Soviet Strange Order of the Red Banner?

[order_of_victory]

Greetings,

As this is my first first post please let me introduce my self, Iam Soviet Medal collector form the North West of England. I own a colection of over 68 medal and orders, 12 of the pieces are currently in the Lancahsire museum as part of a WWII exabition.

During my time collecting Soviet Medals I have aquired some odd medals. One of these appears to be a very early order of the Red Banner of Red Banner of Labour see attached pic.

If any one has any information on this Order please let me know.

Order Of Victory

[Guest Rick Research]

This is a 7 March 1932 award of the Transcaucasian Federal Socialist Republic, which was dissolved in 1936 as a Union Republic. Unfortunately this serial number is one NOT known to belong to the list of recipients. (Their NAMES and DATES of awards are known from period publications, but matching numbers are known in only a few cases where the documents still exist.)

132 were awarded, though a known award #d 146 is known, suggesting there were additional pre-numbered Orders available as extra stock. Kutsenko and Smirnov report 12 known serial numbers and "no more than 15 known to exist."

Um, make that 16, now.

CONGRATULATIONS!!!!!

[order_of_victory]

Well thats better than I thought!

Thanks very much for that!

[Chuck In Oregon]

Hello O/V

Welcome to the forum. You have sure made an impressive start.

That is an incredible order. I am not qualified to debate its bona fides. I can only say that it would be the highlight of most advanced collections.

Is there a story behind how you found it?

I hope that you will keep on sharing with us.

Chuck

[Guest Rick Research]

Me neither, I hasten to add. I am looking at the Republican Orders BOOK and have ZERO expertise as to originality or not.

Given the enormous price all the pre-WW2 Republican Orders are now going for and their generally crude construction, there will inevitably be fakes out there.

It's not an area I would advise getting into, at trade for a new car each prices.

[Vatjan]

Hi guys,

I'm not an expert either, far from it.

I know for fact that these orders are extensively faked, and the order above is probably one of these fakes.

I took the following pix in the Kutsenko's book on republican orders and from Herfurth's catalogue 4th edition.

The details of the above order do not really correspond to these from the books.

Sorry for being to be the bearer of bad news.

First off, Herfurth

Edited January 29, 2006 by vatjan

[Vatjan]

Kutsenko's book on Republican orders

[Bryan]

Is there a story behind how you found it?

It looks like it comes from eBay.

[HuliganRS]

This is another of the "fake" Republican awards. They all seem to share common reverse construction.

Rusty.

[order_of_victory]

Hi

Well I certainly seem to have starded somthing with the medal.

The medal did come off ebay and off the same seller I also aquired a order of the Red Banner of Labour Variation 1 Type 2 see pic's.

Now what do you think of that!

[HuliganRS]

Just as fake as the Republican Order!

The obvious stuff from these pics:

The whole Reverse is BAD.

Mint Mark should be part of the medal (Not Stamped)

S/N is stamped with wrong digit dies

The ring holding the screwplate should be flat

The dish in the middle is too deep

The whole reverse field is too smooth

The obverse pic is too dark for any kind of good analasys.

Rusty.

P.S. You didn't buy the OGPWII from this seller did you?

[order_of_victory]

Hi

No the GPW II didnt come from that seller.

Im not sure about the Red Banner of Labour because McDaniel doesnt list there being any fakes of the Type 1 Veration 2 and I have never seen another fake one!

[Vatjan]

Unfortunately, they are commonly faked.

Also, McDaniels' book dates from 1997, a lot has changes since, mostly for worse

Jan

[Stogieman]

It will be interesting to see where your OGPW2 ends up. I tried very hard to find fault with it last night. The pictures just are not clear enough for me to be 100% and my exposure to these is limited at best. Good Luck and Welcome to The Forum!!

[HuliganRS]

I'm interested in it myself and the only problem I could see from those scans is that the enamel is replaced on the upper arm.

Rusty.

