ID Possible?

[Wild Card]

Gentlemen,

In view of the current interest of, and attention to, things Lippe, I was wondering if anyone might be able to figure out who?s medal bar this might be:

1. 1914 EK

2. Lippe-Detmold war merit cross

3. Lippe-Detmold golden merit medal

4 Lippe-Detmold military merit medal ribbon with swords affixed

5. Lippe-Detmold silver merit medal

6. Lippe-Detmold 1897 Graf Regent medal

7. Lippe-Detmold 1905 enthronement remembrance medal

8. Saxony Friedrich-August medal

9. Saxon Duchies Ernestine House Order, Meiningen silver merit medal

10. Netherlands Bronze merit medal to the Order of the House of Orange

Many thanks in advance for your interest and assistance.

Best wishes,

Wild Card

[Jacky]

To me, it shouts something like a lippisch court-servant....

As I find the houseorder of Orange mostly on medal-bars/frackenspangen of foreign courtservants.

Concerning the bronze merit medal of the houseorder of orange, the royal household has it's own library with receipments, but whether they will help you with your inquiry, that's something I wouldn't put my money on it!

My knowledge about identification stops there, sorry.

Edited April 9, 2007 by Jacky

[Herr General]

I recently donated some items to the Royal House Archive and am in contact with the head of that department. I will try to inform about the lists of this medal!

[Paul C]

My guess, like others, is that this bar is to some type of court or civil official in Lippe. Since there are at least 2 wartime awards I think he was also a reserve or landswehr officer. The problem is that the ranklists do not list any of the civilian Lippe awards. I checked the DOA 1908/09 and it does list the civilian Lippe awards. So to ID the bar a beginning list would be needed and checked against DOA entries. The lack of any service time award tells me that the person was young enough to have served in the war. So I believe the place to start is the reserve section of the 1914 Prussian ranklists and find someone with the Netherland award and then look for his DOA entry. I'll see what I can find.

[Ulsterman]

Interesting missing #4-that's the key.Odd that there are no other "foreign awards".

Edited April 9, 2007 by Ulsterman

[Herr General]

Lippe was rulled in those days (wwI) by the family Lippe-Biesterfeld. Could there be some connection with the Prince who married the Dutch Crown Princess?

[Guest Rick Research]

I've finished ALL the Lippe-Detmold Gold Merit Medals. Of those 171, I could immediately discard 131 on the basis of having other Lippe awards, returns after death, being foreigners and so on.

Of the 40 which did not immediately sort out,

there were exactly 6 who ALSO had the Silver Merit Medal. (I've gone through the almost 600 Silver Medals looking for those 40. Am typing up the SVMs now.)

I'll return to them, but after a brief digression for the Georg issue Saxe-Meiningen Ernestine Silver Medal-- I have the rolls for that, but only from April 1911 on. There were NO Lippe recipients from April 1911, so that will be BEFORE that.

OK, of the SIX double Lippe-Detmold Merit Medal recipients:

I do not have the statutes for those, but I believe that normally a silver holder would have had to return it when the gold was received BUT there are absolutely NO notations for promotion returns, only for those after a recipeint's death.

TWO of the six potential suspects I believe can be safely excluded on grounds of age--

G?rtner Ernst H?wing was born in 1855 and

Siedemeister Heinrich Meier was born in 1854

Sixty year olds being wounded in combat 1914/15 does not seem plausible for the pair above.

That leaves FOUR:

1) Leibj?ger Paul GOSCHIN was born in Schierzig Kreis Meseritz 15 August 1881. He received his SVM 30.5.11 and the GVM 11.11.18. But he would only have been 16 in 1897, so I don't know if he could have received the 1897 Einzug Medal, even if already a court hunter.

2) Oberg?rtner Wilhelm HEISE was born in Detmold 22 January 1872. He received his SVM 30.5.10 and his GVM 11.11.18.

3) K?chenkalefaktor Heinrich HILDEBRAND was born in Heidenoldendorf 11 October 1872. He received his SVM 30.5.08 and his GVM 11.11.18.

and

4) Wagenmeister und Bauf?hrer Adolf STAMM was born in Blomberg 22 July 1877. He received his SVM 19.12.11 and his GVM on 14 March 1914.

