Is this medal naming correct? Post your engraving questions here!

[Dave]

1 hour ago, Austin_Militaria said:

Any thoughts on this engraving? The PH is a split broach USN type, and the SS is a Army type. 

 

 

 

 

 

At first glance, these look ok to me. 

[Dave]

On 9/11/2024 at 4:32 PM, USMarineCorps said:

Hi all,

 

What are your thoughts on the engraving style on this AM - DFC pair?

The only individual I found with this name was killed in an EC-47 crash in Binh Dinh, Vietnam in 1969 and served with the 460th TRW.

However, this does not appear to be in line with other Vietnam era engraving styles I have seen for posthumous awards.

 

Thank you in advance for your input!

 

Fred

 

 

 

These definitely aren't standard engraving. This is the sort of thing when you see a set that has been reissued to the family by the unit. That said, it's also the same engraving style most jewelers could do (this was the standard font that came with a new pantograph). 

[devildog34]

5 hours ago, Austin_Militaria said:

Any thoughts on this engraving? The PH is a split broach USN type, and the SS is a Army type. 

 

 

Message sent

[USMarineCorps]

@Dave, thank you as always for your help. I figured it wasn’t official government engraving, so thank you for confirming this.

 

Here’s another piece I recently picked up. The engraving seems to be consistent with WW2 posthumous examples I have seen, but the recipient earned the medal in WW1. Note that the medal is not numbered and that the brooch and ribbon are no longer present. Comparing it to a 1945 contract DSC I have, the planchet is identical, so I assume it had a slot brooch at some point. Unfortunately the medal has been frequently cleaned during its life, resulting in the base medal showing.

 

Note: I also posted this medal in “REAL OR WHAT?”.

 

[Manatee1015]

Does anyone have any thoughts about the engravings on both this SSM and PH? Both have a slot brooch. The woman selling them says they were awarded to her grandfather during WWII. Some quick research shows that Sibley E. Manning (1922-1992) was in the 2nd Armored Division. The engravings on both medals look off to me, I’m not used to seeing this type of lettering/font on WWII issued medals. I’ve also never seen a SSM engraving, or really any engraving for that matter, that is so off center like this one either. I’m definitely not an expert though, so hopefully someone here could give me their opinion on them.
Also, I asked the seller if her grandfather had these medals replaced later on. I figured that maybe these might be the replacements but she told me no and that these are the original medals. I apologize in advance as the photos she sent to me aren’t the best quality. Thanks! 
 

[S1991]

On 2/21/2025 at 8:42 PM, Manatee1015 said:

Does anyone have any thoughts about the engravings on both this SSM and PH? Both have a slot brooch. The woman selling them says they were awarded to her grandfather during WWII. Some quick research shows that Sibley E. Manning (1922-1992) was in the 2nd Armored Division. The engravings on both medals look off to me, I’m not used to seeing this type of lettering/font on WWII issued medals. I’ve also never seen a SSM engraving, or really any engraving for that matter, that is so off center like this one either. I’m definitely not an expert though, so hopefully someone here could give me their opinion on them.
Also, I asked the seller if her grandfather had these medals replaced later on. I figured that maybe these might be the replacements but she told me no and that these are the original medals. I apologize in advance as the photos she sent to me aren’t the best quality. Thanks! 
 

 

I've seen these being sold by 3 different persons now.. Twice on Facebook and once on eBay. 

 

The Purple Heart and Silver Star are actually post-war re-issued ones. There is a Newspaper article that states that his wartime ones had been stolen by his wife after he came back home from overseas. Somewhere in the 80's, if I remember correctly, he received these.

Quite a interesting story, yet the asking price is a bit.. Well, steep.

[Manatee1015]

1 hour ago, S1991 said:

 

I've seen these being sold by 3 different persons now.. Twice on Facebook and once on eBay. 

 

The Purple Heart and Silver Star are actually post-war re-issued ones. There is a Newspaper article that states that his wartime ones had been stolen by his wife after he came back home from overseas. Somewhere in the 80's, if I remember correctly, he received these.

Quite a interesting story, yet the asking price is a bit.. Well, steep.

Very interesting, thanks for the information! That was my original thought too, that these medals may have been later replacements, but when she told me they weren’t, with that engraving style it seemed a bit suspect. Not saying she was lying or anything, she very well might not have known about the theft. Just that the engraving didn’t seem to be from WWII. On another note, I wonder if the recipient and his wife had a bad divorce or something? That’s a pretty low thing to do, to steal something that meaningful, especially from your own husband. And you’re not kidding about the asking price! 😂 Thanks again.

 

Much appreciated,

- Vincent

[CMT04]

What about this one?

[tdogchristy90]

Friend wanted me to see what the community thought of this USMC engraving.

 

[History Man]

1 hour ago, tdogchristy90 said:

Friend wanted me to see what the community thought of this USMC engraving.

 

 

Looks like standard engraving to me

[warguy]

Yup, I think it looks good

[tdogchristy90]

A friend asked me to update the Bennett photo above with this photo.

