Jump to content

Dog Tags Styles and examples Part 1


Ricardo
 Share

Recommended Posts

I'm looking at buying a pair of WWI USMC dogtags. I was wondering what would be a fair price to pay, they've asked me to make an offer. thanks!

 

A "fair price" or "good price?" :)

 

As a buyer you are not an appraiser so I'd suggest offering what you are comfortable paying. I often hear sellers say "So what do you think these are worth?" and I want to reply "Pay me $100 an hour and I'll do an appraisal."

 

A set of USMC dog tags dated Nov. 1918 sold on bay for $43.00. LJMilitaria.com has a bunch listed but no prices posted. An Australian ebay seller recently sold a set of 1921 USMC tags for $71.00 US. I found another set on ebay described as "Original WWI Marine USMC dog tags Co.L., 11th Regt 1918" that was sold by a Canadian ebayer for $70.99 US.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

teufelhunde.ret

You can also do a finshed auction search for the last 30 days to see what prices have been realized. IMO, much would depnd on who they were issued to... you know the cook, baker, candle stick maker routine. Not everyone carried a rifle. s/f Darrell

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I have seen them as high as $125 at shows

 

Bill

 

I did some ebay searching and the highest recent sale as $84 for a guy who was in fact in France in 1918. There was a pair sold for $29 - belonged to a guy who was Marine in WWI and died as a civilian merchant marine in WWII. I would say Brig, that was with a lot of other collectibles, the dog tags have a fairly broad range from about $30-40 on up to $80-120 and that something in the $70 range is fair to buyer and seller, but if you can get them for $40 you're still within fair market value.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I found this at an antique shop the other day, and in looking up the various types of army dog tags, didn't see this exact type represented. It most closely resembles the "first type" with the exception of the religious denomination. The second type has the tetanus date, which this one doesn't have.

The websites I saw, made no mention of any type of "transition" types. Has anyone here observed this exact format?

post-50776-0-59814700-1399963985.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

They used this next of kin tag up until 1943 then changed over.The story I have heard is that the next of kin was removed as if captured they didnt want the enemy to have any acces to family contact.Maybe Braddocks book on tags can shed some light on the variation.I normally see the early tags in a brass material as yours.I have seen a few in bright metal.

 

RON

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I was just inquiring as to the format, i.e., it doesn't conform to the styles I've seen described. It seems like the first style except it has religious denomination which the first style apparently didn't have. Also, this guy entered the service in '43 after the second style was in use.

 

http://home.att.net/~steinert/us_army_ww2_dog_tags.htm

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Captainofthe7th

I'm not sure. It looks like a late Vietnam tag as the lettering is still indented and not raised, theres no "notch", and they used the SSN not an ASN.

 

That's all I can tell you..

 

Rob

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I know no harm is intended but a veterans SSN and name do not belong on the Internet. SSNs became service numbers in January 1970 and most veterans are probably still alive.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I know no harm is intended but a veterans SSN and name do not belong on the Internet. SSNs became service numbers in January 1970 and most veterans are probably still alive.

 

 

We have altered that to blur out the SSN.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Here's two interesting tags I got recently. The first looks to be all hand stamped on a normal brass tag. I love the uniqueness of it. The Navy tag I couldn't pass up because of the name. He's lucky he was in the service before 1969 or I'm sure he'd have been the butt end of many jokes. :D

post-50776-0-50051300-1399964091.jpg

post-50776-0-78817000-1399964099.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...
  • 2 weeks later...

I just can't figure the branch of arms of that dog tags necklace found in France. think.gif

The owner is not on the NARA list. May-be someone can find something about him.

 

Thanks a lot for your help.

post-647-1222014988.jpg

 

You will notice that the middle name letter is not at the same place on each tag.?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I tried searching for his name on google but couldn't find anything relating to his service, only a lot of genealogy type stuff. All I could tell you from the tag is that he was an Army draftee. There's nothing wrong with the position of the middle initial changing. I have sets of tags where the service numbers don't even match up, it's just human error.

 

Did you actually find these on the ground somewhere or were they purchased? It's a nice set of early tags.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

An Infantry cord would be light blue, no white. This may be faded Chemical Corps, blue and yellow, or just a blue and white cord -- perhaps a shoelace -- with no branch connection.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 weeks later...

A while ago, I mentioned these tags on the Pinned Dog Tags discussion. They belonged to Pvt Richard C. Perry and were found by my brother while metal detecting in the Kaiserslautern area in Germany. He passed them onto me when we were both stationed at RAF Mildenhall in the late 1990's. Looking at them at the time, I wondered what the story was and why they were lost. Well, after researching them a bit, I found out that Richard Perry died of wounds on 19 April, 1945. With the location of where they were found, I figured that he might of belonged to the 80th ID, as that unit moved through the area in late March 1945. Well, I got his IDPF back today, after 3 months of waiting, and found out that he actually belonged to D Co, 7th IR, 3rd ID and died of wounds in Hallstadt, North of Nurnberg. The 3rd ID had been assaulting Nurnburg when he was wounded.

 

Richard C. Perry was born 4 April, 1925 and had just turned 20 when he passed on. He was originally from Manhatten and had a brother John and a sister Isabelle. His Mother Anna Perry requested that her son be buried at the Long Island Military Cemetary in Farmingdale, NY.

 

Now, how could his dogtags be found 100 miles West of Nurnburg? Well, I can answer that now. He was originally buried at Bensheim, Germany, just North of Mannheim. This is very close to the location my brother found the dogtags. He was subsequently moved to the military cemetary at St. Avold, France. So, somewhere in this movement, his tags were lost. That said, they were never included in with the documentation, so they must of been somewhere in his uniform.

 

Thanks for reading. It is sobering reminder of just how tragic war is. Now to find his family.....

 

-Ski

post-3043-1223602765.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest
This topic is now closed to further replies.
 Share

×
×
  • Create New...