German states EK2 equivalents

[Steve Campbell]

Good lord! We have our work cut out for us.

[gregM]

Great thread for future reference.
THANK YOU to Dave and Steve for posting such nice pictures.

[Jesse]

Thanks Dave and steve, this has totally clarified my confusion. Confusion is the word as I have officer, NCO and enlisted totally mixed up. Now how do I tell the wife I need to spend much much more perfecting my collection!

J

[Wild Card]

Dave,

Your summary is fantastic. In fact, considering the interest that it is sure to generate, I can not help but wonder if it could be given a “pinned” status for easy reference. I am particularly thankful for it in that I hope that it will encourage some of the many EK collectors to expand their horizons.

I would like to ask you about three decorations which are not on your list. I do not mean this as a criticism, but am curious as to why they are not included. I’m sure that you have very good reasons. Thank you again.

Best wishes,

Wild Card

The first is the Reuss War Merit Cross, 1914.

[Wild Card]

Second is the Brunswick Order of Henry the Lion, various grades with swords.

[Wild Card]

Third is Brunswick again, this time the 1914 Military Merit Cross.

[Dave Danner]

The summary I wrote was just limited to EK2 "equivalents" for now because categorizing something as an EK1 "equivalent" is a complicated task. A quick and dirty summary couldn't do it justice.

The Reuss KVK is a good example. It would be categorized more or less as those principalities' EK1 equivalent, but that must be qualified. First, the "real" EK1 equivalent of Reuss j.L and Reuss ä.L. was, simply, the EK1. The armies of both Reuss principalities were part of the Prussian Army, so the most typical award for repeated acts of bravery by a soldier from Reuss was the EK1. The Reuss KVK was much more sparingly awarded and subject to the requirement that one already have the EK1.

This really should be stressed from a historical perspective, although less the concern of collectors: the EK1 "equivalent" for all the states whose armies were by the various conventions of 1867-1871 part of the Prussian Army was, in point of fact, the EK1.

For example, if you look through the 1921 Stammliste of Großh. Mecklenburgisches Füsilier-Regiment Kaiser Wilhelm Nr. 90, you will be hard-pressed to find a single officer who has Mecklenburg-Schwerin's Militärverdienstkreuz I. Klasse who does not also have the EK1. However, there are a number of officers there who have the EK1 but not the MMV1. Usually, the Grand Duke would make sure that if one of his subjects were recognized by the Kaiser with the EK1, the Grand Duke would also recognize him with the MMV1, but not always. So the MMV1 can be considered the EK1 equivalent for Mecklenburg-Schwerin, but with that qualification.

And for the three Hanseatic Cities, who had no follow-on awards, the EK1 was really the only award their citizens could receive for repeated acts of bravery.

The pinback crosses established by Saxe-Weimar, Saxe-Altenburg, Saxe-Coburg-Gotha and Reuss were fairly rare awards with strict criteria, including prior award of the EK1. They are EK1 "equivalents" in a broad sense, as they fit two of the main criteria - pinback crosses awarded without regard to rank for further or repeated acts of bravery, but they weren't necessarily "the" follow-on award. That was in most cases the EK1.

The Kingdoms of Bavaria and Saxony are an even more confusing mess when trying to define EK1 "equivalents". In Bavaria, an intervening promotion or relaxed awards standards might mean that a second award would be a higher grade of a prior award. Thus, a lieutenant who received the Military Merit Order 4th Class with Swords in 1914 or 1915 might receive the Crown to that order as a second award when he made captain. And in fact there are even lieutenants who got the Military Merit Order 4th Class with Crown and Swords. A lot of majors received the Military Merit Order 3rd Class with Swords. If they had received the 4th Class in 1914 when they were captains, the Crown to the 4th Class in 1916, and the 3rd Class in 1918, that would be several follow-on awards.

Alfons Ritter von Bram, who started the war as a major, received four awards of the Military Merit Order: the 4th Class with Crown and Swords (11.9.1914), the 3rd Class with Swords (12.9.1916), the 3rd Class with Crown and Swords (23.11.1917) and the Officer's Cross with Swords (3.9.1918). He also received the Military Max Joseph Order, Bavaria's highest military honor, comparable to the Pour le Merite. There's no real way to say whether any of the awards after the initial BMV4XmKr was his EK1 "equivalent".

The later General der Gebirgstruppe Georg Ritter von Hengl presents an even more complicated case. He received his EK2 in 1915, but received no award from his own king. In August 1917, he received the EK1, and less than 4 weeks' later, King Ludwig III awarded him the BMV4X. So in Hengl's case, the standard EK2 equivalent for a Bavarian was basically his EK1 equivalent. He got a Crown to his BMV4X in 1918, around the same time as his House Order of Hohenzollern Knight with Swords. So his second Bavarian award came along with his third Prussian one.

Saxony is even more of a mess, since it had three orders and their associated crosses or medals one could receive, based on rank and what awards one already had. The royal decree of 9. September 1914 covering Saxon awards is a complicated set of criteria depending on rank and prior awards. The simplest example: the bronze Friedrich August Medaille was the EK2 equivalent for a Saxon private. For repeated acts of bravery, the standard award was the silver FAM. But as noted previously, the silver FAM - for this private the same as an EK1 - was for a sergeant the basic EK2 equivalent. Furthermore, if the act of bravery were particularly noteworthy, the private might skip the silver FAM and receive the Silver St. Henry Medal. More than 8,000 Silver St. Henry Medals were awarded, so it was not an uncommon bravery award for Saxon enlisted men.

Similarly, according to the decree, if a Saxon NCO already had the silver FAM, he should receive the Honor Cross with Swords. But there were less than 2000 awards of that decoration, compared with the 8,000+ Silver St. Henry Medals, and you rarely see medal bars with the Honor Cross and silver FAM, while medal bars with the Silver St. Henry Medal and silver FAM appear on the market every few months.

Sorry, this has turned into a really long post on why there can't be a short post on EK1 equivalents.

[Dave Danner]

Third is Brunswick again, this time the 1914 Military Merit Cross.

There is little evidence that this was ever actually awarded. Brunswick basically went with the War Merit Cross, with the normal progression for a Braunschweiger being EK2, BrKVK, EK1. Then in 1918 the duchy added the pinback cross as the KVK1. I expect most recipients already had the EK1.

Second is the Brunswick Order of Henry the Lion, various grades with swords.

Before the war, Brunswick was fairly liberal with this order without swords. If you look at the 1914 rank list entry for IR 92, you see that 4 of 6 majors, 9 of 16 captains, 4 of 7 Oberleutnante, and 16 of 23 Leutnante had some grade of the order or its merit cross (and two other lieutenants had the Ehrenzeichen 1. Kl., affiliated with the order). The officers of Brunswick's Totenkopf-Husaren also had more than their fair share. Bavarians of the 1. Schw.Reiter-Regiment also received the order by the boatload before the war.

You might not have to take off your shoes to count the number of Henry the Lions with Swords awarded to junior officers during the war (there were apparently more awards of the highest grades with swords to generals than the lower grades to combat officers). For whatever reason, the duke chose not to make his house order a follow-on award for officers already decorated.

[Dave Danner]

I've been working on a draft of an EK2 "cheat sheet", but it is complicated by the factors described in previous posts. Here's a rough, partially completed draft to show you what I'm thinking about:

[Steve Campbell]

Thanks for this great information Dave.

[regular122]

Agree with Wild Card on maybe pinning this thread. We see this question many times on EK equivalents but this one has some great info and pics for easy reference. Maybe Daniel, Don or Bill can pin it? Steve

[newcollector]

So if you were to try to collect the EK2 "equivalents" for common soldiers, you would need the following:[list=1][*]Prussia: Iron Cross 2nd Class[*]Bavaria: Military Merit Cross 3rd Class with Swords[*]Saxony: Bronze Friedrich August Medal

Okay, that's three down for me and heaps to go!

[Dave Danner]

The EK2 analog "cheat sheet" I referred to is progressing, although I've somewhat distracted and there's more to do. Here is a snapshot of where it stands now. When finished, it will be in HTML and have links where possible to the images of the awards.

[Wild Card]

The EK2 analog "cheat sheet" I referred to is progressing, although I've somewhat distracted and there's more to do. Here is a snapshot of where it stands now. When finished, it will be in HTML and have links where possible to the images of the awards.

Great work Dave.

Thanks,

Wild Card

[regular122]

Great job Dave. You continue to educate us all. Cannot wait to bookmark it for continual reference. Steve