landsknechte

Wrote to the Bavarian Kriegsarchiv to see if I could get more info on Pohl (along with a couple other Bavarians I'm researching). Between his personnel file and his pension file, they had a whopping 150 pages on him. They were kind enough to confirm his awards for me, saving me from having to gamble on the reproduction fees. [Insert drum roll here.] Pohl only had a MVK1X. Looks like he's not my guy. I have identified an additional candidate, but it's not enough to call it a day. Alfred Kloß, a Kriegsgerichtssekretär associated with the 2nd and 4th Bavarian Infantry Divisions. He's got an AEZ, so this attribution would hinge on him wearing his EK2 on the buttonhole. I'm leaving it in an open file, and I'm going to continue looking. Side note about the VOB: In this case, the clerk who filled out the Kriegstamrolle cited the page number for the Verordnungsblatt entry for his MVK1XmKr, and of course:

Picked this bar up a number of years ago. Mentioned in this thread here, the consensus was that it was a senior NCO beamte in some capacity other than paymaster or intendance. Revisiting it again, I started with the Verordnungs-blatt des Königlich bayerischen Kriegsministeriums from 1914-1920 to see if there were any MVK1XmKr recipients listed in it that might be viable. It became immediately obvious that only a small number of the total recipients were reflected in the VOB. Went through the Bavarian Hof- und Staats Handbuch 1914 and the Militär-Handbuch des Königreiches Bayern 1914 to see if there were any suitable candidates with an 1897, a Julbilee, and a Prussian Crown Order Medal / Crown Order 4th Class / Württemberg Friedrichs Orden. No suitable candidates. Went through the Prussian Hof- und Staats Handbuch 1918 to see if there was a MVK1XmKr recipient that worked. No matches there, unless it came after 31.3.18. Striking out entirely among the NCOs, I decided to come at it from another angle, this time assuming that I might be looking at a MVO3XmKr. BIngo! A foot artillery officer who ended up at the war ministry: Oberst Ernst Schierlinger (Charakter als Generalmajor in 1920) His bio from the book Die Bayerische Kriegsakademie (1867-1914): And another from a Munich newspaper in 1918: Kriegstamrolle courtesy of Ancestry: 22.3.97 Kaiser Wilhelm I. Erinnerungsmedaille 1897 30.9.01 Dienstauszeichnungskreuz 2. Klasse für 24 Jahre 19.2.06 Königlicher Kronen-Orden Kreuz 3.Klasse 24.10.09 Jubiläumsmedaille mit Krone 23.12.12 Militär-Verdienstorden Kreuz 3.Klasse 31.12.14 Eisernes Kreuz 2.Klasse 18.5.15 Militär-Verdienstorden Kreuz 3.Klasse mit Krone und Schwertern 4.1.16 Eisernes Kreuz 1.Klasse He earned a crown for his Jubilee medal by virtue of having spent his one year volunteer stint in the 1st FAR. He opted not to wear his peacetime MVO, perhaps treating his wartime award as an upgrade and replacing it. (Or perhaps because he'd have to turn sideways to get through a doorway if the bar were much larger.) As for the Red Cross Medal, I came across a reference in a Munich newspaper from 1926 where he represented the Red Cross at a local event. His bio for the Bayerische Kriegsakademie book mentions his involvement with the Red Cross as well. Curiously this might hold some sort of record for a ribbon bar with the shortest service life. The Hindenburg Cross was first authorized on the 13th of July, 1934. Best case scenario, as a retired general still living in Munich with buddies in the war ministry and able to jump to the front of the line, he'd have had this ribbon bar for less than three weeks. Schierlinger died on the 1st of August.

Perfect. Thank you very much! 😁

From what I understand, it includes bios of Kriegsakademie graduates. If so, could you look up Ernst Schierlinger who attended 1888-1891 for me? Thanks! 😁

One of the same just arrived in my mailbox today:

Got a few more to add to the thread:

Did a bit of digging, and uncovered two candidates in the 1918 Ranklist. Nobody else came into 1918 with the combination of the RAO and KO, the right amount of time in service to get the DA, not have the 1897, and not have other decorations. Korvettenkapitän Paul Clarenbach Born 26.8.81 Entered Service 7.4.00 a.D. 1.9.20 Per the 1918 Ranklist, had the RAO4, KO4, EK1, and BMV4X (no crown!) Korvettenkapitän August Lassen Born 15.7.81 Entered Service 10.4.99 a.D. 24.11.19 Char.als.Fregattenkapitän 11.12.20 Per the 1918 Ranklist, had the RAO4, KO4, and EK1. The 1918 through 1920 Bavarian Verordnungsblatt doesn't show anything additional for either man. Neither was from Bavaria, and there are no visible connections to any of the ships with a tradition connecting it to Bavaria (i.e. SMS Bayern, SMS Prinzregent Luitpold, etc.) I'd put my money on it belonging to Clarenbach, but I can't be absolutely certain just yet.

