Hello Marc, Peter and others. I had contributed a bit to Wehrmacht.com, but was pulled away to other sites. I returned as I understand my recent article in Military Advisor has caused some consternation wtih particpants on this forum.
Fraud is a strong word to use, especially when it is apparent one has not read the article completely, or is confused by the text.
Let me quote the most apparent contentious paragraph.
"How else can we explain the presence of buckles such as the three variations of the Landespolizei and the Gau Essen. The Feldgrau Landespolizei buckle was not even listed in the Assmann catalog. Was it an unsaleable creations of Assmann or a post war creation for the young collectors? Given the condition of the factories, our man believes these feldgrau buckles to be legitimate war-time Assmann creations that were never authorized or adopted."
If you read this paragraph in its entirety, you will note that I do not suggest the Gau Essen buckle, or any other buckle except the Feldgrau Landespolizei, to possibly be a post-war creation. To suggest otherwise is simply untrue. And, I wrote that the source of the information in this article believed the Feldgrau LAPO buckle to be of authentic war time production.
There was never an assertion that all of these buckles were purchased solely from Assmann. Nor is it written in the article that the buckles in the photograph all came from the Assmann factory. Marc, to assert that I did write this is simply not true. I quote from my article. "But our shrewd collector had the foresight to photograph some of the pristine pieces that came from those factories." I mention in the article that the young man visited many factories from which he purchased material. As a matter of fact, one of the letters from Assmann not published indicated the Assmann source was selling buckles from "...an older man who used to have a factory here in Lüdensheid."
The photographs used in the article were produced some some twenty years ago from original 35mm negatives provided to me by the gentleman in this article, as were the copies of his original correspondance and the page from the sales flyer featuring the buckles. The dealer was Col.Stoddard from San Diego who purchased material from this man. I was told these were photographs of the original buckles from the cache purchased in Germany. I readily admit that I am not an expert in the general field of buckle collecting. The photograph of the boxes was added by the Roger Bender from his file copies to add "color" to the article.
I have written a number of articles for "The Military Advisor". Well documented articles on the Nazi Colonial Police and their honor dagger, the Fuhrerschule of the Sicherheitspolizei and Nazi Police flags of which I am very proud. This article on buckles was not a patch work fabrication as has been asserted in this thread. I made no attempt to assert Gau Essen buckles to be fake.
The article was intended to demonstrate how I believe these buckles to have been introduced into the collecting field. The story is true.
But I simply do not understand how it this article could have produced such anger in you Marc, to accuse me of fraudulently creating it. We have met and shared information on a congenial basis. What have I done to merit such an outburst? I state that I believe buckles such as the Gau Essen and the LAPO buckles are unused prototypes which found their way to collectors by means of post war purchases by men such as my friend.
Fraud is a strong word to use, especially when it is apparent one has not read the article completely, or is confused by the text.
Let me quote the most apparent contentious paragraph.
"How else can we explain the presence of buckles such as the three variations of the Landespolizei and the Gau Essen. The Feldgrau Landespolizei buckle was not even listed in the Assmann catalog. Was it an unsaleable creations of Assmann or a post war creation for the young collectors? Given the condition of the factories, our man believes these feldgrau buckles to be legitimate war-time Assmann creations that were never authorized or adopted."
If you read this paragraph in its entirety, you will note that I do not suggest the Gau Essen buckle, or any other buckle except the Feldgrau Landespolizei, to possibly be a post-war creation. To suggest otherwise is simply untrue. And, I wrote that the source of the information in this article believed the Feldgrau LAPO buckle to be of authentic war time production.
There was never an assertion that all of these buckles were purchased solely from Assmann. Nor is it written in the article that the buckles in the photograph all came from the Assmann factory. Marc, to assert that I did write this is simply not true. I quote from my article. "But our shrewd collector had the foresight to photograph some of the pristine pieces that came from those factories." I mention in the article that the young man visited many factories from which he purchased material. As a matter of fact, one of the letters from Assmann not published indicated the Assmann source was selling buckles from "...an older man who used to have a factory here in Lüdensheid."
The photographs used in the article were produced some some twenty years ago from original 35mm negatives provided to me by the gentleman in this article, as were the copies of his original correspondance and the page from the sales flyer featuring the buckles. The dealer was Col.Stoddard from San Diego who purchased material from this man. I was told these were photographs of the original buckles from the cache purchased in Germany. I readily admit that I am not an expert in the general field of buckle collecting. The photograph of the boxes was added by the Roger Bender from his file copies to add "color" to the article.
I have written a number of articles for "The Military Advisor". Well documented articles on the Nazi Colonial Police and their honor dagger, the Fuhrerschule of the Sicherheitspolizei and Nazi Police flags of which I am very proud. This article on buckles was not a patch work fabrication as has been asserted in this thread. I made no attempt to assert Gau Essen buckles to be fake.
The article was intended to demonstrate how I believe these buckles to have been introduced into the collecting field. The story is true.
But I simply do not understand how it this article could have produced such anger in you Marc, to accuse me of fraudulently creating it. We have met and shared information on a congenial basis. What have I done to merit such an outburst? I state that I believe buckles such as the Gau Essen and the LAPO buckles are unused prototypes which found their way to collectors by means of post war purchases by men such as my friend.
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