Diamonds from luftwaffe ace for sale = 91.000 US $ in Germany!

[Howard J-Harvey]

Hello all,......I think the diamonds are OK. As for the price, It's quite usual for auction houses to put low estimates on individual lots and has always been so. If you look at sales at any of the main auction houses Sotheby's, Christie's etc, you will notice this to be the case. It's purpose is to draw in as many bidders as possible, knowing as they do that this improves the ultimate hammer price. In a way this is a sort of dishonesty, but hey, that's life, you can't trust anyone when big money is involved and you should all know that by now!!!

[Ludwig]

Stauffer ALWAYS has a lot of crap!

[Dietrich Maerz]

Hello all,......I think the diamonds are OK.

I don't know what makes you think that. A comparison with real examples, however, can't be the basis of your assumption. They are worlds apart.

[Howard J-Harvey]

Hello again,...."I think the diamonds are Ok".....This is because I don't bother with this end of our hobby and for that reason I don't study items like these, and here's why. In the seem of things I suppose I am fairly well off, two homes several cars own business no borrowing etc and if I did decide I wanted to purchase a set of oak's diamonds I suppose I could just about afford the $175,000US that is for instance being asked by Wolf/Hardin for a set.....But in this very forum at lest one of the three set's credibility currently being marketed by them has been questioned?.....How awful I (and you) would feel if having purchased a set at this sort of cost, they turned out wrong.....Often I have seen set's offered as being direct from the family that turn out to be duplicates and the award item itself is known to be elsewhere!.....Then there is the very real ability (and incentive) to copy and market as real, versions of these beautiful awards.....Think about it, the component parts are relatively cheep and readily available...Old rose cut diamonds can be found in old items of jewelry at almost any low end antique auction and purchased accordingly, and as for making oak's. 800 or 21 etc, well we all know this can be done competently by any half decent silversmith?....As I understand it, 27 awards were made..........continued over-

[Howard J-Harvey]

continued.........As well as the main award, duplicates and private purchase versions exist, complicating the matter even further. This in turn opens the door to all sorts of "genuine?" variations that the unscrupulous vendor can offer as real.....You may believe that because you've got the book or handled the real thing or even (God forbid) you've paid a huge amount of money to purchase the real thing, you can't be fooled or that your investment is fool-proof......Well it's not!.....Firstly the fakers also have the book,resource,incentive and funds to copy and unlike Victoria crosses which all have recipients details on it's reverse and are well known by definition. Diamond oak's in contrast have nothing...This offers a huge opportunity and I genuinely believe that, if not today, then tomorrow the investment potential of these items will be ZERO!!!!......I collect up to Knights Cross level and all below.....My advice is to leave anything with "DIAMONDS" for the lady's, homosexuals, mugs and spivs!

[Steinar]

cant be too many of these awards around since only 27 got them, but the big question is; how many copies did the winners get, during the war..

[Dietrich Maerz]

Hello again,...."I think the diamonds are Ok".....This is because I don't bother with this end of our hobby and for that reason I don't study items like these, and here's why. In the seem of things I suppose I am fairly well off, two homes several cars own business no borrowing etc and if I did decide I wanted to purchase a set of oak's diamonds I suppose I could just about afford the $175,000US that is for instance being asked by Wolf/Hardin for a set.....But in this very forum at lest one of the three set's credibility currently being marketed by them has been questioned?.....How awful I (and you) would feel if having purchased a set at this sort of cost, they turned out wrong.....Often I have seen set's offered as being direct from the family that turn out to be duplicates and the award item itself is known to be elsewhere!.....Then there is the very real ability (and incentive) to copy and market as real, versions of these beautiful awards.....Think about it, the component parts are relatively cheep and readily available...Old rose cut diamonds can be found in old items of jewelry at almost any low end antique auction and purchased accordingly, and as for making oak's. 800 or 21 etc, well we all know this can be done competently by any half decent silversmith?....As I understand it, 27 awards were made...As well as the main award, duplicates and private purchase versions exist, complicating the matter even further. This in turn opens the door to all sorts of "genuine?" variations that the unscrupulous vendor can offer as real.....You may believe that because you've got the book or handled the real thing or even (God forbid) you've paid a huge amount of money to purchase the real thing, you can't be fooled or that your investment is fool-proof......Well it's not!.....Firstly the fakers also have the book,resource,incentive and funds to copy and unlike Victoria crosses which all have recipients details on it's reverse and are well known by definition. Diamond oak's in contrast have nothing...This offers a huge opportunity and I genuinely believe that, if not today, then tomorrow the investment potential of these items will be ZERO!!!!......I collect up to Knights Cross level and all below.....My advice is to leave anything with "DIAMONDS" for the lady's, homosexuals, mugs and spivs!

