Curious Fella Posted 12 February Share Posted 12 February (edited) Hello friends! My uncle recently gave me this medal claiming it was an Iron Cross, but it doesn't match any example I can find. I looked through German and Austrian medals of WWI and couldn't find a match. Any advice or ideas are welcome, might just be a bit of pretty metalwork I suppose. (Sorry about the cat hair) Edited 12 February by Curious Fella To apologize for the cat hairs! (And remove random photo) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gunner 87 Posted 12 February Share Posted 12 February 1 hour ago, Curious Fella said: Hello friends! My uncle recently gave me this medal claiming it was an Iron Cross, but it doesn't match any example I can find. I looked through German and Austrian medals of WWI and couldn't find a match. Any advice or ideas are welcome, might just be a bit of pretty metalwork I suppose. (Sorry about the cat hair) Hi Curious Fella. Welcome to the forum. I believe what you have there is a patriotic copy of an Iron Cross designed and made to be worn as a jewellery pendant, maybe a gift to a soldiers sweetheart or mother. Gunner Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Curious Fella Posted 12 February Author Share Posted 12 February Thanks for the response and the welcome, Gunner! That is very interesting. I should have said in my OP, my uncle said it was given as a gift from a German POW to his American guard, along with a beautiful wallet as a thank you for teaching him leatherworking. Maybe he crafted this, but seems an odd gift for an American. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gunner 87 Posted 12 February Share Posted 12 February 3 minutes ago, Curious Fella said: Thanks for the response and the welcome, Gunner! That is very interesting. I should have said in my OP, my uncle said it was given as a gift from a German POW to his American guard, along with a beautiful wallet as a thank you for teaching him leatherworking. Maybe he crafted this, but seems an odd gift for an American. That is really interesting and could suggest the item was made, not by a company producing patriotic jewellery, but by a veteran or local craftsman, in the same way as much of the 'Trench Art' was produced. I think it is very much an artefact that a US servicemen would covet. Thanks for sharing it.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gunner 87 Posted 12 February Share Posted 12 February ps if you can let us know your Uncles name, if he served, we might be able to work out which POW Camp the German was held at.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Curious Fella Posted 15 February Author Share Posted 15 February Took a little bit but I've dug up some more information. The item belonged to Captain Stuart R. Carswell from Company A of 9th MG Battalion of the 3rd "Rock of the Marne" Division under Major General Beaumont Buck. After the war he occupied Bell, Germany. He ended his career as a Colonel. Also I was wrong about him teaching his charges leatherworking, here is what my uncle said: "I don't know if his unit was guarding a camp, or just stationed nearby or whatever, but in that era officers were still very much gentlemen, and it's possible he was just interacting with the German officers socially. The Colonel brought his fowling guns, one of which I still have, to go hunting during the war. I was told that the Germans had a leather shop going, probably as some way to keep them busy, and that one of them made the wallet for the Colonel, and that the Reichsmark note and the medal were in the wallet all as part of the gift." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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