Kriegsmarine/Reichsmarine/Imperial/Bundesmarine Cap Tallies

[John R.]

Yes, I'd love to get a Graf Spee to go with a photo I have, but they don't seem to come up for sale that often. I've seen only one on the market lately which is seemingly priced about 3x what would be a reasonable price (with no takers naturally...)

Also, what IS the best way to display talleys without damaging them in any way? I was hoping to display a few along with other insignia in the same frame that one can open from the front but didn't know how best to arrange them and attach them to the backing safely...

---Norm

P.S. Nice collections in this thread

Norm,

Do not attach a tally to anything, the tally is too delicate. For example, a paperclip, etc. If you are going to display them, they have to just be pressed into place by the glass and the tally folded either around the backing material or under itself.

The display itself can take many forms depending on what else is in the display. Really becomes a work of art and up to the collector to form his canvas in an interesting way. This is what is nice about tallies, you could have a tally of a ship and in the center have a photo of the ship, or a period postcard. Lots of ways to display them.

Jody has good ideas on how to do it, maybe he will respond.

John

[Trance_Eyes]

Be quiet. Just be patient. I´ll be watching for one like this for you.

By the way... will nobody say anything about my AVISO GRILLE tally?

Please, what information do you have about this Tally?

[JustinG]

Way I have found to display tallies.

I decided to buy a display case and useing acid free card stock which has felt over it. I then laid out the tallies and made it a quarter inch smaller on the horizontal side than the size of the shadow box. This allowed room for the tallies and for them not to be in contact with the edges and damage them. I then took the back mounting board from the frame of the shadow box and proceeded to place the backing to set it on top of the back portion of the Tallies and this seems to work pretty good. The hardest point of this was making sure that the tallies were taught enough. This process took almost 3 hours for me to get my tallies in place but I like my results.

I will post my display here soon.
regards,

2dresq

[Gregorio Torres]

Please, what information do you have about this Tally?

"Aviso Grille", as you know, was the ship chosen by Hitler for his trips on the sea. Some people have told that this was the Hitler´s yatch, not correct at all, and actually the Führer prefer the mountais, and don´t used a lot his boat.
No doubt, this is the rarest in my collection. As the boat is quite small and for security reasons the crew was almost unchanged during Third Reich years, not many sailors worn this, and when some of these tallys come to the market prices are very hight, as it must be.
This one came to my collection sewn to a sailor´s pillow, with the Kreuzer Endem and Kriegsmarine tallies. This kind of pillows were very used in those times. The sailors used to sew in a pillow the tallys with the names of the ships were they sailed as a souvenir. More veteran = more tallies = most prestige.
My Graf Spee tally came in one of these pillows too.
Regards
Greg

[pantherv]

........

Here's the only 2 in my collection...scanned, but I'll try and get some photo's done this weekend.

I've seen the Graf Spee tally....and then I saw the price tag....

KR....Peter

[pantherv]

...........

Deutschland

[JustinG]

Yes, There are some very expensive tallies out there.
The Uboat School one is going just under $1000 USD.

Nice examples Peter.

Regards,
2dresq

[John R.]

Yes, There are some very expensive tallies out there.
The Uboat School one is going just under $1000 USD.

Nice examples Peter.

Regards,
2dresq

The Uboat school tally is not that rare nor is it that interesting. I can think of only one KM tally (and there are hundreds of named tallies) that is worth 1000 US and it is not this one. Just be patient and you will find the Uboat school tally for around 100 euros or so on ebay.de. Maybe a bit more.

Do not waste this kind of money on any school tally. The reason is that they are not rare, every single U-boat man went through that school so they all had the tally, or multiples of it.

It takes many years to really figure out how you want to collect and then find them. They are out there, believe me. Graf Spee comes up a few times a year for example.

So in the beginning, you might collect everything but in the end, you need to focus on what you are doing. Just like badges, are you going to collect all of a single maker, a single badge type but all makers (like auxiliary cruiser) , an example of every type regardless of maker, etc, etc.

With tallies, you might want to collect battleship, then heavy cruiser (panzerschiffe), cruisers, light cruisers, destroyers, etc, etc. There should be a logical progression.

You must also understand that there are three different types of tallies:

Cotton (issued to the sailor post 1938 and all named are rare)
Cellon (Private purchase)
Gold wire (privately purchased by the sailor and also issues to sailors prior to 1938))

No material is worth more than another however certain collectors like cotton better.

Cellon is the hardest to determine if it is a fake or not. Cotton and Gold Wire are fairly easy.

If you can find a real Prinz Eugen, go for it. 99% of what you see on ebay are fakes.

Finally, there is no Bismarck and no Tirpitz. Only named ship tallies exist for those ships put in commission prior to Sep 1939 have them. Ships after this only had "kriegsmarine".

Hope this helped. John

John

[John R.]

This tally belongs to Jeff V. and with his permission, I will post it. Very rare. Gold wire.

John

[John R.]

Reverse

[Trance_Eyes]

Thanks for that John,

This leads me all the way back to when you 1st contacted me about my Eugen Tally which is a repro. This was my first lesson in Tally collecting and its now great to see an original in its glory.

As a reference here is the standard repro Tally getting around for a few dollars from your local souvenier shop...

[Trance_Eyes]

2.

[Trance_Eyes]

I guess another Question now is how are these Tallies (Originals) actually made, stitched ect...

I'm not sure if anyone has any further information regarding this?

[Norm F]

...It takes many years to really figure out how you want to collect and then find them. They are out there, believe me. Graf Spee comes up a few times a year for example.
...

Hope this helped. John

John

Thanks for the very useful tips John. And the nice pics posted.
Interesting to see that cap, since my Dad served on the Graf Spee during the Spanish Civil War, but all of his stuff was lost during the war except his Soldbuch and some photos. Thus my collecting centers around matching of items in old photos and his service record, and specific cap talleys limited to the ships he served on as an EM or junior NCO. Thus, it has a personal flavor to it, and mercifully fairly apolitical since the Navy experience was all outside of Germany and the messes that went on back there at home.
Makes for an eclectic and diverse collection, since I need to learn about a large spectrum of topics to collect genuine period examples of talleys, insignia, medals, etc and try to stay within budget. Great fun though and really fascinating and hopefully someday I'll have a good display to post pics here as well!
This forum is truly wonderful.
Cheers.
---Norm

[John R.]

Nice post Norm. I am sure your Father had great stories to tell about that ship and his Navy days. John