The Man With The Missing Ernestine

[Paul C]

This ribbon bar came to live at my house on 3 February 2009. I found the original wearer on 23 June 2010, having spent 1 year 4 months and 20 days (which is why the Research Collective does not charge billable hours—least of all to ourselves) hunting him down in all the wrong places!

What do we have here? Prussian Iron Cross 2nd Class combatant 1914, Oldenburg Friedrich August Cross 2nd Class on combatant ribbon, Prussian Red Eagle Order, Prussian Crown Order, a Prussian long service award, and an Ernestine House Order.

What does this combination tell us?

Most commonly a Red Eagle/Crown pair is a 4th Class of the former and 3rd Class of the latter—a routine combination for a pre-1914 Oberstleutnant level officer. But…

There is no ribbon for the 1897 Centenary Medal, making such seniority impossible. Ohhhhhhhhkay,

How about 4th Classes of both, to a very lucky Captain level officer? That could be, with a circa 1920 XXV after wartime “double time.”

Next, the wearer was presumably an Oldenburger, since correct Prussian precedence would normally (but not always with “war-before-peace” being common practice) have put that “OK2” in next to last rather than 2nd place. What an Oldenburger was doing with a pre-war Ernestine is something only the Rolls could tell us.

You would think—unless you have personally hunted through thousands and thousands and thousands of Rank List pages—that a Red Eagle/Crown/Ernestine trio would not be that uncommon.

You would be correct dot dot dot

WITH all the OTHER things (like an 1897 Centenary Medal) that REGULAR officers racked up in their careers. Regular officers who were NOT serving in an Oldenburg unit with NO Army Corps or “Chief” connection between the four federal states.

But the obvious conclusion here, in the absence of that pesky Wilhelm I commemorative medal is—this was a Reserve or Landwehr officer.

Obvious, and distracting. Let this be a ghastly object lesson about doing things the long way around!

I’ve been doing such research for 3 decades now, and what this bar said to me was “Landwehr old boy.” Why? Because your average “young” Reserve officer had nothing but his part time long service award. I assumed, wrongly in this specific case, that only a much older officer with some really good “day job” would have acquired THREE peacetime Orders.

So I’ve wasted a year and a half looking back and forth through decades of Landwehr officers—back and forth because there were many retirees called back up for the war—all for naught.

[Paul C]

You guessed it—he was a Reserve and not a Landwehr officer. DOH !!!

And here he was in 1914

[Paul C]

Hauptmann dR Cassebohm wore the uniform of the Feldartillerie Schießschule, while resident in Landwehr Bezirk II Oldenburg.

Like many of his colleagues, his at that moment of discovery unknown civilian Day Job status was obviously higher than his part time military rank, since he has, indeed, got a Red Eagle 4 and Crown 3.

Next going backwards and forwards looking for HIM revealed that he had his “Captain-level” Red Eagle while still a Leutnant dR! Most perplexingly, his “Lieutenant-level” Knight 2nd Class Ernestine EH3b or as in these sources, HSEH3b—the lowest and so presumably FIRST Order he ever received was never listed until 1912, AFTER getting his “Lieutenant-Colonel-level” Crown 3.

Huh!?!?!

The often unreliable German Orders Almanac—a vanity press publication where recipients of awards willing to pay for their entries could “advertise” themselves, DOES show the Ernestine—as of 1908!!!!

[Paul C]

That source also gives us his first name—always a problem with official Prussian sources, job title, and address. Those are confirmed by the 1907 directory of Prussian Reserve officers—

[Paul C]

Now that those details have been extracted from the dark cobwebby corners of history, checking in the Prussian Orders Lists should, will, and does provide details on the award dates of both Prussian Orders and his status and actual jobs at the time:

Friedrich Cassebohm, Großherzoglich oldenburgischer Regierungs Assessor in Oldenburg, by 1911 an Amtshauptmann in Cloppenburg, Oldenburg:

He was initially commissioned as a reserve officer in 1st Guard Field Artillery Regiment, from which he and quite a few other reservists were transferred to reserves of the 4th Guard Field Artillery Regiment 1899/1900. He then transferred 1900/01 to reserve status with the Field Artillery Shooting School

Leutnant der Reserve 14.12.95

Oberleutnant dR 20.07.07 J2i

Hauptmann dR circa 1911/12

RAO4 12.03.06 as Regierungs Assessor in Oldenburg (1905 Orders List Supplement 2 page 43)

KO3 18.09.11 as Amtshauptmann (1905 Orders List Supplement 7 page 180)

EH3b was not from Altenburg BUT note that despite the fact that he must have received that Order first as the lowest class, Cassebohms official annual Army Rank List entries did not show it until 1912! More peculiarly, yet it WAS listed in the often unreliable vanity press German Orders Almanac 1908/09!

His home address 1908/09 was Ofenerstr. 24, Oldenburg.

The mystery remains as to how the OFFICIAL annual Army Rank Lists managed to miss his Order from Coburg or Meiningen (Altenburg does not come into question since the late Erhard Roth published its complete Rolls up to 1914) and yet the privately printed vanity press Orders Almanac got it right.

Here is his 1911 Prussian/Württemberg Rank List entry from 1911before his final peacetime awards had been presentedillustrating the LACK of any Ernestine before 1912 in the official source

Edited August 18, 2010 by Paul C

[Paul C]

All of which just goes to illustrate how difficult it is for those of us who do research to track down somebody from DEFECTIVE original OFFICIAL period primary sources, and how important it is to “triangulate” from as many different original sources as possible to FIND such errors. It is not easy, quick, or always even possible. Given the maddening Prussian omission of given names, with common family names, often “suspects” cannot be sorted out when “2” or “3” Nofirstname Müllers (say) might actually have been the same man!

Luckily there was only ONE Cassebohm!

Much remains still unknown—his date of birth, civil service “rank” dates, Captain’s commission date, wartime service, and pre-1909 award date of that Coburg or Meiningen EH3b. I only have those Rolls from 1912 on.

Out of the entire German army, Cassebohm was the ONLY officer (of ANY sort) with JUST the 4 peacetime awards shown… and from Oldenburg.

Sources:

Rangliste der Königlich Preußischen Armee und des XIII. (Königlich Württembergischen) Armeekorps: annual editions from 1895 to 1914

Rangliste der Offizier des Beurlaubenstandes der Königlich Preußischen Armee… Nach dem Stande vom 19. Oktober 1907

Königlicher Preußische Ordensliste 1905: Nachträge 2 (1906) and 7 (1911)

Deutscher Ordens-Almanach Jahrgang 1908/09

Roth, Erhard, “Verleihungen von zivilen und militärischen (bis 1914) Orden und Ehrenzeichen des Herzogtums Sachsen-Altenburg,” 2000.

My thanks to Paul for posting this since I am not online.

[dond]

Way to go Rick. :beer: