Groupings that have "grown" or "lost" items over time

[Les]

I've been looking through some old auction catalogues and noticed that some groupings bought/sold in the past have sometimes turned up on the market again, with the addition of new items that weren't in the group previously. I've also come across the opposite situation where a grouping has been split up and parts sold off to different buyers, sometimes with the seller not saying anything about the group being split up, or even if it happened to him.

With small groupings, this may have far more than we might want to know or think about. Keeping tabs on what happens to lesser mortals may be all but impossible. However....what about keeping tabs on some of the major groupins that have grown or shrunken over time? Anyone have examples they can document? It might be worthwhile starting this as a thread that can be updated in the future.

Maybe...maybe starting to keep records on some of the more important groupings over time might give some of the "marriage brokers" out there pause to think before adding items to small groups in the hopes of jacking prices up, cleaning out closets, and putting the skids to stories of "General Bader's trunks" item/part 1297.... inlcuding the RZM "SS" camo undies once offered by someone who had other items said to have "belonged" to "General Bader." ;-)

Les

[Ed_Haynes]

Some call it "restoration", others call it FRAUD.

[Stogieman]

Actually, the undies were pretty cute......... "Tighty-Whities" that the guy drew an Iron cross on the butt with magic marker!!

I can see replacing something that was lost with an original. But it must be noted as an "add-on". Anything else does constitute fraud.

[Ed_Haynes]

Yes, there is legitimate restoration, and we all know what it is, but there is also FRAUD and we all know what it is. Much like the difference between killing and murder?

When things are unnamed and unnumbered (and, historically, should have been thus) it all gets very very gray, very quickly, especially when we know there are unethical wolves howling in the forest around us. Were we all like the Gentlemen on this forum, . . . .

[Gerd Becker]

Actually, the undies were pretty cute......... "Tighty-Whities" that the guy drew an Iron cross on the butt with magic marker!!

I can see replacing something that was lost with an original. But it must be noted as an "add-on". Anything else does constitute fraud.

In my opinion and maybe i am a little picky, even that is already a step to far. Notes get lost over the time or the next buyer "forgets" this detail when reselling the group.

Maybe for Display purposes, when i have a spare one, but never, when i resell a group.

Just my two Euro Cents...

[Luftmensch]

Ecktualllly....Les and Ed this is a timely thread, because there is a middle way--neither restoration nor fraud, which was NOTsanctioned by the Buddha of Militaria Stogieyama, whose side I'm sure you will take.

Some time ago I bought a Saxon pilot's group. The family dumped his book collection, papers were destroyed, I got the Becher and some related paper, and the medals are missing presumed lost among the grandchildren. Here is a picture of his group on public display in Dresden I believe several years ago.

You Hawkeyes can probably blow up the medal group, but it is an EKII, Heinrich, Albrecht 2nd cl., FA Silber, and Frontkaempfer--kinda neat since he started out as an NCO and wound up in Palestine.

I would make a dog's breakfast out of trying to mount 5 loose medals, so I thought myself really clever when I bought this on eBay (ignore the cross).

Now I could replace just two of the five for display purposes, and replace them if we ever found the original group. But I'm slowly gathering, as a non-medal guy late to the table, that original finishing is important--doubly so when you don't have names and impressions on the pieces. On the Allied medal side, it's no big deal if you take a tired looking group to Spink and have the tattered ribbons replaced with shiny new synthetic ones and the medals all polished and lacquered

before court mounted.

There...I've confessed...now I feel better....(the truly penitent looking emoticon here). If you are too aghast to answer I understand...

[Kev in Deva]

I've also come across the opposite situation where a grouping has been split up and parts sold off to different buyers, sometimes with the seller not saying anything about the group being split up,

Les

This particulat seller on Ebay is always breaking up groups, takes the medals and crosses of the bars and sells them as individual items

Normaly his auctions start of with a Ribbon bar stripped of medals, then the individual items are sold seperately listed as per under, in the past I have seen him sell even the Militrary Service book seperate as well

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/GERMAN-Bayer-MVK-wit...1QQcmdZViewItem

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/GERMAN-Bayer-Wound-B...1QQcmdZViewItem

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/GERMAN-Bayer-Wound-B...1QQcmdZViewItem

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/GERMAN-Bayer-Vets-Ho...1QQcmdZViewItem

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/GERMAN-Bayer-Kyffhau...1QQcmdZViewItem

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/GERMAN-Bayern-Kyffha...1QQcmdZViewItem

In this case they could be all seperate items but judging by what I have seen in the past, he is quilty of destroying history

Should be a crime to do this

Kevin in Deva

[Les]

John,

If you get frustrated at not being able to re-unite all the items in the group, I know where there's a good home for what you've currently got.... ;-)

What I was thinking about with this thread, is what I learned about a paper grouping I bought from someone on ebay, that is a member of another military forum (no names...). I got over 100 plus items, mostly scrapbook type clippings, some photos, a few family land documents, etc, to a WWI Oberst that received the PlM in 1918. HIs last name was/is GrusonI didn't pay all that much for the items, and was looking forward to doing some research on the man.

A few weeks after the items arrived, I read on the other forum that someone else who was a member bought three scrapbooks filled with photos, signatures of people that Gruson met after the war at veterans reunions, visitors to his house, and other social situations.

I contacted the other person who had the scrapbooks, and both of us learned we bought the items from someone else on the same forum who split the group up and sold off parts to at least two people....possibly more.

When I learned what was in the scrapbooks, and considering what I had, figuring out what happened wasn't too hard. Gruson lived near Magdeburg, and after WWII stayed in his home town which was in the Soviet zone of occupation and later the DDR. Gruson died in 1961, and apparently his family must have sold off various items belonging to him after the "wall came down" in the early 1990's.

Now I'm wondering what else was there, what happened to the Urkunde for his various awards, his PlM (I have a photo of him wearing it during the "DDR era") and other awards.

The collector/dealer that sold the stuff to me wasn't very helpful and informative on saying there was more at one time, etc. In retrospect, if I'd known there was a Pour le Merite recipient's grouping that was broken up, or being broken up, I'd have reconsidered bidding on the items I got. I was an unknowing participant in the breaking up of an important group of documents...and finding out about it after the fact, ticks me off.

Try to put the group back together? Who knows what was in there, and offering to buy items that "might" be his, is like offering to buy General Bader's trunks again....because there will be plenty of people saying they have items that Gruson had, or used, and that....means without documentation, it all becomes story time.

Les

[Guest Rick Research]

I think we are at cross purposes here.

Ripping apart medal bars... or sewing 'em together is not at ALL the same as REUNITING groups that have been dispersed, willy nilly, across the planet.

I've seen PIECES brought back together HERE among us... and things that are and can be verified: papers, photos, and so on.

This is the main reason I constantly bewail the End Of The Catalog Era.

I can go back to the 1980s and spot items THEN and track them forward, to say that where now there are TWO papers, there were once FIVE... or vice versa.

I know people who labor mightily to bring sundered items back together.

Me, for instance.

It has, upon more than one occasion, taken me almost 20 years to do so.

One case in point I might cite is that BOTH Wild Card and I have award documents--named paperwork--to Max Joseph winner Karl Ritter von Gonnermann. Items acquired from different sellers, obtained years and continents apart.

When combined, at that happy theoretical fiture moment OUR pieces will indeed be a "restoration," regardless of what individual items can be found as odd lots sold in half forgotten paper catalogs.

Neal O'Connor and I once accidentally acquired parts of a split apart group that neither of us knew at the time WAS a group-- because the German auctioneer in the 1980s had a habit of listing items anonymously. Because he and I were in constant communication, imagine our surprise on learning that we each HAD part of the same officer's "stuff." And before he died, his piece came to live with mine. UNFORTUNATELY, the other anonymous pieces disappeared into a void...

but if ever they turn up online, I will see them, I will find them,

and I will do everything within my power to get them back together again.

Nothing wrong with that.

[Les]

I think we are at cross purposes..

..............<snipped>

Nothing wrong with that.

Rick, actually what I had in mind here, is to start trying to compile a record of what groups are known to have been split (and by who), and also who has "married" bogus groups. That's two different concepts that can parallel each other here.

Splitting groups happens, and I agree with you that catalogues were and are a good thing. They serve as a record or snapshot in time of something that was. They also form a small protection against potential fraud when someone claims to have found the underground vaults of Wilhelm's secret shadow government in it's undisclosed location, or even Al Capone's proverbial vaults. Those snapshots mean anything "new" had better be very well documented.

Now....we can resolve who get's the items you and Wildcard covet from the other..... dueling decoder rings, and who can lift the heaviest stack of books to table height without breaking a sweat....?

Les

[Luftmensch]

By "group" are we talking "Orders, Decorations and Medals"? Or, Les, are you trying to put tunics, swords, scrapbooks and medals together? Or is the criterion what started out together should be tracked whatever it was? I like that principle.

