landsknechte

This one is downright disorienting...

That thing looks like it's about ready to start melting at room temperature.

No Hindenburg Cross, therefore it has to be 1934 or earlier.

...any news yet?

Very seldom does one see widows that are so highly decorated...

I really must break that pesky habit of trying to interject logic into Weimar ribbon bars... Do you think the Thuringian commemorative is a plausable candidate though?

Random thought... Would this bar make any more sense if it were the bottom row of a double row bar?

I can't extracate the image from the PDF of Thies' latest catalog, but I may have found another match on page 24: "Medaille auf die 200-Jahr-Feier des 2. Bat. 7. Th?r. Inf. Reg. No. 96" Curiouser and curiouser...

Didn't see this one until after the fact, but I can only presume it came from the same man. Even though I missed out on the opportunity to keep the group together, at least I can hang onto the record of it.

Yep... I'm still alive and collecting. I had to take a break from sinking most of my disposable income into photographic gear and a new car to pick up at least one new toy. I suspect it's from a naval groundpounder of some sort, provided that the two naval vanity decoration were chosen by the recipient with some sort of respect for logic. Of course, that may be too much of a leap, given the Weimar years...

Honestly, I don't know much more about this decoration than that it came in two different grades and seldom appears on bars other than singles. I have a tendency to save pictures of whatever random decorations I chance upon while surfing, as a reference for the ribbons. --Chris

I've only been able to find a photo of the gold version in the Third Reich incarnation, I'm afraid.

Yup, the picture is of Freddy. I have no idea how the archiv came into possession of his photo album, nor when they got it. His son Adalbert was KIA in WWII, but he had three daughters that survived. It was Otto that married into the von Stauffenbergs. I presume he's some relation, but I haven't been able to establish what the connection might be. (There are two different lines of Freiherr von Berchem - one Prussian and one Bavarian. If I remember correctly, Otto was Bavarian.) As far as I know, he only had two brothers. Max, who was a Hauptmann a.D. in Bavarian FAR 8, and Hans who was KIA as a Leutnant in Hessian Leibgarde Regiment 115. ...and yes, I'm interested in whatever I might be able to dig up.

...just had a thought. Can anyone whose familiar with these sort of photos venture a reasonable guess as to whether the original of the photo was autographed by Berchem, or if the name would have been added by someone else?

Wow. Got home and realized just how odd the settings on the [shared] computer that I use at work actually are. Anyhow, let's try this one on...

#4 Better?

#3

#2

Assuming you're set for 1024 x 768, these ought to work. Let me know if you're working on an itty-bittier monitor, and I'll adjust accordingly.

On a lark, I emailed the Bavarian Hauptstaatsarchiv to see if they had anything on the owner of an ID'ed ribbon bar in my collection. Rather unexpectedly, this letter arrived in the mail: Along with it is a wealth of information. Unfortunately, I can barely make any of it out. My German is bad enough, and then you toss in some Sutterlin, and I'm completely useless: #1 #2 #3 #4 Could anyone be so kind as to help me make heads or tails of this? Thanks, --Chris

For some reason, Adalbert Freiherr von Berchem was a heck of a lot easier to track down. He's the one with the bandage on his head. (Somewhere on my hard drive, I've got a better pic. Still looking.)