Goschin and Stamm were the sort of minor entourage figures who might have packed up and gone along with the Prince on his travels, though even Heise and Hildebrand were the sorts who might have gotten a present from a visiting royal without ever leaving home. There's no way to tell with "Lakai" awards.

It's one of these four. My bet would be on either Goschin or Stamm as of an age to have seen some sort of frontline service, been wounded, and then back to their Court jobs by war's end. Heise and Hildebrand were both already 46 in 1914, which would have placed them in the Landsturm category from day 1 of the war and so less likely than the other two for THREE wartime frontline awards, I'd say.

Unfortunately I do not have the rolls for the disputed succession medals of 1897 and 1905, which would almost certainly confirm or exclude "suspects" without the Meiningen or Dutch rolls.

4's a lot better than 171.

If I had to gamble, despite his youth in 1897, my bet would be on GOSCHIN as being the ONLY one of these four in the Prince's personal household. Maybe he lined up with the other personal body servants in the Schloss driveway on accession day in 1897 to tug his forelock. IF a silver was returned on receiving a gold, ONLY Stamm did not receive his gold in the chaos of the last day of the war when Detmold awards were handed over by the boxload in all grades of all awards.

[Solomon]

Please wait two weeks

I?ll visit the archive in Detmold again and I?ll try to get a copy of the award rolls for the 1905 enthronement remembrance medal.

My bet would be Mr. Paul Goschin, I know a quite similar medalbar.

(military merit medal - golden medal Leopold Order - Hindenburg-cross)

The owner (I?m quite sure I identified it correct) was a "Forstaufseher" (Rick, please look at No. 66 ).

So, give me some time and the ID of this very nice bar will be solved.

Greetings

Solomon

[Guest Rick Research]

Yup, Herr Glocksin got nothing on all the rolls BUT that extremely unusual solo Leopold Gold Medal-- on 11.11.18 of course-- at age 27.

Very strange things were handed out in a mad rush on 11 November 1918. The clerk lost it on two pages, hand shaking so bad everything is double written in a terrible, psychologically revealing bit of calligraphy.

[saschaw]

As the Military Merit Medal has been removed from the bar, I think it is his war time bar, which made it impossible to be a 1918 award of the Golden Merit Medal. Might be right correct input, or might not be ...

Great bar nontheless ...

[Solomon]

As the Military Merit Medal has been removed from the bar, I think it is his war time bar, which made it impossible to be a 1918 award of the Golden Merit Medal. Might be right correct input, or might not be ...

Great bar nontheless ...

Tztz, I didn?t teach you well in awards of Lippe-Detmold...

At the medalbar, I mentioned, there you can find also the military merit medal (with swords, also on the ribbon) and the golden merit medal (awarded in November 1918!!!).

Sure, it is a war time bar, but the former owner might be a "Lakai", who served at the front and at the court of the Prince...

for example as a forrest worker ("Forstaufseher" = the possible owner of the bar I described) or as a hunter ("Leibj?ger").

P.S. Please remember the date of the award: November, 11th of 1918...

It?s the date of the resignation/abdication of the prince of Lippe-Detmold.

Greetings

Solomon

Edited April 10, 2007 by Solomon

[saschaw]

Hmm, but weird then, that just one is missing ...

P.S. Please remember the date of the award: November, 11th of 1918...

It?s the date of the resignation/abdication of the prince of Lippe-Detmold.

Yes, but is it sure, that all these awards were actually made on this date, or maybe some later and said to be on this date? We know this from the last day of Germans in Turkey in 1918, when maaaany Ottoman awards (most OWMs) were given by this date, but actually they were awarded later, with documents saying it was in this "last day".

[Solomon]

Hmm, but weird then, that just one is missing ...

Do you mean the military merit medal, which is missing???

It?s absolute correct that this medal isn?t any longer at this medalbar

The former owner awarded the war merit cross Lippe-Detmold...and he had to return this medal!

(I know, many didn?t do that...but he did, as the statutes told him).

The medal is also mounted at the correct place...before the silver merit medal and after the golden.

