Even the Dull & Boring Once Had Names!

[Guest Rick Research]

This Old Style ribbon bar has been languishing in my “to do” pile for years. Frankly, I had never given any previous thought TO attempting researching its original wearer because it seemed… obviously… hopeless.

Sometime in the past century, this ribbon bar was tossed someplace where sun struck across part of it, fading the ribbons across the top left. What HAVE we got here?

1) Hessian Order of Philipp the Generous in some grade

2) Prussian long service award (more on this below)

3) 1870/71 War Medal (never had battle bars)

4) 1897 Kaiser Wilhelm I Centenary Medal

The reverse is red backed and reveals that this was, indeed, a RIBBON BAR as worn by officers, not the dual purpose hooked back bar used for enlisted ranks and their equivalent. So…

A seriously under-decorated officer (of some sort). Alive in 1897. A native Hessian—if he’d been a Prussian or naval officer, the Philipp would be in last place per regulations.

The key is where—and what—the long service ribbon is. Until 1913, the only all-blue Prussian long service awards ribbons were for the career officers’ XXV Years Service Cross (PrDA) or the Prussian Reserve/Landwehr Decorations 1^st and 2^nd Class (PrLD1, PrLD2). Enlisted ranks could have held a PrLD2 BUT… before 1913 that was a brooch worn below ribboned medals, and when found on a ribbon bar of the period, almost invariably was worn as the full-sized blackened iron brooch AFTER ribboned awards—even the lowly 1897.

So we have here either an XXV or a PrLD1, before 1913. Quite theoretically possible this could have been any of the three long service awards mentioned above post-1913 as well… but then the wearer would have been at civil retirement age and still wearing a military uniform.

Consulting annual Rank Lists, REGULAR officers were quickly eliminated. Into the 1890s, military recipients of the Phillip received it with swords under all circumstances. That made no sense, and from the mid 1890s on only war awards bore swords. Theoretically, this bar could be a fashion statement worn without any devices (X or battle bars on the 1870/71) so that had to be considered. Again, either way no REGULAR matched. Remember that we always have to consider whether awards have moved off a medal bar to the neck when “nothing” is found like this. No Hessian matches that way either.

We now know that the recipient was a Reserve or Landwehr officer. And… THREE turn up...

[Guest Rick Research]

We now embark on the frustration of comparing period sources. Rank Lists omit first names and crucially, campaign medals and crosses as well as commemorative medals. Rank Lists provide three Landwehr officers who had “civil” Philipps (all Knights 1^st Class—HP3a), PrLD1s (all awarded 1890/91) and… nothing else visible:

Hauptleute der Landwehr-Infanterie

Dr. Hermann LAHR

Carl MEISENZAHL

And

Emil SCHRÖDER

First names were provided by the Hessian Orders List, and then the vanity press German Orders Almanac was consulted. Lahr’s entry reveals his birth date and place, while Schröder’s gives his first name but no birth data and Meisenzahl’s does neither.

Lahr retired from Landwehr service 1905/06, while Meisenzahl and Schröder remained on geriatric Landwehr duty right up to the Great War!!!

IF this ribbon bar was Lahr’s, he could have worn it from 1897 to 1905.

In that year he received the Prussian Red Eagle Order 4 (30.08.05 as Dr., Großhzgl. hess. Oberamtsrichter in Darmstadt), as well as the Hessian 1905 Wedding Medal and—on 25.11.06 a Crown to his HP3a. In 1913 he was a Geheimer Justizrat—the Hessian Orders Lists are bizarre in listing date of the most recent Hessian Order but with the recipient’s status at the time an edition was published. His 1914/15 Court and State Handbook entry confirms these awards and a combatant 1870/71. From the Military Weekly, Lahr was recalled for wartime service (at age 65) and promoted to brevet Major der Landwehr on 18.04.15, commanding Landsturm Infantry Replacement Battalion I Darmstadt.

IF this ribbon bar was Meisenzahl’s, he could have worn it from 1897 to 1915. He was finally retired from 45 years of reserve duty (!) as Hauptmann dL II on 24.12.14, having served for the opening months of the Great War in Fortress Company 9, Mainz.

[Guest Rick Research]

IF this ribbon bar belonged to Schröder, he too could have worn it from 1897 to 1915. He was promoted brevet Major dL II on 18.04.15 as a Battalion Commander in Landwehr Infantry Regiment 55! The most ancient of this trio, he’d been a commissioned reserve officer since… 1869!!!

But even vanity had to be paid for by the word. In Meisenzahl’s and Schröder’s Orders Almanac entries, although they listed their HP3a’s and PrLD1’s, neither of them listed their… 1870/71 medals! Hardly surprising, since given lack of other decorations, neither probably saw much—or any—Franco-Prussian war combat. Stay-at-homes were freakishly granted steel 1870/71 Medals on “combatant” ribbons, while medical personnel and officials who could have been wounded under enemy fire got steel Medals with “noncombatant” ribbons.

Lahr started out as a SecLt dR in Hessian IR 115. In the 1880s army structure he was a Landwehr PremLt attached to “LIR 117” before settling down to decades frozen in grade in Landwehrbezirk Darmstadt II. His doctorate was presumably “jur,” since he was a judge (Oberamtsrichter) and Privy Justice Councilor, as well as member of the Hessian Provincial Committee (Ausschuss).

“Businessmen” Meisenzahl and Schröder (is there anything vaguer than the German job non-description “Kaufmann”?) picked up their civil HP3a’s on 16.02.96 and 25.09.95 respectively. In 1879 Meisenzahl was a SecLt dR in IR 118 while Schröder was already a PremLt dL in “LIR 115.” By 1886 these two were locked together in “LIR 115” and then Landwehrbezirk Darmstadt I.

While no birth date has turned up yet on Schröder, the 1914-18 “Ehrenmal” shows that he died in Crefeld on 19 April 1918 as commander of Landsturm Battalion VII/32.

These three suspects are probably among the most boring I’ve ever turned up: ploddingly dutiful reservists who spent half a century in uniform for the most minimal of awards. Without further data, it is not possible to winnow THREE down to ONE

but the object of this lesson is: Even the d-u-l-l CAN (sometimes) be (mostly!) researched!!!!

Sources

Prussian and Prussia/Württemberg annual Rank Lists 1879, and 1886 to 1914

Rangliste der Offiziere der Beurlaubtenstandes… Nach dem Stande vom 19. Oktober 1907

Prussian Ordensliste 1905 Supplement 1

Hessian Ordensliste 1914 (1913)

Hessian Court & State Handbook 1914/1915 (1914)

Prussian Militär-Wochenblätter 1915

Major dL aD Friedrich Uebe, “Ehrenmal der preußischen Offizier-Korps,” 1939

Deutscher Ordens-Almanach 1908/09

[turtle]

Very interesting topic! Thanks for so much effort on this!