What are the reasons for early Mongolian orders being so rare?

[Urnuh]

Originally Posted by Pobeda45

Urnuh, I am a huge fan of your book. Really well done, bravo!

Two questions for you:

The early Mongolian orders that do come up for sale every once in awhile--are those primarily ones where the owner had already died by the time the exchange was started?

Were the 1940 type Red Banners of Combat also exchanged for the 1945 type? Seems like the 1940 type is much more scarce and desirable. I prefer the early design myself. :thumbsup

George

George, thank you.

The Order of the Red Banner of Combat/Military Valor (1926 and 1931 types), the Order of the Red Banner of Labor Valor (1926 and 1931 types) that occasionally surface for sale these days are most likely the ones awarded and whose bearers died before they could return them to be exchanged for later type specimens. Also, some orders, mostly the Orders of the Red Banner of Combat/Military Valor, awarded to former Soviets were never replaced with newer type orders because of the death of the bearer or difficulty in tracking that particular recipient. The Mongolian Embassy in Moscow systematically withdrew the old orders and gave new ones to the Soviet recipients as soon as the order design was changed and new design orders were manufactured. I would say that they succeeded in their efforts quite well prior to 1948 since the money paid for all orders and some medals was wired to the Soviet recipients residing in the USSR through Mongolian Embassy in Moscow. You know that an each order and two honorary medals carried some monthly cash until 1948 and the recipients were entitled to the monthly payments even if they lived in another country. Therefore, the Mongolian Embassy should have a good record of the Soviet awardees at that time.

Your second question, as with the above, some of the 1940 type Red Banners awarded to Soviets were never replaced. This also applies to 1940 type Order of the Polar Star since the design of it was identical (besides the Old Mongolian acronym on the seal) to 1945 type OPS. But overwhelming majority of the 1940 type Red Banners were withdrawn and replaced either in Mongolia or in the USSR. The reason why this type of orders is also rare is because they were awarded for a very short period of time. Therefore the ones awarded were withdrawn and the ones un-awarded were recycled. Few samples were transferred to museums and the Central Bank. The Central Bank sold most of its stocks in 2005. I saw some Central Bank released Industrial Valors (1940 type) with deliberately damaged enamel. It was sad to see this pieces damaged but still it is good that they have survived at all.