribbon wasn't a WW1 campaign medal. That might suppose the Purple Heart was of Ww1 vintage. Why? Because cavalry was HEAVILY officered by old cadre regulars. If that's a West Point ring and he graduated in say, 1920 he'd be at 25 years which is just about right for bird Colonel AFTER WW2. (Before WW2 you were lucky to make Major after 25 years). The bronze star was later awarded for combat service to anyone who had the CBI/CMB @ 1947 (they changed the regulations as part of a veterans' inspired political lobbying effort) and a lot of officers wore both, but some did not. The V was instituted in December, 1945 to distinguish bronze stars for valour from those for "merit"-which included the 'in combat' awards. Converted CBI/CMB bronze stars were NOT authorized the "V". Campaign stars were supposed to be worn, but I have seen LOTs of uniforms and photos of officers not wearing them. They got caught on wool overcoats (worn often in winter Germany) and got ripped off. The photo MUST date from- at the earliest- 1945 no matter what because that's when they actually started handing out the WW2 victory medal. The medals I see are: top: purple heart/ bronze star middle: ?/American defense ("Old army")/European campaign bottom: ?/WW2 victory/Occupation GREAT discussion!!!

very cool. You NEVER see these for sale-anywhere.

Ww2 Victory medals were given out starting @ later in 1945. The occupation medal I thought was authorized in 1947 (although the earlier version was worn chronologically (after the Ww1 campaign medal) so this denotes post WW2 service. The European campaign medal seems to be the one next to the "old army" medal, which means there is probably a US campaign medal on the rack behind the hand. If he didn't retire a brigadier I'd be surprised. Note the ring. Is that a class ring?

sigh....it's been a long time since I saw a partisans' badge with a number on it.

Ha! I have that one in my files. As I recall RR identified it as a navy deck officer harbor beamter/engineer/ordinance type who got bumped up upon demobilization. One on 3,000 military noncom. EK2s. There was a bunch of fantastic Kiel senior navy NCOs portraits published on the WAF @ 10 years ago wearing their newly awarded noncom Ek2s @ 1918. they were all "Ludwing Mueller, harbor engineer" or Felix Schmidt, navy architect". etc.

The chap who has access to the SWB rolls is at the Great War forum. He can help you I reckon.

Man-would I LOVE to see the book published with the Mohler medals used as illustrations as an OMSa monograph. Heck, I'd underwrite that endeavor myself!

wow! Oh to go back 20 years.

Hansa- hrumph. i paid the great city of Hamburg a LOT of money for the xeroxed rolls and they mailed me an empty box! Someone in Holland however has them and apparently they may be being worked on. Hope springs eternal.

Yup- I would look hard at that EK2 as it almost looks as if someone painted the rim silver---but I'd buy it in a heartbeat.

...and very cool! Did nurses get them?

I think it is safe to say it's definitely a diplomats' gala uniform. I was looking at stills from an UFA broadcast of Hungarian and Romanian diplomats at a reception for Goebbels and they are all wearing this high collar, "Napoleonic" style uniform. Is there a name on the back? The Diplomatic Goethe might tell you who he is. my understanding is that military attache's at embassies always wore their full dress uniforms.

Just to let you know what I mean by 'rare", I have some award summaries to Bavarian artillery units from 1914-18 and an award roll for a Landwehr regiment. ONLY 2-3% of all the EK1 awards went to enlisted men under the rank of Vitzfeldwebel. In looking at the award summaries from the Dresden newspapers-this 3% seems to hold true throughout the war. There's a great quote about this that I'm reworking at the moment, but I plan on writing it up for the JOMSA next year. Medals mattered in Germany, they conferred social status and having the EK1 after the Machtergreifung sometimes got you preferential treatment if you were Jewish. The below is of an EK2 award....but still...

True- but also with the advent of the internet came....information. Imperial used to be a bit of a back water. The Rick R. started to write really interesting stuff on chat boards and boom-prices went up, up up. I thank God I got my Turkish stuff when i did (when it was still obscure). I have carefully noted records of the how Gallipoli stars shot up in price over ONE year from $35 to $100 after RR did his "Brigade Pasha" post at the WAF. THEN came his Tamara posts .....and I was too late for those. Same thing for Saxon St. Henrys' medals. Oh to go back and buy a nice second class St. Henrys' medal for $50! Similar things have happened to other areas of collecting (I will NEVER again see another Communist Hungarian partisan star- below $100 I reckon)once information became available. Remember the good old days-@ 10 years ago of Mongolian Orders. Oh- sob-sob.... Now I note that French campaign medals are picking up....... :banger: