Republic of Ireland IRISH 1916 IRA SET On EBAY

[Brendan]

Brendan,

I share PKs suspicions, you do not need to cut the ring in order to remove or replace the ribbon. I should know, I have a considerable number of original 1916 Medals in my collection (I started a long time ago !). I suspect you were the victim of a switch when the ribbons were changed.

Do you have any photos of the earlier group which we can compare ?

Regards,

Paul

Hi Paul,

Unfortunately no photos, I only took photos for the Ebay auction and that was long after the ribbons were put on and the medals, they were also shown and left with other people so they could check them out with a view to buying them. They say the best lesson learned is the expensive one and I think I have learned a lesson from this experience.

Thanks,

Brendan.

[PKeating]

If it's any consolation, replacing originals with fakes is one of the classic scams. It's been done to a lot of German veterans. It has also been done to many museum collections, from the Imperial War Museum downwards. If there is someone out there advertising medal remounting services and switching medals like this, he ought to be exposed for it. Mind you, without proof, one cannot accuse people. If you were done over in this way, it's a very expensive lesson, given the prices these medals are fetching. It is a shame that you did not consign them for auction through Whyte's as they were. Serious buyers wouldn't have cared about rotten ribbons. eBay is really the last place to offer anything nice. Whenever I want to offload something of quality, a successful sale for top dollar is never more than two or three telephone calls away. Mind you, you got a good price for the RDF BWM/VM pair.

PK

[Brendan]

If it's any consolation, replacing originals with fakes is one of the classic scams. It's been done to a lot of German veterans. It has also been done to many museum collections, from the Imperial War Museum downwards. If there is someone out there advertising medal remounting services and switching medals like this, he ought to be exposed for it. Mind you, without proof, one cannot accuse people. If you were done over in this way, it's a very expensive lesson, given the prices these medals are fetching. It is a shame that you did not consign them for auction through Whyte's as they were. Serious buyers wouldn't have cared about rotten ribbons. eBay is really the last place to offer anything nice. Whenever I want to offload something of quality, a successful sale for top dollar is never more than two or three telephone calls away. Mind you, you got a good price for the RDF BWM/VM pair.

PK

Hi PK,

Proof is the thing, I would hate to go accusing someone of something like that only to find I had accused the wrong person and I would have to sell an awful lot of medals Dublin Fusiliers or others to pay my legal fees.

Thanks,

Brendan.

[Ulsterman]

Brendan:

I'm sorry you got burned.

I admire and respect your integrity in pulling the auction.

I've been very pleased with the other items I got from you.

[Kev in Deva]

Hallo Gentlemen,

opinions on this one as well please:

http://cgi.ebay.com/Eire-Ireland-WW1-War-S...1QQcmdZViewItem

Of particular interest is the fact its missing its suspension bar.

Kevin in Deva

[Kev in Deva]

I see the above mentioned medal is at US $519.00 with 5 bidders competing.

Kevin in Deva.

P.S. Another mystery is: why is every-thing-irish blocking me from bidding on his items? anything to do with querying about the 1916 Set at the start of this thread?? I do hope not.

Kevin in Deva

Brendans response via ebay:

"Hi Kevin,

For some reason some people who ask me questions through Ebay go on to my blocked bidder list, I have contacted Ebay about this several time but I might as well be talking to the wall, come to think of it I probably am talking to the wall. I have just checked my blocked bidder list and deleted 15 names off it, I have only put one on and that was a guy who didn't pay for an item. Tell Kevin in Deva I am sorry for the hassel.

Thanks, Brendan.

Kevin in Deva

Edited April 2, 2007 by Kev in Deva

[Paul L Murphy]

The 1917-21 Medal looks ok. It is unusual that it is without the top suspender. Personally I would wait until I found one with the top suspended since it is an integral part of the medal.

[PKeating]

I concur with Paul. It looks perfectly OK but any example commanding a substantial price ought to have the top suspender. Gosh...I remember when one could pick these up in London antique markets for around ?15.00 or ?20.00. I think Ireland's escapist attitude to her looming economic troubles, some smart types with a talent for hype, the 90th anniversary and a rash of people with more money than sense caused the enormous hikes in prices.

