New Addition - Possible maker connection - Rettenmaier = "Flatback" Maker

[Dietrich Maerz]

...Please ask yourself why Rettenmeier marked their wound badge and iron cross but not the rest of their possible production?

I fully understand why this marking/not marking is sometimes here in the "Badges" forum a point with a question mark. As Norm already pointed out there is a good reason and I like to explain it again (because it is really important):

- the LDO Number was intorduced in March 1941 and was only used to mark orders, medals, decorations, ... for the private retail market.
- the PKZ Number was introduced in mid 1942 and was only used for orders and medals ordered by the PKZ for distribution to the Wehrmacht. These included: the Order of the Iron Cross, the Order of the German Cross, the Order of the War Merit Cross and the Eastmedal (and other civilian decorations)
- war badges (which were not orders) were handled by the branches of the Wehrmacht itself and did not require any marking. That is why one doesn't find any. (sure, there are a few exceptions as always!).

That is why it is so extremely important not only to study the orders, medal and decorations itself but why one also has to have a solid understanding of the rules, regulations, distribution channels and procedures of the different branches and the different order and war badges in order to come up with a (hopefully) complete picture.

And that is also why it is so damn' important that we have our timelines correct ....

Dietrich

[BassD]

[QUOTE=Dietrich Maerz;5633994- war badges (which were not orders) were handled by the branches of the Wehrmacht itself and did not require any marking. That is why one doesn't find any. (sure, there are a few exceptions as always!).
Dietrich[/QUOTE]

Hi Dietrich, can you show me please the order that war badges not require any markings? You know i am searching a long time for docs and orders from the Wehrmachtsbeschaffungsämter, Kleiderkassen etc... but i never found anything about the regulation and guidelines of the productions of war badges. Think it would be very interesting to find something about this. But before i did not found any docs about that it was not nessessary to markermark the badges, i am carefull with such statements.

And why have so many IAB, PABs and GABs markermarks when it was not require? Think there are more IABs with markermarks outhtere and unmarked. Or war badges from the Kriegsmarine... Schwerin Berlin as a big supplier of the KM, who should know the guidelines markermark so many of their badges. Why should they do that if the didn't must it?

[Dietrich Maerz]

Dear Basti,

I was maybe a littel imprecise in my statement. What I meant is that they did not require a PKZ-number marking. Of course are there badges with maker marking and other numbers and letters. We all know that.

In the strict sense it might always be required to find a document for any regulation like you search for. But very often it is the case that one does not find a "negative" document, meaning one saying "It is NOT required to do such and such", which - by its non existence - implies that the status quo is the correct one.

Alas, we might find a document which say "It is required to mark such and such" , however, we might not find documents which say "It is NOT required to do such and such".

Sometimes the visual reality of things might be the better guide line.

Dietrich

[Nick Carraway]

It is instructive that we see Assmann luft badges marked L64 on very late war zinc badges which corresponds to when Luft badges were open for private sales.

[Norm F]

Among KM badges, certainly the vast majority of award pieces (other than Schwerin) were unmarked. The most common early awarded Minesweepers in Tombak, which are readily availabe in well-worn states, are Junckers and Schickles -- all exclusively unmarked. Schwerins were equally common but I think their name was incorporated into the reverse more as a point of pride rather than regulation. The most commonly found awarded zinc piece in later war groupings seems to have been the so-called "unmarked AS in triangle". The marked "AS in triangle" examples seem to turn up less commonly.

Consistent with Dietrich's statement, PK number marked KM badges are an extreme rarity and the small handful that exist always have the number stamped into a main pin of the type used on an EK1 or KVK1.

LDO numbers are another matter of course. All Hymmen and Mayer Minesweepers are marked with their LDO numbers as per regulation for private sale, while Deumer and F&B seem to have marked just those examples destined for private sale.

Best regards,
---Norm

[luggas]

the problem ist that this thread like many other "possible maker" threads is full of unproven guesswork which is repeated again again and again until enough people jumped on it and it's accepted as "evidence".

Thanks Andreas, thats what i mean.
My english is not so good, that i can follow the full thread.

It was no attack to Tom. If it come so, i am sorry.

[Norm F]

Hi Guys,

Another observation pertinent to this thread. Look at the catch on the L/59 marked Rettenmaier EK1 which Tom D. posted earlier in the thread. Then look at the catch on the flatback silver IAB posted by Tom Y. here:
http://dev.wehrmacht-awards.com/foru...ight=flatbacks
Continues to add up...

Best regards,
---Norm

[Thomas Durante]

Hi Norm,

Indeed, looks like a perfect match. Another piece of the puzzle and more evidence that these Flatbacks are likely Rettenmaier's.

Thanks Norm.

Tom

[Andreas Klein]

Correct me if i'm wrong ... i see a flatwire catch without base plate on the iron cross and a round wire catch with base plate on the IAB.

Interesting that an apple is a perfect match to a pear?

[Norm F]

Correct me if i'm wrong ... i see a flatwire catch without base plate on the iron cross and a round wire catch with base plate on the IAB.

Interesting that an apple is a perfect match to a pear?

Hi Andreas,

I should be more precise. Of course a Tombak EK1 frame doesn't require a base plate like the zinc IAB does for attaching the catch.

The catches themselves are of course identical. One apple is identical to the other apple on a plate.

Which, like every other individual observation, is not that meaningful taken singly, but is much more compelling when taken as whole with all the other observations and anecdotes. So the process goes.

Best regards,
---Norm

[Andreas Klein]

Hi Norm,

please have a close look at the end of the catch at the area where it is soldered to the badge. There you can clearly see that on the iron cross we have a flatwire catch while we have a round wire catch on the IAB or in simple words ---- they are totally different from each other.

You can't compare them and call it an "evidence" that the IAB features the same setup as the iron cross.

Nevertheless where is the evidence that L/59 made their own setups in a unique design which wasn't used by anyone else?

Have a look in Frank Thaters Iron Cross book and at the pictures posted in the threads --- it's no secret that L/59 used a wide area of totally different setups on the same badges. The only logical reason for that is that they got their setups from a third party supplier.

And there is the end of any maker connection based on the design of the used setup because you can't say how many firms used them.

[scott3000]

This is a very Interesting thread

[Norm F]

-- it's no secret that L/59 used a wide area of totally different setups on the same badges.

Hi Andreas,

Yes, it's interesting that Rettenmaier used a wide variety of setups on the same award in contrast to some other wartime combat badge makers in other cities like Berlin, Vienna and Gablonz who seemed slightly more consistent over the few years of wartime zinc production (as a generalization). That in itself may be significant.

I'm curious, since Rettenmaier's manufacturing business was one of the few that continued on after the war up until modern times, and given that makers like Souval and S&L had large quantities of leftover wartime stock for many years after the war, do you believe all the Rettenmaier products that we see now are wartime produced or are we dealing with a "Souval-like" situation with large amounts of wartime leftovers being used up and released in the post-war market?

Best regards,
---Norm

[BassD]

Norm, you can't imagine how many leftovers are out there. Especially needle systems.... we found tons of them. And this more than 60 years after the war

[Andreas Klein]

Hi Norm,

i can't say it. Imo one of the secrets with no chance for an answer. I think germany was full of awards after the war. I was told for example that Quenzer had hundreds of IC still in stock in the late 70's.

I made photos in 2010 of boxes with ready to assemple iron crosses of Carl Wild and that had been around hundred crosses only in the boxes which were opened for us.

We were told that a countless number of boxes were still in stock. Not opened, not count ...