Hungarian Medal with Crown (Signum Laudis) with a miniature on the ribbon

[Lukasz Gaszewski]

Among many peculiarities of the award system of the Kingdom of Hungary (1920-1946), there was one regarding the Hungarian Medal with the Crown, a continuation of the Austro-Hungarian Signum Laudis.

At the end of WWI, many soldiers had been presented to A-H decorations, but due to the dissolution of the Empire they never received them. In 1930 Regent Horthy established a special type of the Hungarian Medal with the Crown for these soldiers. On the ribbon of a bronze medal there was a miniature of the appropriate Austro-Hungarian award (usually the Cross of Military Merit or Signum Laudis) the person was eligible for. The ribbon should be of the military type: green, with narrow white and red edges.

And here is my question: I have seen several Medals with the Crown with appropriate miniatures, albeit on the Hungarian war ribbon (red with narrow white and red edges) rather than on the military ribbon. There were too many of them to be all fakes. This applied also to ribbon bars, worn instead of the medals. I have been looking for hard and long, but have been unable to find any explanation. Does anybody know if there was a regulation, introducing the war ribbon in the place of the military ribbon in such cases?

I will owe a lot for explanation.

Lukasz

[hunyadi]

Acording to the "Large Hungarian Medals Book" and my rough translation skills. The war time ribbon (red central) ribbon was awarded to those whose paperwork and review process were still not completed by 1939. I would say that these type of awards are very rare, and I would be suspect of such a large ammount. I do know that a certain Hungarian firm has been manufacturing very good reproductions for decades now....

[Lukasz Gaszewski]

Thank you and excuse late replay. I have found out that the replacement was based on the Regent's decision of 1940. The same decision also authorized wearing swords on the ribbon if the recipient had been eligible. I am not sure if the Regent's regulation included also those who had received the medal with miniature before 1940, but I think that at least some of them replaced the military ribbon with the war ribbon, too.