Soviet Lieutenant General Ivan Ivanov Kravchenko

[Ed_Haynes]

Badge 5

Reverse plain.

[slava1stclass]

That's the EXACT photo from the personnel file! I wonder if the researcher who copied the record yanked the photo????? (If so, I'm pretty pissed... I've been offering a LOT of money for the photos from the personnel files, only to get the "they can't do that" reply...)

Dave

To all:

File photo yanking/stripping was all the rage in the mid to late 90s. Back then certain inside dealers had them by the dozens - literally. Archival Full Cavalier vet photos dated from the late 70s (when the Soyuz began first issuing Full Cavalier booklets to the surviving vets) as well as HSU photos were in abundance.

Such instances are virtualy unheard of now. It appears that tighter internal control mechanisms were implemented within the archives and no amount of dyengi will pry the remaining ones loose.

Regards,

slava1stclass

Edited April 27, 2006 by slava1stclass

[Ed_Haynes]

Badge 6

[Ed_Haynes]

Badge 7

Plain pebbled reverse. Very shiney and eludes a good scan. Photo-fiddled for legibility.

[Ed_Haynes]

Finis

Comrades: That distinctive "kaboing" you just heard is the ball landing squarely in your court. Help!

[Mondvor]

Rick was absolutely right - "it's a small world..."

I bought this foto in Kiev about 4 years ago together with 6 or 7 other pictures of Soviet officers wearing Nevsky. I bought them from a dealer who had a lot of stuff from Kiev City Military Registration Office Archive (sorry, I don't know how to translate VOYENKOMAT in English). The rumors were around that he had a friend among the officers from this Archive and gave him a percent from his buisness.

Anyway, I think that Dave war partially right. No real pictures could be taken out from Podolsk Central Military Archive. It's a law and they obey it. But probably you know that all pictures were made at least in 3 specimens. First specimen is in Podolsk Archive. Second one is in local "Voyenkomat" file were this officer was registred after retirement (in our case - in Kiev's Voyenkomat). That is much easier to get an access to those local files comparing with Podolsk (especially in Ukraine which is independent now).

Were the third specimen goes I don't know. Probably to KGB arcives or somewhere else. I have a friend who is currently working in Magadan's Voyenkomat (Russia's Far North city). I can ask him how it works.

Of course I can make a high-resolution scan of that picture. But I can only download the files that are less than 65 kb. Well, I can cut a fragment... But on the picture the badge is facing to the side. It's not exact frontal view. Also it's in a shadow. But I can try

Ed asked if it would be on the market. If you are interested I can just trade it for similar picture of the other Nevsky or any 3rd class "polkovodets" cavalier.

[Ed_Haynes]

Ed asked if it would be on the market. If you are interested I can just trade it for similar picture of the other Nevsky or any 3rd class "polkovodets" cavalier.

Thanks, but of no help to me. I do not collect photos or have any or even seek them (not as I'd know where to start looking). Should one drop into my hands by accident, you'll surely hear from me. As least I know the photo that belongs with the group is, as they said in the X-Files, "out there", even if split from his medals and paperwork. There are rumors, also, that other paperwork and photos and such for this man are "out there". (In Area 51 methinks.)

[Guest Rick Research]

I say "Local Veterans Commissariat" for the Voyenkomats, since the normal thing we see them doing is issuing jubilee medals to veterans and so on. What would be town and city region veterans affairs offices here.

"File photo yanking/stripping was all the rage in the mid to late 90s. Back then certain inside dealers had them by the dozens - literally. Archival Full Cavalier vet photos dated from the late 70s (when the Soyuz began first issuing Full Cavalier booklets to the surviving vets) as well as HSU photos were in abundance.

Such instances are virtualy unheard of now. It appears that tighter internal control mechanisms were implemented within the archives and no amount of dyengi will pry the remaining ones loose."

5 to 10 years ago these were here by the THOUSANDS, and I mean THOUSANDS. I would sit on the floor at shows and go through brown paper supermarket bags FULL of them-- almost invariably still in almost alphabetical order ("Ah today we have the letter 'G' from Kharkov," and so on...)

