Post war Pour le Merite

[Tony T-S]

Its great information, many thanks. I have two very inexpensive copies that pretend to be nothing more. I couldn't get close to one of these, but its nice to have something that reminds me of the real thing. For serious collectors this sort of information is invaluable.

[reichenberg]

Its great information, many thanks. I have two very inexpensive copies that pretend to be nothing more. I couldn't get close to one of these, but its nice to have something that reminds me of the real thing. For serious collectors this sort of information is invaluable.

Likewise - I spent all of £22 for one of mine. I saw that the same dealer now has one identical @ £28 - ripoff merchant!

[jackjl]

Fake S&L's pop up on eBay pretty frequenly. In fact there is a seller that is offering his as an "S&W" - for Schneider & Wagner. I have never heard of Schneider & Wagner - Wagner und Sohne yes, but Schneider & Wagner? Nope. At least they are "nice" enough to tell you that it is a Post WWII Copy, which it indeed is; however, the only thing close to an "approved" award post WWII is an S&L. Either way, there are a few signs that you are dealing with a fake:

1. The L in Le Me',, extends all the way into the golden frame.
2. The suspension lacks the baroque definition. It is flat
3. It is missing the die defect on the left wing of the eagle on the lower left corner.
4. Fraudsters have become savvy that their fakes are easily spotted so they are now stamping them with S&W on the revers and claiming that they are from a different maker.
5. The enamel is shoddy at best.
6. The lettering and the crown seem to be recessed in the paint - as if they were painted over and someone had to scratch away the paint to reveal the inscription.


Here is a photo of text book "FAKE" S&L:



Here I have highlighted the tell tale signs that it is a knock off:



Here is a photo of the reverse showing hocus bogus S&W stamp:



There is a seller on ebay.de that sells these for Eu 125 and does not make any claims that they are anything other than reproduction PlMs. However, there is one other seller: antikmarktmuensterland with his auction: here that is trying to make up a story about his little paper weight. For just a few hundred more, you can find a decent S&L. Which is too bad, because, this seller has this same style fake for sell just about every other month.

Thanks for your information. I actually bought one which is claimed to be s&w production. But then I realized that it was probably a fake since the construction and enamel seem rough. So I returned it on time. AND it was probably the same person you mentioned above, although the ID is history1901 https://www.ebay.com/usr/history1901. I observed that both of them are located in Dorsten, Germany, and are selling typically the same type of PLM periodically(sometimes history1901 posts the item but not antikmarktmuensterland, and vice versa)may be the seller does not want us to notice him list PLM for too many times so he created an alternative account, and I believe he has at least one more account like this(called Antiqua or something, I don't remember that clearly).JUST A REMINDER I hope you guys can be careful of this.