General's Grade Shoulder Board Question

[Gardereiter]

Greetings

I have a question about the thin colored thread that runs through the gold braid of a General's shoulder boards.

When officers reached a certain grade of General, and especially when they received important command appointments (say, over an entire Army Corps) were the thin colored threads running through the shoulder board-braid simply all black? or did they retain the colors of their State of origin, such as Wuerttemberg or Saxony?

Somebody here posted some very nice, substantial General's boards here on E-Stand recently but I can't seem to find the ad any longer. I believe the thread color was black. I would enjoy seeing that pair of boards again sometime.

Thank you very much in advance.

[Gary B]

The general boards retained the color of their "state".

Green - Saxony, Blue - Bavaria, Black - Prussia etc

Gary

[Gardereiter]

Many thanks for the information, Gary.

The photos of WW1 Generals are all black & white so one can't really tell what color the threads are.

Plus I've never seen general's boards with other states' colors (other than Prussia's, that is) so they must be somewhat rare.

BR

[Chip M]

General's boards state color's rarity corresponds to the size of the state's army and the number of general's allotted. So, theoretically after Prussian, would be Bavaria, Saxony, Württemberg, Hessen, Mecklenburg, etc. I have a M15 Hessian general's board with red/white state colors.

Chip

[Gary B]

Many thanks for the information, Gary.

The photos of WW1 Generals are all black & white so one can't really tell what color the threads are.

Plus I've never seen general's boards with other states' colors (other than Prussia's, that is) so they must be somewhat rare.

BR

Hi BR,

Sometimes you can tell what state a General is from if he has/is wearing a pickelhaube. Other than that it is difficult with a B&W picture. If you are interested in seeing/purchasing Imperial German General officer boards look on Helmut Weitze's site or Der Rittmeister's site. They have a few from states other than Prussia.

Gary B