Those did NOT come from the Podolsk central archive, but from many many many Local Veterans Commissariats--

and I was told that all this paranoid old Soviet clutter was simply being thrown away, swept out to clear up space. I would often encounter several to the same officer in the same brown bag, so I suspect that there were probably many more copies of each photo-- probably left behind at the location of every unit over an entire career. So I know for a fact that a photo that I have one print of has at least another copy, just from the same files.

I agree, the supply in those numbers has disappeared. But I got several dozen (some of those in the 1970 Lenin Centenary Medal thread) a few months ago, and every single one of them was from the Kharkov area.

I have posted a good number of these LVC personnel file photos, many in the back pages here now, and they always had some LOCAL origin that had nothing to do with any specific unit. Whether the files FOLLOWED an officer to where he ended up retiring, I don't know.

[slava1stclass]

5 to 10 years ago these were here by the THOUSANDS, and I mean THOUSANDS. I would sit on the floor at shows and go through brown paper supermarket bags FULL of them-- almost invariably still in almost alphabetical order ("Ah today we have the letter 'G' from Kharkov," and so on...)

Those did NOT come from the Podolsk central archive, but from many many many Local Veterans Commissariats--

I agree, the supply in those numbers has disappeared. But I got several dozen (some of those in the 1970 Lenin Centenary Medal thread) a few months ago, and every single one of them was from the Kharkov area.

Rick,

Don't disagree. I would venture to guess, however, that the thousands of photographs to which you refer were likely run-of-the-mill officer photos and not necessarily those of Full Cavaliers and HSUs.

The Full Cavalier archive photos to which I referred earlier weren't coming out of the same local military commissariat - the stamps on the back of the photos attested to that. Judging from the remaining traces of paper on the back of these photos, they were pulled directly off the original copy of the Special Awards Record Card for HSUs and Full Cavaliers.

Regards,

slava1stclass

[NavyFCO]

Ed asked if it would be on the market. If you are interested I can just trade it for similar picture of the other Nevsky or any 3rd class "polkovodets" cavalier.

Since the group came from me in the first place, I'll be willing to do a trade to get the photo for Ed. PM sent. (Thanks for being willing to do that, BTW!!!)

Dave

[Mondvor]

Since the group came from me in the first place, I'll be willing to do a trade to get the photo for Ed. PM sent. (Thanks for being willing to do that, BTW!!!)

Dave

Thanks for proposition, Dave! But we already made an agreement with Ed. Tomorrow I'll send him a picture.

Andrew.

[NavyFCO]

This all got me digging through my photos. Here's a general (HSU Mitrofanov, Vasili Andreevich) wearing not one, but TWO blank faced academy badges, just like Kravchenko's!

[Ed_Haynes]

Thanks for proposition, Dave! But we already made an agreement with Ed. Tomorrow I'll send him a picture.

Andrew.

Yes, Andrew has been a true gentleman on this. Many public thanks!

[Stogieman]

Interesting.... is there any solid theory as to why these were blank?? Secret political school?? Inside joke??

[Mondvor]

I'm not a big expert in Academy badges. But from what I've seen before I can say that there was no such badges with blank shield. All of them came with a legend (exept late ones without a shield).

Now it's a question arised - what happened with Kravtsov's badge? I don't know... I can give two possible theories about that.

1. Kravtsov missed his original badge of Frunze Military Academy, find somewhere the other one with different legend and removed all letters from the shield. But it is hard to be real.

2. More real theory. A badge was missed from the group and dealer decided to make a group more complete. He found a badge from different Academy and removed the legend mechanically. After that he polished the area.

3. Could be some other explanation, but I beleive that original letters were removed from the badge.

On General Mitrofanov's photo both badges could have a legend. But they are unvisible because of camera flash reflection, lack of light or low picture resolution. Take a look at Suvorov that is hanging near those badges. Do you see any letters? I do not. But it should be a legend ALEXANDER SUVOROV. Otherwise it is a new variation

Edited April 28, 2006 by MONDVOR

[Ed_Haynes]

Thanks to Andrew, Kravchenko's photo has now been reunited with his medals.

