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Collecting Soviet State Awards

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Collecting Soviet State Awards COLLECTING SOVIET STATE AWARDS - PART III: Orders for Revolution and Merit in Labor, Defense of the Motherland, Development of Friendship, and Strengthening Peace; Medals for Merit in Labor and in Economic Achievements Tom Lifka, OMSA #4937 This article is the third in a series covering the medals and orders of the former Soviet Union. The first two articles, which appeared in the March and May 1992 JOMSA issues, focused for the most part on military medals. In the present article, I will continue my comments on the medals, but also begin to provide information about the orders. While there is a good deal to say about almost all of the orders, the remaining medals typically require little commentary from me beyond production quantity and my guess at a fair market price. Were I to write about all remaining medals in one artlele, I am afraid readers would be bored in reviewing little more than a long series of photos, accompanied by a list of prices and numbers. Hopefully, the approach I have selected of featuring both orders and medals in each of the remaining articles will keep the text more interesting. As in the earlier articles, I am not going to repeat physical descriptions and historical information about the awards. This information is available in many excellent publications, some of which are reviewed in my article in the November 1991 Journal. As previously, my purpose is to produce what I hope are some useful thoughts on condition, availability and likely price of interest to a collector considering the acquisition of an award specimen. MORE GENERAL THOUGHTS ON COLLECTING SOVIET STATE AWARDS Varieties Among Orders: As the reader will soon see, for many of the orders, there exist several varieties. Varieties of the same order result for one of two basic reasons. The first reason is that the statutes or regulations governing some physical or design characteristic of the order changed with time. With regard to the medals, such changes only occurred on one occasion, when on June 19, 1943, the five medals created between 1938 and 1943 were ordered to be hung from the new, standard, five-sided hard ribbon rather than from small, red rectangular and triangular serewbaek suspension devices. As we shall see, this statute also affected several of the orders. But other rule changes altered the appearance of the orders, too, and I will attempt to mention as many of these as I know of as I discuss each specific order below. Personally, I have chosen to collect the varieties in this category, not only because of the official change brought about by the statute or otTteial regulation, but because usually these changes resulted in the alteration of the appearance of the award as it is worn or displayed. Thus, these varieties become a significant part ofthe overall history and significaneeofthe award. Finally, these changes and varieties are generally well-documented in the currently available literature on Soviet awards. The second category of varieties occurs from a very different set of circumstances -- those having to do with the actual physical production of the awards at the government mint. The USSR awards were produced at the Moscow and Leningrad Mints, and in the ease of some awards, there are minor differences at each mint i~ the die used for casting, in finishing, etc. Even as each piece is worked on by craftsmen, tiny differences inevitably occur from specimen to specimen. The orders are oRen made in two, three or more separate pieces held together, and may be attached by small rivets, solder, or both. Later, production of such multiple-piece orders sometimes changed, and they were cast in one piece. Since the medals are all of one piece, even when carrying enamel, these variations do not apply to them. For the most part, these production variations are only visible by examining the reverse of the orders. In other words, these are 19 variations that are not designed to be seen or make a noticeable difference. When these differences are significant enough, I will try to mention them in the commentary below. At the present time, these production varieties are not documented or mentioned in any of the literature I have seen, though some information may have been published in former Soviet numismatic periodicals. I certainly do not have the expertise at present to write about them with any authority. I suspect that only a few collectors/dealers in Russia, and perhaps a few people who work at the mints, are really in a position to catalog these variations. At some point, hopefully, that compilation will occur. I have decided for myself not to collect this catego~’y of varieties, except when production differences have changed the obverse of the order in some fairly discernible fashion. Lack of information, cost, and in some cases, excessive duplication of the same award has been enough to convince me to leave this aspect of collecting to museums. Serial Numbers: All Soviet orders are awarded with a serial number hand engraved or stamped on the reverse. Occasionally, as I noted in my last article, you will find an order specimen with the number visibly scratched out. The original recipients very likely did so to protect themselves against identification with their illegal trade. But this is a rather infrequent practice. Almost all the awards you see will have a number. In general, the number is an aid in verifying authenticity. For example, if you are purchasing the Order of Glory, 2nd class, and you know that only around 46,000 have been awarded, you can check to make sure the specimen you are considering has a number below the number awarded. In most cases, the assumptions made in this example to validate the specimen will be correct. In others, however, the numbering systems used by the government mint in the award process were evidently not so simple and linear. I say evidently because I have no definitive evidence, other than my observations, to go by. For some orders, higher numbers were used for serial numbers than the total awards given. A listing of all the awards held by the Armed Forces Museum in Moscow, with recipients and serial numbers listed, was published in the early 1980’s as Awards of the Motherland (Nagradi Rodin),). If one looks, for example, at its listings for the Order of Kutuzov, 3rd class, numbers will be found like #6850 and #7627, even though a total of only 3328 of this high award was given during the Great Patriotic War. The specimens of the Order of Friendship of Nations I have examined virtually all have a serial number that is higher than the 10,000 awards which the most recent literature documents as given out. Awards seem to have been given in roughly chronological order beginning with the lowest numbers. Examination of data in Awards of the Motherland also reveals, however, that sometimes awards with higher numbers were given in time earlier than those with somewhat lower numbers. Perhaps during the war, when so many awards were given month after month, it happened that some sectors of the front used their supply faster than others, thus accounting for a high number in one geographic location being given before the same award with a somewhat lower number in another. Unfortunately, as with other aspects of production, there is still a great deal of information about the serial numbering system used for various orders that is as of now unknown. Perhaps a few experts in Russia, either collectors or mint workers, have the knowledge, and will publish it at some point. I certainly have nothing like complete knowledge, but to the extent I have some significant information about serial numbers for a particular award, I will include it in my remarks below. I am sometimes asked if, by using the serial number, it is possible in Russia to conduct research to learn the recipient and other information concerning a particular award. Thanks to information provided by OMSA member Kevin Mahoney, I am able to respond partially at least. The records 20 necessary for matching serial number to awardee are located in the archives of the Presidium, the highest official political body of the former USSR. At present these archives are closed, even to Russian researchers. Former Soviet governmental and Communist Party records are very rapidly becoming available to qualified scholars, and it is possible that the portion of the Presidium archives covering state awards will some day open up. For the present, however, the type of research medal collectors would like to do ideally is simply not possible. Orders for Revolution and Merit in Labor, defense of the Motherland~ development of Friendship~ and Strengthening Peace 1. Order of Lenin (figure 1): The Order of Lenin is the highest state award of the USSR. Unlike other orders in this category, it was given for both military and non-military achievements. Sometimes it was given automatically with other high awards, such as with the Gold Star Medal for the Hero of the Soviet Union. In the last year or so, the collector’s market has been flooded with this order, of which over 400,000 were awarded. Nevertheless, the fact that it is relatively common should not diminish the central position this item commands in any collection of Soviet state awards. Along with the Hero of the Soviet Union and the Order of the Red Banner, the Order of Lenin has the richest history of any USSR award. Figure 1 : The Order of Lenin 21 .
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