Damaged, Repair, Clean, Preserve Soviet Awards And Documents.

[Tal Inbar]

Art,

The relative of mine had an order of Lenin, 2 order of the red banner, order of Alexander Nevsky, orders of the GPW (1st and 2nd class) and some medals.
To my sorrow, I learned about the awards after he died and his family gave them away - I saw only pictures.
Another relative had many awards from the 1920's and 1930's, including order of Lenin and Red banner of the RSFSR - but all was left in the USSR.

Tal

[Art]

To bad Tal...I can sympathize with you though..my great great grandfather fought in the American Civil War on the Northern side. He had a musket rifle that was in the family until the 1960's, when my grandfather sold it. I'll bet similar sad stories account for 90% of the awards we all own..

BTW, here is a closeup of the number of the award mentioned in the McDaniel letter. Upon close inspection the entire "starpoint" the serial number occupies had been sanded down by what appears to be a wire-brush of some sorts. Probably one of those wire-brush motorized discs that are used for cleaning rusty metal.

Art

[desantnik]

For the first time ever, today I defaced a Soviet decoration.

I accidentally dropped a RS, shattering the enamel on one of the rays on the kitchen floor. However much I'd like to blame one of my huligan daughters, in the end it's my doing. It's a shame because the set with docs, unit photos, and research belonged to a female medic in an engineer unit.

As hard as I've been hammered in the stock market, this almost feels as bad.

[Art]

Accidents happen Paul! I'm sure you could take it to a jewelers and have the enamel replaced so it looks very good..

[Kirchgoens]

I truly feel your pain... Last year I did the exact same thing. It was a beautiful wartime flatback OPW2 with fully intact enamel in great condition. I brought it home, so proud of my find, only to drop it on the ceramic tile of my kitchen floor in the first two hours. Two starpoints were shattered out, and I was heartbroken. Nothing breaks faster and easier than a wartime OPW2. I see more of them broken than intact, and I still think and agonize on my contribution to this late period homefront damage.

I'm not selling my stocks and mutual funds, and I continue to save, so that money will come back in spades one day. But my OPW2 will always be broken. I am sad and deeply bummed a year later.

[Christophe]

Sad story.... But it happens.
The worst thing in such a story is that you can only blame and feel angry against yourself : "why did I do this ? I should have taken more time, be more careful, etc..." But, that's part of life : we all do too many things at the same time.

Cheers.

Ch.

[marcotk]

Every collector's nightmare.. Also I guess we feel so bad in these occasions since these are unique items per se, If I loose my wallet with some $$ inside, I can re-earn the $$ but a damaged RS is for ever..

[Esteban_cool]

I remembered when my Polonia Restituta fell off my hands. Not as painful as a RS or OPW, but still one of my favorite and most loved pieces.

[ekclete]

I can feel your pain! Same happened to me with a Nevsky but back when they were cheap so the pain was not so severe.

[EricFG]

Despite the lack of camera focus here's an example of a VoJ I just aquired.
I don't think I've ever seen a medal so extremely worn down.