My question is perhaps overly narrow and specific. With British medals there is NO stigma to getting groups, remounted, refurbished. They are all named and can easily be seen to belong together. I see Stogie's point--I think its peripheral to an earlier thread about comfort level with unnamed medal groups.

Question--if you can prove the medals came together and are still together, does it matter to you guys if the stitching is period or redone, as long as both jobs are professional?

Another question--what if you have a Bavarian Merit Order on a bar and the enamel is smashed to bits, would you replace it?

Edited May 9, 2006 by Luftmensch

[VtwinVince]

Hmmm, this is a good topic. I've been picking up various awards that my uncle won, and which were "liberated" from him in 1945, to add to the original awards which I inherited from him 20 years ago. Unfortunately, some are quite rare, such as the NSFK Motor-Pilot Badge. One item which I've been on the lookout for is his 1940 Ehrenpokal, which I am petty certain is in Germany in a private collection. Other items, to include award documents and Soldbuch, are at the Bundesarchiv. I don't have plans to sell my uncle's items, so the concern of "mixing and matching" isn't relevant to me.

[Stijn David]

Hello,

Very good thread for sure, altough i am not a imperial collector (i do buy some of the nice enamelpieces sometimes iff it is quite in my collecting field) i do recognize the phenomena.

I normally collect German glider pilot related material as my main collecting interest (award documents, awards, etc ...) , and have also encountered some groups that where either growing or reducing over the time.

I formyself will never let a grouping grow when for example i do have 5 award documents from the same person and only 2 awards. It is something different with award documents (and much easier offcoarse) as these are named, etc ...

Sadly splitting up grouping does happen day after day, i am still looking for 2 award documents (2 different groupings) that where split of simply for the money.

Who is now responsible for the splitting up?, well that is a very hard question as i think both collectors, dealers and even the veterans and their family do it. Let me explain a bit more; i have also already encountered that i had the luck to receive the medals directly from a veteran, however he wants to keep his award documents. So the group gets split up. Iff for example i do not reach the goal of getting the award documents and he (the veeteran) does decease then the following problem comes into sight. Either the family thows that damn stuff away or it does get in the hands of the reseller. !!!!

So the chances of reuniting the grouping are really minimal and getting a complete one is a very hard thing, but the line is very thin and makes you think.

Anyway my personal collecting ethics are that i never ever will splitt a grouping.

Cordial greetings,

[Luftmensch]

C'mon you guys...

I'm trying to learn the subtle twists of collecting unnamed German groups...

If you had a group with a Bavarian MVO, let's say, which was smashed to smithereens...would you replace it? Would different stitching on the replacement medal make the next buyer suspicious that an MVO wasn't on there originally? Would keeping the old medal and threads to show him keep you from taking a hit in value?

[Les]

C'mon you guys...

I'm trying to learn the subtle twists of collecting unnamed German groups...

If you had a group with a Bavarian MVO, let's say, which was smashed to smithereens...would you replace it? Would different stitching on the replacement medal make the next buyer suspicious that an MVO wasn't on there originally? Would keeping the old medal and threads to show him keep you from taking a hit in value?

John, I'm normally in favor of leaving things alone and doing as little as possible. If the damage occurred during the owners lifetime and was "owner-inflicted" (for doing a head-first down a long stairway while intoxicated at a public gala...or pushed by his wife during an argument), there might be some historical relevance to keeping the item as is. If you "restore" it and later find out it was a mistake, the integrity of the piece has been altered. If on the otherhand, the damage was done recently, and it's one of those otherwise "invisible" bars, you'll still find people on both side of the spectrum on replacing damaged items with intact ones.

By the way, there are jewelers capable of redoing enamel. If the enamel is broken and the rest of the medal intact, whether having the medal restored by a competent enamel worker is an option.

Me? I'd be inclined to leave it alone, and hold off on any immediate impulse to fix it. Think before doing anything that can't be undone.

Les

[Luftmensch]

Thanks, Les! You guys approach these bars like museum curators! I can respect that.

But if I break something, Les, and you want to buy it, I'm going to attach a note in old ink swearing the cross was broken in `18 while my Opa Fritz was descending the main staircase at the Chateau wearing a sky-clad courtesan on each arm whilst riding a drunk Crown Prince piggyback with his baton sticking out of Fritzi's Fliegerass all while under air attack from Rickenbacker's flying circus...

(The emoticon wearing a halo and magnivisor on his head)

Rgds

[Ed_Haynes]

. . . You guys approach these bars like museum curators! I can respect that.