That is all correct (other tahn the part about leaving the diamonds to certain groups...) but why does that make you think "the diamonds are OK?"

[bobcam1]

I'm a little more concerned with his "leave anything with "DIAMONDS" for the lady's, homosexuals, mugs and spivs!" comment, than I am with his non-answer about why he thinks the diamonds are ok.....

I guess being "fairly well off" leaves allowances for perpetuating moronic stereotypes.

Bob.

[Howard J-Harvey]

Hi Deitrech......I rather thought that by saying the diamonds were OK I would induce a heated reaction and could then post the subsequent thoughts that I have now done in responce!!!........There now follows a few more observations about diamond awards generlally......Firstly, I can only think of one set of diamond awards that are unqestionably genuine, and those are the Rudel gold oaks etc that are still held by the family, this is partly because he was the only recepient....If for some reason I was offered one of the other golden oaks that were also made at the same time how would I know they were genuine? ....Now at this point reading this, some of you are probably uttering all sorts of foul language and derision and indeed some of you are lucky enough (or unlucky enough) to be glancing at a diamond award you yourself purchased direct from a vet and so know to be genuine!...But here's the thing, you know them to be genuine, they conform to all the recieved wisdom concearning your secific award, they, if you like 'tic all the boxes, but one day you will die and if, as I believe the level of expertice has been achived to fool all, who will pay top dollar for it?.....I have seen a diamond pilot/observer that was beutifully made that conformed to spec but was wrong.............Cont'd

[Howard J-Harvey]

contd.........This item was subsequently sold to a European collector for top money........From a jewelers point of view the construction of any of the nazi diamond awards is very basic and so needs very little technical ability to reproduce, this with the expert addition of patina can and dose even now, fool many of the perceived "experts" within our community!.....This hobby, possibly more than any other, is a veritable minefield of deception and fakery and can and dose make mincemeat of the unwary and ill prepared. and occasionally even makes a fool out of the most experienced!......Sytners Treasures has a "genuine"(tee-hee) Field Marshals baton at the moment?...I wonder if he looks them in the eye when he takes their money????

[Dietrich Maerz]

Hi Deitrech......I rather thought that by saying the diamonds were OK I would induce a heated reaction

No need for a heated discussion here. They are such bad fakes that everybody can see it....

Firstly, I can only think of one set of diamond awards that are unqestionably genuine, and those are the Rudel gold oaks etc that are still held by the family, this is partly because he was the only recepient....If for some reason I was offered one of the other golden oaks that were also made at the same time how would I know they were genuine?

True, how would you (personally)?

Dietrich

[Leroy]

The diamond set presented here is a very pretty copy, maybe made last week, maybe made during the war. The workmanship (without seeing the back) appears to be very nice. But it will always just be a copy, good for display, without ironclad provenance that it was used as a "dupla" by an authorized recipient (and I feel sure there were such things). These are clearly not "issue".

Even if I could afford it, I would be hard-pressed to buy any set of the diamonds and sleep comfortably at night, despite Dietrich's excellent work in educating all of us. I believe (especially these days) that the technology exists to fake these awards (down to details only observable under extreme magnification) far better than even an educated and well-trained collector could ever detect.

[Mike Coleman]

Quesstion for HJ-H

I understand what you are trying to express but can only follow the logic up to a certain point. I will grant you that a good jeweler could reproduce a set of diamonds that would be accurate but in order to do so he would have to be given a set to examine and take apart to make exact molds to replicate the various parts of the set. That is where I can't follow because who in their right mind is going to take something worth over $100K, have it ruined by disassembling it and then have exact copies reproduced to totally devalue the piece. It would take someone either very ignorent or someone who thinks they would sell over 100 of these forgeries to make up for his investment loss ( a possibility ) or someone vendictive enough to want to trash the value of everyone else's collections. With all due respect I just don't see it happening.
Mike

[Peter Wiking]

...I believe (especially these days) that the technology exists to fake these awards (down to details only observable under extreme magnification) far better than even an educated and well-trained collector could ever detect.

Do not put to much faith in modern technology.

Peter

[Leroy]

Peter,
I believe, based on what I have been told concerning the manufacture and duplication of precision military components (for aircraft, spacecraft, etc.), that
virtually anything can be duplicated. I do agree with you, however, that I would not expect the ordinary well-trained jeweler to pull this off. It is all a question of how much money you wish to spend (and what level of technology you can access). The diamonds are certainly approaching that level. Would you spend $40,000 to make an $80,000 profit? I don't know, but I have high faith that the necessary technology is already here. Maybe not available (YET) to everyone, but certainly here. By the way, disassembly is not required if what you are making is a cosmetic duplicate. Who would take apart an original to see what is hidden? Could Otto Klein & Company (which still exists) do this if they really tried? I bet they could.
Leroy