[tdogchristy90]

As I’m more active on the forum than him, my buddy asked me to post these photos as he finally got this in hand…

 

 

[Scarecrow]

Hello,

This Bronze Star, recently acquired, came from a house cleanout.  The current owners of the house said they had no idea know who it belonged to. My question is, has any one of my more learned Forum members seen engraving like this?  Also just initials? Was this common?  Thanks for any input.

 

[Spartan19]

9 hours ago, Scarecrow said:

Hello,

This Bronze Star, recently acquired, came from a house cleanout.  The current owners of the house said they had no idea know who it belonged to. My question is, has any one of my more learned Forum members seen engraving like this?  Also just initials? Was this common?  Thanks for any input.

 

This bronze star has been recently engraved. For one its sloppy and two they added all of those lines in the middle witch should be smooth. To be frank it's quite ugly. 

 

Maybe someone in the family engraved it or took it somewhere to have it engraved.

[Spartan19]

9 hours ago, Scarecrow said:

Hello,

This Bronze Star, recently acquired, came from a house cleanout.  The current owners of the house said they had no idea know who it belonged to. My question is, has any one of my more learned Forum members seen engraving like this?  Also just initials? Was this common?  Thanks for any input.

 

 

Here's what a government engraved bronze star should look like. Notice there's many many differences between mine and yours. Also I know mine is 100% good as mine also comes with the original documentation for it.

[Scarecrow]

14 hours ago, Spartan19 said:

This bronze star has been recently engraved. For one its sloppy and two they added all of those lines in the middle witch should be smooth. To be frank it's quite ugly. 

 

Maybe someone in the family engraved it or took it somewhere to have it engraved.

Spartan19,

Thank you for your input, appreciate you taking the time to reply.  However you are incorrect in your assessment.  This has not been recently engraved.  This was given to me by a friend and his sister while cleaning out their deceased grandmother's home.  They were going to throw it in the trash but then he thought of me knowing I liked that "war stuff" he asked if I wanted it.  Of course I said yes.  Their grandmother lived in that home in excess of 50 years.  And this elderly woman would have no reason to have had it engraved particularly since she didn't know who it belonged to.  No doubt, as you mention, someone from some vets family probably had it engraved privately.  I know that it is not a government engraved one.  But it most certainly was not engraved recently.  My question centered solely around whether someone had ever seen a BS engraved with only the initials.  Again thank you for taking the time to respond.

[Allan H.]

The "JM" Bronze Star was PROBABLY engraved with someone else's name on the back. The vertical lines were most likely done by the jeweler to hide the previous engraving.

 

My two cents,

 

Allan

[Dave]

@Scarecrow - I agree with Allan on this. Someone had a previous name removed and the initials added. They took it to a jeweler who used a line engraver (image below) to remove the previous name, and then that same person hand engraved the initials. 

Who, why, or how are unknown, sadly.

 

[Scarecrow]

Alan, Dave,

 

Thanks for your responses.  Much appreciated.  I would concur with your assessments.

[Spartan19]

3 hours ago, Scarecrow said:

Spartan19,

Thank you for your input, appreciate you taking the time to reply.  However you are incorrect in your assessment.  This has not been recently engraved.  This was given to me by a friend and his sister while cleaning out their deceased grandmother's home.  They were going to throw it in the trash but then he thought of me knowing I liked that "war stuff" he asked if I wanted it.  Of course I said yes.  Their grandmother lived in that home in excess of 50 years.  And this elderly woman would have no reason to have had it engraved particularly since she didn't know who it belonged to.  No doubt, as you mention, someone from some vets family probably had it engraved privately.  I know that it is not a government engraved one.  But it most certainly was not engraved recently.  My question centered solely around whether someone had ever seen a BS engraved with only the initials.  Again thank you for taking the time to respond.

What I meant by recently is it was probably done within the last 20 to 30 year's. So technically not recently but also not 80 plus year's either. Also to add my two cents. Just because someone lived in a house for 50 year's doesn't really mean anything when it comes to stuff like this..

[Dave]

1 minute ago, Spartan19 said:

What I meant by recently is it was probably done within the last 20 to 30 year's. So technically not recently but also not 80 plus year's either. Also to add my two cents. Just because someone lived in a house for 50 year's doesn't really mean anything when it comes to stuff like this..

 

Cody-

Unfortunately, in this case, there's no way to tell how old it is. That kind of graver has been around for several hundred years, so this could have easily been done 70 years ago. Or 60. Or 80. Without a crystal ball (mine is cloudy) there's no exact way of pinning down the date. 

 

Dave

 

[Wharfmaster]

The original recipient may have been awarded a named BS that was misspelled and this is how he had it corrected. We will never know for sure.

 

 

W

[KASTAUFFER]

After seeing the price climb on this medal, I figured I should post it here.

 

This engraving on this medal is bad in my opinion. 

 

It mirrors other bad engraving from the 1980's-90s from a known faker in Detroit.  Once you have seen a real one, the bad ones stick out like a sore thumb. 

 

[KASTAUFFER]

Here is a real one