Interestingly enough, I approached Whyte's last year with a stone proof of a portrait of Sir Roger Casement, done in Dresden during Casement's last visit to Germany just before the Rising. The stone proof - a unique item - was done for a German propaganda book of the time and ended up in the collection of the director of the hotel where Casement stayed. Gustav R?cker collected autographs of some of the interesting people who stayed at the Europa Hof from the WW1 era to the 1930s and I have the collection. So, yes, the print appears to be signed by Casement. Whyte's estimate? About ?200.00. This was in the run-up to that Uprising sale. I had actually made a bet with a friend who was pushing me to cash in on the whole 90th anniversary hype that this would happen when I 'came from nowhere' and asked the auction house about this piece. Had I been a dealer or someone better-connected with them, I expect the estimate would have been somewhat higher. Not that I wish to cast aspersions. Maybe the chap at Whyte's failed to grasp the historical importance of the piece... But I won my bet, which I made on the basis of my highly jaded attitude to auctioneers in general.

At the end of the day, far more of these medals were minted than ever awarded. Of course, a set with verifiable provenance and related ephemera will always have a substantial value, particularly if the recipient happened to be well known or well-connected. However, I would challenge $500-plus for an unattributable, incomplete War of Independence Service Medal.

PK

Edited April 2, 2007 by PKeating

[Brendan]

I concur with Paul. It looks perfectly OK but any example commanding a substantial price ought to have the top suspender. Gosh...I remember when one could pick these up in London antique markets for around ?15.00 or ?20.00. I think Ireland's escapist attitude to her looming economic troubles, some smart types with a talent for hype, the 90th anniversary and a rash of people with more money than sense caused the enormous hikes in prices.

Interestingly enough, I approached Whyte's last year with a stone proof of a portrait of Sir Roger Casement, done in Dresden during Casement's last visit to Germany just before the Rising. The stone proof - a unique item - was done for a German propaganda book of the time and ended up in the collection of the director of the hotel where Casement stayed. Gustav R?cker collected autographs of some of the interesting people who stayed at the Europa Hof from the WW1 era to the 1930s and I have the collection. So, yes, the print appears to be signed by Casement. Whyte's estimate? About ?200.00. This was in the run-up to that Uprising sale. I had actually made a bet with a friend who was pushing me to cash in on the whole 90th anniversary hype that this would happen when I 'came from nowhere' and asked the auction house about this piece. Had I been a dealer or someone better-connected with them, I expect the estimate would have been somewhat higher. Not that I wish to cast aspersions. Maybe the chap at Whyte's failed to grasp the historical importance of the piece... But I won my bet, which I made on the basis of my highly jaded attitude to auctioneers in general.

At the end of the day, far more of these medals were minted than ever awarded. Of course, a set with verifiable provenance and related ephemera will always have a substantial value, particularly if the recipient happened to be well known or well-connected. However, I would challenge $500-plus for an unattributable, incomplete War of Independence Service Medal.

PK

I wouldn't pay to much heed to Whyte's, I sold 2 oil on canvas paintings of 2 obscure English Lords with them a few years ago, their estimate was 80 to 150 Euro, the paintings sold for 11,800 Euro, when I queried the amount of commission they charged they said it was for their expert advice.

I was reading through Western Militaria section and saw a question from a member requesting a copy of the 1916 Roll of Honour. Being new to the board I wasn't sure if I should reply because the message was nearly a year old and I wasn't sure how long a topic remains active.

The member requesting the Roll was given the incorrect information that there was no Roll available. In 1966, when the 1916 commemoration medal was issued the National Museum of Ireland decided to put together a Roll of Honour of those who took part in the 1916 Rising. It took over 5 years to produce the Roll and when it was published there was much consternation and debate. The Museum applied the same criteria to be included on the Roll as was applied to be eligible to receive the 1916 medal.

There were 2411 1916 medals issued, there are 1468 names on the Roll of Honour, a discrepancy of 943 medals. The Roll only includes the action that took place in Dublin so the discrepancy was put down to medals being awarded for actions that took place outside of Dublin. The Museum did examine the actions that took place in Galway, Cork and any other action that was alleged to have taken place during the qualifying period but they decided that the actions were either of no significance or there was insufficient evidence to prove the action took place at all.