[Stogieman]

Rusty, sorry you did not get the OPW2, but it still went for a bargain!

[HuliganRS]

The more I looked at it, something wasn't just right!

It looked good but I had a weird feeling about it...

I decided to pass. I can get a real one for about $150 more.

Rusty.

[Stogieman]

Igor has a very nice one, but damaged for not much more. I try to stay away from damaged unless it's part of the group.

[HuliganRS]

Rick,

Sadly more than 90% have upper ray enamel missing! There are a few out there that are OK but they are few an far in between!

Most damaged ones have had that enamel replaced!

I've been collecting for a while and have seen a handfull with full enamel still present...

Rusty.

[Stogieman]

which begats an interesting side-bar question. There's so many "period repaired" pieces floating around. It must have been quite an industry. How much is value/desireability affected by these repairs?

[HuliganRS]

Rick,

That's in the eye of the beholder.

Original enamel comands a premium. What that premium is is up to the seller.

Rusty.

[NavyFCO]

which begats an interesting side-bar question. There's so many "period repaired" pieces floating around. It must have been quite an industry. How much is value/desireability affected by these repairs?

I think much of that is personal preference. First, it's tough to tell whether something was repaired by the vet or by a collector. I once bought a group (and have since sold it) where two of the awards were screwbacks that had been converted by the vet to hanging. A collector had attempted to re-convert them back to screwback, but instead ended up drilling big divots in the back of the medals before giving up and selling the group. I got the group, took the awards to my family jeweler who then added a 14K gold loop to one and a sterling silver loop to the other (so they were the right matching materials). In this case, the awards had been "messed with" by two collectors and the vet himself.

Broken enamel was pretty common on Soviet awards. Figure that many of them were worn in combat and were just not treated all that well. I've dropped my fair share of awards (two) and have seen the enamel break out of them... just imagine all the awards that were dropped over time by either their owners, or the kids playing with them, etc.... I was visiting one family in Russia and they pulled out their grandfather's awards, which included a Lenin. The group was nicely mounted, except for the Lenin that was just loose in the box and getting pretty beat up from randomly hitting the other medals as the box was moved around. Go figure.

I haven't seen too many good enamel repair jobs come out of Russia, though I do know of at least one US-based dealer that has a contact that can make "near" perfect repairs of the enamel - so good, in fact, that the repairs pass most collector's inspections of the repaired pieces.

As far as desireability, going back to the top of this post, I think it's mostly just personal preference. I like awards with some "wear" to them. To me, it adds character. I love getting groups with awards that have damaged pieces and a photo of the vet wearing that exact damaged piece. That just goes to even further the connection with the vet in my opinion.

To many collectors though, they want their awards "perfect". Those are the same ones that give Rick R. a bit of heartburn as they're normally the ones that buy a group because of the "rare perfect condition version of X" award, and can care less about the WHY of the group. I even once sold a group to a guy and not a few weeks later saw all of the vet's other awards and documents up on eBay as the collector only wanted the single "rare" example of a certain award in the group! (Luckily, I was able to convince him to keep the group together, but how many more are like that out there???)

Perfect condition awards will always bring a premium, but at the same time, you need to determine why you're collecting... for condition or history? Sometimes they go hand in hand, but many other times that's not the case.

My two cents...

Dave

[order_of_victory]

Rusty,

The OGPWII wasn't fake I had two of them in my collection they both looked a felt the same and both are genune and both came from very good dealers.

Also I would never sell a fake as orginal if I had thought there was something wrong with the medal it would have been stated on the listing. I must agree the enamle was a bit iffy on the top ray but I have yet to see a perfect one that wasnt a fake.

Order of Victory

[HuliganRS]

No one said it was fake!

With the pictures you sent me all I could tell that it was an OGPWII on suspension.

I had a gut feeling that never failed me so I ran with it.

I hope someone got a great deal...

Rusty.

[order_of_victory]

Thats not way it sounded "I can get a real one for about $150 more"?