EK 1914 EK 1 & 2 documents to the Kaiserliche Marine

[Odulf]

Gentlemen,

I am very fond of award documents of medals an decorations to the German Navy.

Question: does any one know how many EK2 and EK1 have been awarded to Navy personnel for the Great War, and how that compares to the Army?

Next some EK2 documents from my collection.

Many EK documents were made up after Armistice, but this particular preleminary Besitzzeugnis was awarded to an Obermatrose o/b SM Linienschiff Nassau on 29-8-1917. The signature is of the ship's captain (from 12-1-1917 / 10-11-1918) Kapitän zur See Victor Reclam, who was pensioned in January 1920 as Konteradmiral.

SMS Nassau, with a complement of 1000, saw much action in 1916. The most note worthy were the bombardment of Great Yarmouth and Lowestoft in April; the Battle of Jutland, where combined artillery from SMS Nassau, Thüringen, Ostfriesland and Friedrich der Grosse sank the RN armoured cruiser Black Prince and where Nassau was hit by artillery shells and collided with the RN destroyer HMS Spitfire. In august she participaded in the failed break-out of the German Fleet to the North Sea.

Edited December 4, 2010 by Odulf

[Odulf]

The Besitzzeugnis of a Torpedo-Obermaschinist, post war dated 27-9-1919.

In 1919 he was submitted to the 1. Nordsee-Minensucht-Halbflottille / 2. Torpedoboots-Division.

It is interesting to note that the A5 size document has been torn off, as the top shows little teeth not unlike those found as edge on stamps.

Edited December 4, 2010 by Odulf

[Chris Boonzaier]

Nice!

I will get some of mine up tonight!

[Odulf]

A pre-set Besitzzeugnis EK2 printed in brown ink, of Matrosen-Artillerie-Regiment 3, to a Matrosen-Artilleristen who served in Western Flanders.

Notable is the signature of Marine-Zahlmeister (Naval Paymaster) Tirnstein who was obviously "mit Abwicklung der Geschäfte beauftragt" (in charge of liquidation of affairs).

[Chris Boonzaier]

Here is a pretty cool one to the Raider "Greif"... sunk on its first voyage, basically as they steamed out of port....

You can see a fantastic marine Death document to a man from the same ship here

http://gmic.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=3296&hl=greif&st=20

[Chris Boonzaier]

EK1 to a less than honorable U-Boot. The commander was the only U-Boot commander to be tried for war crimes. He did things like picking up the survivors with their lifeboots, machine gunning the life boats while the survivors were on the deck of the U-Boot, then diving and letting them drown... or torpedoing hospital ships...

[Chris Boonzaier]

another Uboot EK1, boat unknown

[Chris Boonzaier]

A rare bird indeed, and although it is a boot unit is is not really part of the navy, this man was just by chanced attached to them

FMK is the Freiwilligen Motorboot Korps..

See here

http://www.dsm.museum/Pubs/24_11.htm

[Chris Boonzaier]

marine infantry

[Chris Boonzaier]

SMS Seydlitz

[Odulf]

Quite stunning Chris, that turns me on

What puzzles me, is that some pre Armistice ceritifcates are printed Vorläufges-Besitzzeugnis and others are not (mine has even the word Vorläufiges added by pen). One would think that, considering that all certificates are provisionally in waiting for the end of the war and the definitive official Governmental certificates, all pre Armistice docments would me marked as such. But obviously they are not.

[Chris Boonzaier]

Quite stunning Chris, that turns me on

What puzzles me, is that some pre Armistice ceritifcates are printed Vorläufges-Besitzzeugnis and others are not (mine has even the word Vorläufiges added by pen). One would think that, considering that all certificates are provisionally in waiting for the end of the war and the definitive official Governmental certificates, all pre Armistice docments would me marked as such. But obviously they are not.

Hi,

It was a Kaiser decree sometime in early 1918 that all Vorläufiges-Besitzzeugnis should from that moment on be considered the final document, so you see wartime docs issued after that date with the Vorläufiges crossed out, and still issued during the war.

I consider WW1 to be the wild west epoch of EK docs, units seemed to have done whatever the hell they wanted.

The navy seems to have been the most consistent.

best

Chris

[Chris Boonzaier]

A few more....

[dedehansen]

On 3.12.2010 at 19:08, Chris Boonzaier said:

another Uboot EK1, boat unknown

Hi Chris,

it is T164 = Torpedoboot 164

https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_deutscher_Gro%C3%9Fer_Torpedoboote_(1898%E2%80%931919)

Kind regards
Andreas