Another interesting point is that many who qualified for the medal refused to accept it. My own Grandfather fought in both the 1916 Rising (his name is on the Honour Roll) and in the War of Independence. My Grandfather firmly believed that medals should not be issued until the war was over; he also served time in prison in 1943 for assaulting a local dignitary for wearing a Truce Medal with Bar when my Grandfather knew that this dignitary had not taken part in any military action during the War of Independence and had been targeted by my Grandfather's IRA unit during the War because he was a know informer.

Another topic of interest for those interested in the background to these medals is the Irish national and local newspapers, particularly the letters to the editor page. The newspapers of both 1942 and 1966 contain a raft of letters from veterans of 1916 and others complaining that 1916 medals were being awarded to people who spent Easter Week 1916 under the bed or down the local police station telling tales.

The Roll has been published in various books, The 1916 Proclamation by John O'Connor, re-issued in 1999 and still available, contains the Roll. Wouldn't it be just awful to discover that the medal you had paid all that money for was awarded to someone who had done nothing during the Rising or even worse had actually been on the other side?

Brendan

[PKeating]

Fascinating information, Brendan! There is, by the way, no problem with resurrecting old threads if you have new information pertaining to the subject matter.

You said what I hesitated to say, that it is actually very hard to ascertain the participation of someone in the 1916 Uprising, to say nothing of the War of Independence (aka Anglo-Irish War) and the Civil War. In rare cases where a veteran was known and there is supporting documentation, it is a different matter but what is to stop some intelligent, talented forger from creating 1916 groups from scratch, with original medals, when prices in excess of ?20,000.00 provide the incentive?

I have seen very cleverly faked German WW2 Knight's Cross or elite unit groups bought by fairly experienced collectors who only found out by chance, because of some anomaly or error in the documents, spotted by an informed third party. With an Irish 1916 group, it would appear that one could fabricate a participant, using some genuine period letters, a pension book from the 1940s or 1950, an old driving licence, and a few other things, with a few additions and enhancements indicating that he was in Boland's or some such place during the fighting, along with a photo of a couple of old geezers wearing their 1941-issue medals, and a pair of original medals. Outlay? Well, prices have risen so the 1916 medal would cost a bit but let's say our forger lays out a total of three or four grand in cash, along with his time. The 400% to 500% profit makes it viable.

As you so rightly point out, in addition, who can say if a man who genuinely received a medal or the two medals in the 1940s was a genuine veteran? In a few documented cases, where the chap was known and people attested to his participation, one can be sure but how many such cases are there? A lot of the real Men of 1916 never had medals. Nor did many of the fellows involved in the War of Independence and the Civil War. I knew many of them as a kid in Dublin in the 1960s. I remember one of them, at my parents' house in Upper Mount Street in 1966, just after the unveiling of the Wolfe Tone Memorial which my father designed, making sneering remarks about the massed ranks of "veterans" who turned up to hear Eamonn de Valera's speech. As far as he and his mates were concerned, they were what we now describe as "Walts". He was somewhat blunter in his terminology. And he was a Boland's veteran. He's in some of the news photos. He really "was there".

Some idea of the strength and vehemence of their remarks can be gleaned from how clear my memory of it remains, even though I was just five years old at the time. Of course, as I grew older and more interested, I would ask them to tell me stories and, like all genuine veterans, they tended to steer clear of nasty stuff and "heroics". They preferred to remember the good times...but as good times were rather far and few between for them during the wars, they didn't have a lot to tell a young lad. One story Paddy - shan't give his surname here in case the medals he never bothered getting turn up at Whyte's! - told me concerned a young girl who turned up at Boland's asking for some bread, as all the bakers had closed up after selling out. The young girl was a great-aunt of mine by marriage and was able to confirm the incident.

This is not to say that all applicants for these medals were Walts and poseurs. They certainly weren't. But an alarming number of these medals appear to have been handed out to bullsh1tters. It's rather like French Resistance medals. I'm sure that were one to sit, say, thirty recipients down in a room to fill out a questionnaire related to things any real veteran would know, many would fail it and not because of encroaching senility! They wouldn't be able to tell you, for example, how to load or field-strip the sort of weapons their units used. It's like all these fake paratroopers one meets: when you pose some simple questions, they flunk the test. It's too late to address the issue where these Irish medals are concerned but I think anyone contemplating the purchase of such medals should be very wary, especially in the aftermath of the Whyte's' sales.