I've had this bar for a number of years, and decided I'd give it another go to see if I can ID it: I can't find anyone in the right range of ranks to warrant a MVO3XmKr that also had a SEHO, so I started to look for senior NCOs with a MVK1XmKr instead. I found a few candidates there. Some were lacking the jubilee, and a couple had additional decorations. The one survivor thus far is Feldwebel-Leutnant Franz Pohl (born 10.2.1884 in Ochsenfurt, Bavaria). He served pre-/early war in the Bay. Infanterie-Regiment Nr. 22, before being transfered to Armierungs-Bataillon 1 in 1915. Ancestry has the Kriegsrangliste, but with an annoying amount of crap obstructing the one column I'm most interested in: He got the SEHO Verdienstkreuz 24.8.1917, and had the EK2, the JM, and DA2. I can confirm the MVK1X in 1915, but not the MVK1XmKr. The Verordnungsblatt mentions the MVK1X awarded in 1915, but there's no record of a MVK1XmKr entry in any later publication of the same. I looked up another known MVK1XmKr recipient I'm familiar with, and they only have a MVK1X entry for them. Not sure how accurate they tend to be overall, but I'm leaving that one in an open file. Can anyone with access to the Bavarian MVK rolls check to see if he shows up there?

It might be akin to the miniature versions of those older style landwehr badges that occasionally make their way into some lapel bows:

Does anyone know if any of these are available online or in a PDF format somewhere in the ether? Prussian Army Ranklist w/ XIII Wurttemberg Army Corps for 1917 Prussian Army Ranklist w/ XIII Wurttemberg Army Corps for 1918 Prussian Army Ranklist w/ XIII Wurttemberg Army Corps for 1919 Siekmann's Taschenkalender für Beamte der Militärverwaltung Also, what's the current status on the Bavarian MVK/MVO rolls? (I could really use the BMVK1XmKr section to answer some questions.) Did the Lübeck Hanseatic Cross rolls ever get published?

Found another one of these up for sale, this time on that weird ribbon I've been trying to definitively nail down for ~20 years. (The seller describes it as a "Prinz Albert 1 Klasse medal silber miniature", the attribution of which I'm not putting a lot of stock.)

Check out what the cat postman just drug in:

Just received this bar, and I'm trying to get a picture of the recipient. The Bulgarian decoration might point towards 72nd (4th Thuringian) Infantry. I'm assuming the green ribbon is the joint long service medal shared by the Saxon Duchies for enlisted army or the gendarmerie. Who might have been in a position to have earned the Saxon long service and a Prussian long service? The seller that I got it from found a picture of what might be a later bar from the same group: Anyone more familiar with the Saxon Duchies have any thoughts as to where these various clues might be pointing?

I've got a handful of ribbon bars with that on on it. It haunted me for years. I eventually found a medal bar with that ribbon used with a Bavarian veteran's association medal attached. That's been my only lead, and the medal bar leaves a little bit of doubt because the medals clip on similar to this one.

The ribbon in the link you sent is slightly different. The one in the link has a thin blue edge stripe outside of the white, while the one on the medal bar has the white on the outside. Bit of a long story, but the ribbon on the bar is one of my weird research interests.

Found this photo buried on my hard drive. Anyone recognize the gold cross between the Hindenburg Cross and the long service medal?

Thank you so much for the info! I wonder why he omitted the Turkish decoration.

I'm in the process of trying to organize my collection a bit, and in so doing I'm revisiting some of my old bars. I posted this rather salty bar 15-ish years ago, suspecting that it might be identifiable given the rarity of the GSF3aX. Nothing came of it at the time, but I took another look at it today and got a hit! Only two people in the 1918 Naval Ranklist have the right grade of the White Falcon plus the Hamburg Hanseatic Cross. One was a doctor with a few additional decorations, and the other an artillery officer: Kapitänleutnant Martin Ratz. I've just barely started to look into his his history, but it looks like he was posted on a on everything from a Victorian era steamship (still rigged for sails), coastal artillery, a couple of dreadnoughts, to ultimately finish up the war on a captured Russian battleship. He spent the interwar period doing exactly what you might expect - working for a botanical supply company in Erfurt.. He went on to serve in WWII in some capacity, with the rank of Korvettenkapitän. He died during, or shortly after the war, and was buried in a military cemetery in Belgium.

Any idea what #6 might be?

I stumbled across this ribbon bar being offered for sale, and I'm utterly perplexed as to what I'm even looking at. The only scenario I can come up with that makes any sense is that the ribbon that looks like a WWII Ostfront Medal, is instead something else, and maybe we're looking at the bottom row of a double stacked ribbon bar. Anyone see something that I'm missing?

It looks the part, but I'm not sure if doubles of that Red Cross decoration would be possible. Also, the swords seem problematic for that sort of award. I suspect it's something like this:

Ignore the color shift in this pic, the original pic is a better representation in that regard. The stripes have that same sort of texture,

It certainly seems like a good match physically, and it makes more sense than anything else so far, They look like the blue and silver/gray ribbons that accompany some of the Bulgarian bravery decorations, but the blue is faded to (or has been replaced with) a dingy white. The peculiar stripes are the same style.

I've been struggling to find anything that matched, even if it didn't make a ton of sense. With that one, I was trying to figure out if it made sense with #4 being the medal version of the Prussian Crown Order, #5 being the FAM, and #6 being the Württemberg Military Merit Medal. With that scenario, I'm also left wondering how probable that there's no long service decoration. (I'm still trying to wrap by brain around the precedence either way.)