So everything is fine

Greetings

Solomon

[Guest Rick Research]

I would say, having spent three months working through the Rolls, that the many hundreds of awards made on 11 November 1918 WERE made on that day. At one point the elderly clerk was so overcome by emotion that his handwriting completely fell apart and he had to be replaced by another scribe. Maybe he was simply so worn out from massive writing all on that final day that he couldn't keep up. Or perhaps it was so obviously the end of his world that he couldn't continue. But the handwriting in the rolls is so consistent-- with tiny, microscopic "economy" use of obviously sub-standard "War Ink" that I am sure these were NOT backdated and slowly entered in afterwards. Lippe's awards system continued functioning right up until the very end, and as the perfectly preserved and maintained rolls demonstrate to this day, Lippe's archive personnel have never ceased taking excellent care of their records. The Rolls contain notations on returns well into the 1930s, so somebody kept CURRENT records.

It would be interesting to see some award documents from the 11 November 1918 bestowals

but then ALL Lippe-Detmold documents are so frustratingly rare that I haven't seen any.

[Solomon]

It would be interesting to see some award documents from the 11 November 1918 bestowals

but then ALL Lippe-Detmold documents are so frustratingly rare that I haven't seen any.

Here is the interesting detail from the signed receipt of the golden merit medal of the Leopold Order from Max Glocksin (No. 66).

He awarded the medal on Novemebr, 11th 1918 and got the fitting document together with the statutes on October, 16th of 1919.

The Lippe-Detmold documents are so rare, because I?m buying everything I?ll get

I just bought two days ago a nice award document for the war merit cross incl. the paper-role in which it was sent to the recipient

Greetings

Solomon

Edited April 10, 2007 by Solomon

[Guest Rick Research]

HEYYYYYY!!!! I am not going to retype all the Rolls because the reciepts list ... religion!

So, like other examples you've been able to show us from your collection, awards were handed out on the date shown in the rolls, but the Fancy Paperwork followed along LATER. The same thing happened with Prussian Kriegshilfsdienst Crosses during and after the war-- handed out and THEN the certificates got done... eventually.

[Wild Card]

Gentlemen,

I don?t know how you do it.

Aside from a big thank you, I have to say that you guys are truly amazing!

Sincerely,

Wild Card

[Solomon]

Sixty year olds being wounded in combat 1914/15 does not seem plausible for the pair above.

That leaves FOUR:

1) Leibj?ger Paul GOSCHIN was born in Schierzig Kreis Meseritz 15 August 1881. He received his SVM 30.5.11 and the GVM 11.11.18. But he would only have been 16 in 1897, so I don't know if he could have received the 1897 Einzug Medal, even if already a court hunter.

2) Oberg?rtner Wilhelm HEISE was born in Detmold 22 January 1872. He received his SVM 30.5.10 and his GVM 11.11.18.

3) K?chenkalefaktor Heinrich HILDEBRAND was born in Heidenoldendorf 11 October 1872. He received his SVM 30.5.08 and his GVM 11.11.18.

and

4) Wagenmeister und Bauf?hrer Adolf STAMM was born in Blomberg 22 July 1877. He received his SVM 19.12.11 and his GVM on 14 March 1914.

And the winner is.........

Oh noooo.....

There are two possible winners:

1) Paul Goschin, F?rstlicher Leibj?ger in Detmold

2) Heinrich Hildebrand, K?chenkalefaktor

Both got the 1905-medal

I?ll scan the list of the recipients for Rick, so he is able to make a cross-check.

Sorry, there is still no ID possible...

Greetings

Solomon

[Guest Rick Research]

Yessssss there issssssssss. You KNOW what the answer is...

(Theme from the movie "Jaws")

Yes. The 1897 Einzug Medal Roll.

[Solomon]

Yes. The 1897 Einzug Medal Roll.

And this roll doesn?t exist

There are only the signed receipts...only about 1100 papers with terrible handwriting.

But there is another possibility, much easier to do:

...finding the signed receipt of the golden merit medal, where both listed their other awards...

A job, which I?ll have to do when I?ll go to Detmold again

Greetings

Solomon

[Guest Rick Research]

1,100 entries with terrible handwriting's not thaaaaaaaaaaaat bad.