EK 1914 Oldenburg Frederick August 1st Class

[Steve campbell]

Just picked up this nice Oldenburg FA cross in first class. You don't see these around as much as they are rarer than Iron Crosses. This one is pretty nice and is a good compliment to my EK collection. Any ideas what these are made of?

[Steve campbell]

The rear. This one is highly vaulted. Any ideas on the maker?

Edited June 5, 2007 by Steve campbell

[Tom Y]

The wartime ones were blackened iron and had a concave back.Many of the later ones were painted brass with a flat back like yours..

Edited June 5, 2007 by Tom Y

[Steve campbell]

I believe this is a later one. It looks to be painted brass to me also. Thanks. Any idea how many of these were made later. There is said to be under 7000 awarded.

[Tom Y]

Here's a wartime issue one.

[Steve campbell]

Nice. Another one to add to the wish list.

[Mike K]

The wartime ones were blackened iron and had a concave back.Many of the later ones were painted brass with a flat back like yours..

The wartime examples attributed to KNAUER were blackened iron and one of thie variants had the central concave dish as imaged above. Wartime Meck-Schwerin and Lippe-Detmold first class crosses (attributed, I've read, to Zimmermann, Stuttgart) were produced in tombak and use the same distinctive hardware as the vaulted Oldenburger example Steve has shown. Personally I think there is a good chance the Oldenburger FA1X in this thead has a good chance of being wartime produced, but by a much less common maker.

Regards

Mike

[Steve campbell]

Thanks. This is sounding better all the time.

[Gerd Becker]

In my opinion the Oldenburg FA-Cross 1st class is the nicest designed of the EK-"equivalents", especially the pinback-awards. Its much more an "iron cross" than the IC itself also.

[Steve campbell]

I love it. I have it in with my Iron Crosses case, the only non EK there and it really fits in nicely. I'm going to be looking for more of these German States awards, within budgetary means of course, because some are quite pricey.