PK

Edited April 2, 2007 by PKeating

[Ulsterman]

Just to add my tuppence here. twenty-fve odd years ago I interviewed a very old member of the OIRA on the Falls Road in Belfast. He said the same things as Prosper-that many "1916 IRA vets" were posers and not actually here. He'd been an 8 year old message runner and "biscuit-getter" (his words) around Trinity college and was the first person to really tell me about how bitter the Civil War had actually been. It knocked me over.

Still, $700 US for a "Tan War' Medal is just silly. Off to eBay with mine.

[Danny70]

Hi All...

Thought I would add this into this thread for future reference... I finally got around to visiting my friends collection to take some more photographs of the 1916 medals. Unfortunately, the light was bad so this photograph is a little blurred, but the size of the medal can be seen against the measuring tape. I had no finer way of measuring it and could not weigh it either, but IMO it seemed to be a fraction of a millimetre under 40mm across.

Regards - Danny

[Irish1916]

Gentlemen, I would like to add some information to this forum, but do so with caution, due to the high profile and knowledge of its contributors.

I had an opportunity to examine this 1916 medal in detail and compare its size and weight against the average size and weight of my collection. I have found in the past that there are small percentage differences between the proven originals.

I have posted these sizes (in a per cent format only, to avoid adding further information to any forger) on my web site along with photographs of fake WISM and 1971 anniversary medals.

I would appreciate if any one has one of the ?Australian? fake 1916?s to make contact as I don?t think this 1916 could be one of the Australian examples as these have been described as obvious fakes and I would not have considered this too obvious (perhaps through lack of experience ?). I would be interested to compare the weight and size of this ?fake? with an Australian fake.

The pictures are at http://www.theeasterrising.eu/030%20Replicas/Replicas.htm

It is with trepidation that I join this, my first forum, but I hope I have added to your discussion.

Regards

Paul

Link To My Fake Medal Web Page

[Ed_Haynes]

Thanks for this, Paul. And welcome.

[PKeating]

As a fellow Dub, albeit ex-pat, it is great to see Ireland's small but active community of students, historians and collectors "coming out of the woodwork". Welcome Paul! And a very interesting post too! Small differences in external dimensions and weight can often be attributed to hand-finishing, even in pieces emanating from the same mint or medallist, particularly back then. I think the problem with this piece was its marked difference in size, suggesting a casting from an original. I am sure that there are plenty of pikeys in Ireland with the requisite skills to make convincing cast fakes for people who have never seen an original example of this very, very rare medal.

PK

[Ceallach]

Gentlemen, I would like to add some information to this forum, but do so with caution, due to the high profile and knowledge of its contributors.

It is with trepidation that I join this, my first forum, but I hope I have added to your discussion.

Regards

Paul

Link To My Fake Medal Web Page

Welcome on board Paul.

An Ceallach

[Paul L Murphy]

Another thing to bear in mind is that the later strikings are thicker than the original 1941 pieces, but are completely original. When I am back in ireland I will try to go through my stuff and weigh, measure the lot since I have examples of both types.

[Danny70]

It is with trepidation that I join this, my first forum, but I hope I have added to your discussion.

Regards

Paul

Welcome to GMIC Paul,

It's good to have you here, and thanks for the link to your website.

I haven't previously seen pictures comparing these medals with the fakes. Thanks for giving me the opportunity.

Regards - Danny

[Irish1916]

Thank you Paul, PK and other emails and phone calls, what an impact a posting to this forum can have.

I have measured all my 1916 medals and can concur that the latter are all slightly thicker than the earlier examples. I have compiled a table on this subject but don't feel it would be wise to publish such accurate information in the public domain.

The weight was the most noticeable difference when you had this piece in your hand; one of my examples is "rounded" at the end of its extremities probably more from wear and handling than the hand finishing process, although this hand finishing must also be taken into account.

The six or so research requests (received from this and one other forum) have all been replied to directly, I was asked to publish the full data base but I would like to reiterate that this WILL NOT happen. I will answer any request personally if I have any data that I fell is theirs.

Finally the link to the fake medals that I posted does now not work, sorry. I should have posted a link to my home page and not a sub-directory as it has been moved. So the correct link that should work permanently is www.TheEasterRising.eu

Thank you all for your support on this web site project, it makes it all the more worthwhile to get so much positive feedback

Corrected Link to Visit My Website