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    Posted

    Death's Head insignia

    This insignia and the previous ones were all harvested off a hate belt (not by me, but a friend who did allow me to buy some of the items). The belt was the best of its kind I've ever seen and the person who put it together in 1919 (he used the German shoulder numbers to date it) even went to the trouble of soldering prongs on the back of insignia to hold it to the belt. Unfortunately, the solder put a hole right through the center of the skull to pin the death's head to the belt :banger::banger::banger:

    At the time, I was going to try to gently bend the flanges of the gaping hole closed and back out the dent...but considering the age of the metal I lost my nerve and left it as you see it. I'm not planing to sell it, but just out of curiosity...what would the insignia be worth in very good condition??? And what is it worth with a bloody hole it's head? :banger:

    Posted

    tough crowd :rolleyes: ..I realize now that I didn't put anything with the photos to give scale. The IR insignias are all small enough to have been taken from shoulderboards. The death's head is also this size, but I believe would have been taken from a peak cap.

    Posted

    Hi,

    Nice devices Claudius! I am sure Robin l would kill for the skull.

    I must admit the whole thread has been an education for me. I have never occupied myself with Litzen and shoulder boards before. Begin to find them kinda cool though....

    Posted

    Claudius,

    Nice devices. I think the reason you did not get any comment right away might be because this thread was concerning collar Litzen and your additions didn't really follow the theme. At least one of your items, the oak leaves, is not from the period. No harm done obviously, but I found it to be a bit curious :Cat-Scratch:

    Best regards,

    Chip

    Posted

    I'm in the process of moving, and my collection is primarly located in several plastic tubs. I check periodically to make sure the moths don't use my cloth for a buffet, and thought I would take some pictures of a few of my tunics. I hope this starts a great thread on litzen (thats your opening Chip!).

    Regards

    Dave

    First are some infantry officer M-1910 waffenrocks. Once you decipher which units are shown here, your quiz is to figure out what is the common denominator to the grouping, aside from the fact that they have litzen and cyphers (hint: one tunic doesn't really belong in the grouping). Good luck!

    tunicsbrdskv0.jpg

    I saw this photo leading the thread with all these cyphers on shoulderboards and I thought they would fit right in. The oak leaves come from the same hate belt. I just wanted to show them on a thread with other similar cyphers.

    Posted

    OK, Claudius, my error. :speechless: But perhaps as Chris has mentioned, we should start a new thread on shoulder board devices. Lord knows there are plenty of them to talk about and besides, it's my main interest in collecting. :rolleyes:

    Chip

    Posted

    I don't have a problem with that. In fact, when I find the photos of the hate belt these little items came from I'll start a new post with it.

    • 5 months later...
    • 1 year later...
    Posted

    A silly question from a not really uniform guy....

    just which units could use litzen in WW1? Initially I thought only guard? I am thinking about a M15 jacket with M15 litzen...

    Well, there were lots of units that wore the collar Litzen on the M15 Bluse. In addition to the Prussian guard (with its handful of variations), the "guard" units of the other states often had them as well. Think about the Hessian Leibgarde IR115, the Baden Leib-Grenadier Regt.110, the Bavarian Inf.Leib Rgt., the Saxon Leib Gren.Rgt.100, etc. Then you have to throw in a lot of the officers of the technical corps, Eisenbahn, Flieger, etc. Then there are the traditions regiments that have them "just because", like the Mecklenburg Jäger Batl.Nr.14, the Hessian FAR.Nr.25, etc. The list is actually rather huge. Take a look at the charts in "Deutschlands Armee in feldgrauer Kriegs= und Friedensuniform". It shows all the Litzen worn on the Bluse and the Friedensuniform.

    Chip

    • 2 years later...
    Posted (edited)

    Well, that is an interesting question. I say that because I am wondering how you tell the difference between a Jäger Bn. Nr. 3 and a 3.Jäger Regt. officer's boards. I suppose if you were lucky enough to find a Bavarian officer's pair, you could definitely say it was from the regiment, but a pair with Prussian state "darts" is a different matter.

    A "bright" pair of Jäger 3 officer's boards sold on Ebay just a week or two ago.

    I have a pair of Leutnant boards and what I believe is the board of the unit commander, Ralf von Rango.

    Chip

    Edited by Chip
    • 4 months later...
    Posted

    Wie gehts:

    As an addition to this thread, here is a private-purchase officer's Bluse for the 5. Garde Regt zu Fuss. There were only three regiments in the German army which utilized the "old Prussian" style litzen on the Bluse; the 5.G.R.z.F, the G. Gren.R.5 and Fus.R.80. To delineate between the three units, both the 5.G.R.z.F and Fus. R. 80 used the muted silver Spiegel on the gray collar tabs, but Fus.R.80 was cyphered on the shoulder boards. This leaves 5.G.R.z.F and G.G.R.5, which both used the non-numbered/cyphered white-piped shoulder boards, but the Spiegel on G.GR.5 is a muted gold on the gray collar tabs. Hence, 5.G.R.z.F.

    Regards

    Dave

    • 1 year later...
    • 1 year later...
    Posted

    Something about Litzen and Kragenpatten : Early in the war the General Staff officers wear with the 1910 feldgrau no litzen but a collar patch crimson in colour . the doctors one similar but blue with red piping . the paymasters a blue one piped withe and so on . of course the Garde korps officers and all the other units mentioned previously went to war with their litzen over collar patches . The M 15 litzen for officers were all made of muted metalic thread of silver . over there a 2 3 mm wide braid in gold or silver corresponded with button colour . the officially matt grey litze for the rank and file carried a similar line of white or yellow cloth . and in some cases a fullung between the two litze a filling in red or other colour . cheers 

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