It is the usual soft-focus, pebbled finish photo that we normally see. Silly Soviets, they seem to have been more concerned with the person's visage than with his awards! To make matters worse, the mystery academy badge is hidden away over at the side. The best I can scan is below. Not sure it helps.

[Guest Rick Research]

Here's an example of the "generic" Academy badge bestowal document SHOWING a blank shield so that the same blank form could be used for all such presentations:

[attachmentid=37686]

I'd have just drawn the badge with NO shield, myself.

Of course, this is NOT one of those academies ("Riga Red Banner Engineer-Aviation Military School of the A.F. 'in the name of K. Ye. Voroshilov' ") that we ever DO find with a named shield. It would indeed have had to have had a HAND ENGRAVED designation, I suppose-- the one in later air force Major General of engineer technical service Petukhov's group has no shield at all.

[Stogieman]

Nice document (Truly) Evil Twin?. Another piece he's been holding back on sharing. I know I will regret admitting this, but I actually like the academy badges. the pre-1960 ones are extremely well-made and quite nice with beautiful enamelwork and (primarily) in real silver.

[Ed_Haynes]

Help!!

Somewhere along the line, my (OK, my incredibly dumb) questions about Kravchenko's badges got lost. I hope no one minds me bumping this thread in a repeated plaintive plea for help.

http://gmic.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=6207&st=5

Mystery Badge 1 - http://gmic.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=6207&st=71

Mystery Badge 2 - http://gmic.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=6207&st=72

Mystery Badge 3 - http://gmic.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=6207&st=73

Mystery Badge 4 - http://gmic.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=6207&st=74

Mystery Badge 5 - http://gmic.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=6207&st=75

Mystery Badge 6 - http://gmic.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=6207&st=77

Mystery Badge 7 - http://gmic.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=6207&st=78

Thanks in advance . . . .

[NavyFCO]

Let me take a shot at the badges:

Badge 1- Badge for the veterans of the 1st Cavalry Army (or was it Division?) from the Russian Civil War. When my contact bought this group from Kravchenko's son (a certain General Major Kravchenko) he was beside himself with this badge. In fact, his first e-mail was something to the effect of: "Look, I got this badge! It came with a nice group to a general, but look at this badge!" I still don't have a clue why Kravchenko had this badge (he obviously was too young to be a RCW vet) but apparently it's quite rare. Avers No 5 lists it as a $15-$20 badge... The price is meaningless really, but consider that it lists the October Revolution as a $30-$40 medal, you get a rough estimate of worth.

Badge 2- Veteran of the 2nd Guards Army

Badge 3- Veteran of the 116th Karkhovskaya Rifle Division

Badge 4- 50th Anniversary of the Kiev Military Academy in honor of M.V. Frunze (that's a stab in the dark at what VOKU means - or is it military region?)

Badge 5- 25th Anniversary of the Soviet Committee of War Veterans

Badge 6- Best I can translate it is "Participant in the Victory Gathering"... I assume perhaps a Victory Day parade in Kiev in 1985???

Badge 7- 40 Years of Victory at Stalingrad.

Hope that helps!

Dave

[Ed_Haynes]

Thanks, Dave!

[Ed_Haynes]

Badge 1- Badge for the veterans of the 1st Cavalry Army (or was it Division?) from the Russian Civil War. When my contact bought this group from Kravchenko's son (a certain General Major Kravchenko) he was beside himself with this badge. In fact, his first e-mail was something to the effect of: "Look, I got this badge! It came with a nice group to a general, but look at this badge!" I still don't have a clue why Kravchenko had this badge (he obviously was too young to be a RCW vet) but apparently it's quite rare. Avers No 5 lists it as a $15-$20 badge... The price is meaningless really, but consider that it lists the October Revolution as a $30-$40 medal, you get a rough estimate of worth.

And, in The Photo, he is clearly wearing that puppy (though in the infuriating soft focus zone!).