Otto Skorzeny Knights Cross Papers ++

[Gregory Koepp]

THANKS HANK, GLAD SOMEONE LIKES THEM.

ALSO THE K.C. DOC, AND G.C. DOC, HAVE BEEN WITH THIS GROUPING FROM DAY ONE, WELL BEFORE THEY THOUGHT ABOUT MAKING FAKES. SO HIS PROVDENCE IS ROCK SOLID. I DO UNDERSTAND THAT SOME WILL NEVER BELEAVE ANYTHING, AND IF THIS CONTINUES THIS HOBBY IS DOOMED IF ANOTHER RARE GROUPING COMES TO LIGHT, OR ITEM??? (like that Russian Propaganda I.C. I found)

MOST PEOPLE NEVER LOOK INTO WHAT THEY JUMP ON SO FAST? I CAN SAY AFTER GOING BACK OVER AND LOOKING AND TALKING THIS GROUPING IS AS GOOD AS IT GET'S.

GREG KOEPP

[Napalm]

It still doesn't explain the Upside down sig?

[markus]

Very interesting thread. I always enjoy famous SS-Officer groups!

My first observation, as a native German speaking, regarding the last posted documents is as follows:

- Some rather unimportant paper items dealing with his activities in the Studentenbund are seemingly from him personally/from his estate.

- The military promotion-recommendations, GCiG-recommendations, etc. all seem to come from Otto's personnel file, rather than from his estate.

How they found their way out of the SS-file into a private collection I would prefer not to know. I have seen several high ranking SS officers groups, one of which is in my collection (swords recipient), but never have I seen recommendation and administration documents in them. That is something the individuals never received, but remained at the SS-Personalabteilung.

- Newspaper clips can be from anyone.


They are all genuine documents, but the group IMO is a put-together.

I would love to see more of Otto´s award documents, rather than administration and recommendation papers of different SS-Admin. depts.

[Chris]

Markus is 100 percent right. This is a "salted" group which includes:

-- Some original file documents which Skorzeny never saw or owned, stolen from his personnel file.

-- Some newspaper clippings and ephemera which have no value.

-- Some completely unrelated documents from a student group which happen to have his name mentioned in them.

-- Bad fakes of important award documents.

Somebody got really ripped off on this deal.

[peter u]

Hello,

Chris & Markus explained the group in their postings #108 & #109.
Thanks, not much more to add!

Cheers,
Peter

[RaymondG]

Hi

It has certainly been a fascinating thread to read and many thanks for posting the images.

There are several points here:

1. Award Documents
Simon Orchard put forward a very compelling case for the docs being forgeries

http://dev.wehrmacht-awards.com/foru...9&postcount=30

Greg, you wanted an 'expert' opinion on them and you got one for free as Max History is a recognised signature expert.

http://dev.wehrmacht-awards.com/foru...5&postcount=45

So, can we now conclude that they are fakes?

1. Other official documentation

Now from what I see, much of this would have come from Otto's personnel file which he certainly would not have been in his possession. So, unless he carried them around with him (which he wouldn't), or went back and 'liberated' them himself, they would have almost certainly been added to the grouping later. I guess they were liberated at the end of the war, or much later and have been added to this group. I cannot see any other way in which he would have had them from Day 1.

It would be interesting to see what microfilm they have for his file at the archives. This would show whether they disappeared at the end of the war, or much later.

It is not unusual for collectors to legitimately add items to a grouping if a grouping is split and then a collector tries to get pieces back together. I do not think this is the case here.

Personally, I think that there are some great, original documentation in there, but that is where it ends.

Raymond

[RaymondG]

Hi

I have been doing some digging in the scans of Skorzeny's file that I do have.

Now this is the document that Greg posted

[RaymondG]

And here is one from the microfilm held at NARA.

It is the same document.

[RaymondG]

The above scan is from the microfilms held at NARA.

So, the document cannot have been always together as it would be impossible.

I am not sure when the documents were returned to Berlin, but I guess these went missing either in the States or after they arrived back in Berlin. Maybe a forum member can tell me when they were returned to Germany.

In conclusion, I would suggest they were added later and I am not quite sure why they are not in the archives in Berlin?

Raymond

[Simon O.]

Greg

As you believe the RK and DKiG docs to be genuine, could you give us your explanation of the signature? There are a whole series of other issues but we can keep it to this one most glaring mistake.
As for the DKiG, I stand by what i said with regard to the stamp. I leave the floor open for anyone to show this same stamp in use on a known genuine DK prelim.


This thread started as a 'show and tell' and i thank you Greg for taking the time to show us this, i'm sure it's of interest to many. However, your last comment, about the owner being interested to sell to serious buyers propels this into another sphere where the group and in particular those two award docs (as they're by far the most valuable) are going to be looked at under a microscope. Authenticity by association is meaningless.

[RaymondG]

Hi

I have done a bit more digging and I think this archived article answers all my questions:

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpag...51C1A96E948260


Raymond

[peter u]

Hello,

Like Simon said it is indeed intresting to be able to view & inspect fake awarddocuments.
But two fake awarddocuments don't become authentic because they are now added with a stolen archive documents from the personalfile of O.Skorzeny.
The letter from "Benders publishing" says it all.
Like I and many others already knew: is that the documents and objects from O.Skorzeny went "missing" in May 1945.
His home in Vienna was looted by the red army!
And his documents, uniforms and memorabilia that were kept in his HQ when he surrendered to the US army was seizured by the US army and souvenired by GI's.
What happend with these, liberated, souvenired or looted objects after 1945?
- It seems that his personalfile that was seizured by the US army somehow found his way out of an archive for the second time since 1945 and is now for sale together with some fake awarddocuments and newspaperclipings.
- His cigaretcase is in an US museum.
- And all the rest, like his soldbuch, wp, awarddocuments, pictures, uniforms, awards, Musolini operation memorabilia,...etc, still seems to be missing.
The large majority most likely destroyed.
So don't be naive approaching O.Skorzeny collectables.

Cheers,
Peter

[peter u]

Nazi Germany related documents stolen from an archive?!?!
-First time I hear that story

Militaria dealers selling stolen merchandize?
- Also a scoop for me!


P

[markus]

Many thanks for the link Raymond. I did not know there was still one report on the web, since the incidents happened in the 1980s.

Yes, thousands of documents, especially award recommendations (with rare and nice signatures) were stolen from the archives back then and they are still being sold today.

I know that the German Federal Police (BKA) and the FBI were working on these cases of theft and resale, but it would be interesting to know whether they still are!

Greg: What´s your friend´s name?

[Mark C. Yerger]

Personally, as someone else wrote, I've never see Hauptsturmführer abbreviated that way. Not after looking at, literally, tens of thousands of pages of Personalakte.

The Vorschlagsliste is one of many taken from BDC (stolen) in the 1980s, a still known US dealer being partly involved. Some European employees of the archive were arrested after the fact but the effort to regain custody of the material was half hearted at best. The film at NARS was created in the 1970s when the archive was intact. All things stolen were from big names, including Otto Kumm's full Personalakte.

Mark