Well, we are museum curators -- or, more important, "history curators". If you want to collect things that are just "things" and be driven purely (impurely?) by monetary value, other things exist to study?

[Guest Rick Research]

"Question--if you can prove the medals came together and are still together, does it matter to you guys if the stitching is period or redone, as long as both jobs are professional?

Another question--what if you have a Bavarian Merit Order on a bar and the enamel is smashed to bits, would you replace it?"

Les answered what I would have up in #15. It is what the ORIGINAL OWNER had. For that reason, I do not apprve of the 'accepted" British practice of re-ribboning and remounting groups.

If what you have is perfect, great. If what you have is not-- that's it.

It is indeed like virginity... it don't grow back.

ANYTHING that alters an "as found" original group LESSENS its historical value

regardless of monetary:

Purists want PURE.

All others can trade pork belly futures for profits.

[Great Dane]

I remember on one occasion earlier this year where a medal on eBay caught my eye. It was a medal awarded to a swedish pilot in the late 1930s. (Now, remember that this isn't my primary field of interest, so the details are a bit rusty now. I did, however, research it a bit at the time).

It turned out to be a group of medals, orders and badges awarded to one of the pioneers of Swedish aviation (I have forgotten his name unfortunately ), who flew one of the first non-stop flights to Tokyo in the late 1930s. There was a connection with Germany, but I can't remember if he started from Germany or had a German co-pilot.

Among the medals were named Japanese medals in gold, named and unnamed Swedish decorations and aviation badges and even an Order of the German Eagle.

At the time I spotted the auction, 7-8 items were sold separately. All the auctions had a picture showing all his awards, and that made me curious. Sure enough - looking at the seller's history, several badges and medals had already been sold. Of the Order of the German Eagle there was no trace...

And - yes- all the items had different buyers...

This splitting up of such a historical important group really broke my heart...

/Mike

[Luftmensch]

Purists want PURE.

All others can trade pork belly futures for profits.

Edited May 9, 2006 by Luftmensch

[Claudius]

I just wanted to toss in agree that Medals and documents that belong to one guy should stay together. I haven't seen groups "grow" too much. But I could see why that would be a neferious attraction to a seller looking to increase the value of the group by increasing its size. I would obviously be against that.

Having said that, I have added representive medal in the ricker mount next to the docs to a guy However, when I sold that group, those medals went back into my collective pool of specimens. I know it was said that this is a dangerous practice. Adding items for your own benfit and trying to remember later when you come to sell them that they were added. But every collector should know their collection well enough not to forget these things. If you can't remember, log your collection and groups. That's what I do. How else would I know exactly how much I paid for something, and when I got it.

I such a purist that I have a medal bar with the Centennial medal that is pulling out of the bar. It's pulling the bar string and stuffings with it. It's not too bad, but the bar would look a heck of a lot better if it was snugged up tight. I didn't want to mess with it and I was that way when I bought it, almost 20 years ago.

[Luftmensch]

Postcsript to all you "purists" ......

If any of these guys could come back and speak I GUARANTEE you they would say.....

".....POLISH MY MEDALS!...."

"......STAND UP STRAIGHT!!....."

"......CLEAN YOUR PLATE.....THERE ARE CHILDREN STARVING IN SUDWESTAFRIKA!!!....."

and

".....GET YOUR AUTO...I WANT TO GO TO THE REEPERBAHN AND LOOK UP AN OLD FRIEND....HOW CAN I WEAR THAT HANGING BY A THREAD!!!!....."

Edited May 9, 2006 by Luftmensch

[Great Dane]

I did a little more research on my posting #19:

The pilots name was Karl Gunnar Lindner. He was one of the aviation pioneers from the pre-WWII era. Among his highlights were:

- 1928: Flying a Junkers W 33 together with German Baron von H?nefeld in an attempted round-the-world flight. They reached Berlin-Sofia-Constantinople-Bagdad-Karachi-Calcutta-Mandalay-Hanoi-Canton-Shanghai-Tokyo, where they gave up due to bad weather.

- 1934: First flight Stockholm - Hannover. Lindner and his radio-operator had to bail out of the plane.

- 1938: First flight Stockholm - Moscow. The only passenger in the Junkers Ju-52 was the Japanese ambassador in Moscow.

- 1939: First flight Bromma (Sweden) - Perth (Scotland).

What a shame to split this group!

The seller was from somewhere in South America (Brasil?). Maybe Lindner ended his days down there?

It was obvious from the description of the stuff on eBay, that the seller did not split it up to get a higher profit, but just had absolutely no idea what it was or who it had belonged to

/Mike