NavyFCO

His document. Note the badge number.

The reverse with screw...

The reverse, shot #1...

I'm a big dummy... I was posting some photos for on the thread about wound stripes and had totally forgotten that my wound-in-the-mouth fellow had also gotten one of these badges! This is a real beaut... take a look!

Wanna see the good stuff though? Check this out! Nicely duplicate issue Lenin and Red Banner of Labor!

Here's his group. About as nice as you can get labor-wise!

Here's his full portrait. Bloody handsome fellow!

Here's an odd one that I found looking through my old photos. This guy had a BEAUTIFUL group of awards, including a duplicate issue Order of Lenin. Interestingly, I found a fellow that HAD HIS ORIGINAL screwback Order of Lenin and the group went to him! Pretty amazing - to have both the first one AND the duplicate! Anyway, I was never able to figure out who or what this guy was. Can anyone on here figure him out from his collar ranks? Thanks! Dave

Here's a photo of the happy fellow...

Here's the backside of it...

I totally missed these, and this group is sitting right across from me! This fellow's heavy wound was being shot in the mouth and losing the "parts" that go in there... Dave

In case you can't make it out, there is a "Stalin" on the front of the locomotive. The smaller badge belonged to the same fellow. Here are the reverses...

Here you go...

Here's a bigger version of the same. I KNOW I've got a pic of the badge around here somewhere!!!! Dave

Rusty - aha - it now can be researched though! It's a bit more complex than military research, but is possible. Dave

Here's one with a replacement document...

Yep, the six volume set is the one. I think I paid somewhere around $300 for my set from a guy that was selling a set on eBay that never sold. There's a really rare 12 volume set out there... The same guy had that set but it was close to $800! I couldn't afford that. Dave

Here's a general's uniform (he was a KGB officer) who wore a single "light" wound stripe...

Here's the backside of his homemade stripes...

The veteran on the left was wounded six times in one engagement while crossing the Dnepr River. He was nominated for the Order of Lenin, but was instead awarded the Order of the Red Banner for his bravery. These are his stripes. Dave

Here's a pic of some veterans wearing them...

Here's one from a uniform I had:

This book can normally be found on places like abebooks.com (they have seven right now, ranging from $45 to $125 in price) and sometimes with the vintage book sellers on Amazon (where I got mine.) I use this one in conjunction with the Charles Sharpe series, which is 12 volumes. Between the two of those, I can then normally track a unit's history and positions using the maps from the six-volume set of "History of the Great Patriotic War in the Soviet Union 1941-1945" and figure out everywhere a person in question fought. I then also purchased numerous German histories of the Eastern Front, and they are normally very good regarding the intensity of battle, what units were fighting and so on. Using all of them you can get a pretty comprehensive view of what the veteran went through during their war! Dave

Just be careful with an award with the last type of order book, as you can (still) buy these blank and it's easy enough to put a name and number in it if you're a native Cyrillic writer. I've seen way too many high numbered Courage orders and Homeland 3rd orders (both of which were released from the Mint in the hundreds as unissued awards) that are "documented" but with the dubious late type document. Dave

If you want one with more documentation, expect to pay much more for it! Now you're starting to talk of a group with photos, documents, newspapers and the like... Which gets exponentially more expensive. Unfortunately no one has yet studied what number ranges of Lenins were awarded for what (there's a book coming out shortly that covers a lot of ranges, but not all) so you never know if a Lenin was awarded for long service as a civil employee or for something else. A friend of mine accidentally had what he thought was a "long service" Lenin from the mid 50s researched and to his surprise back came a citation for the an officer who set up "listening" (if you know what I mean!) networks in Berlin! So, you really never do know... Dave