Recently I acquired an extensive Massachusetts Volunteer Militia shooting medal group that includes three beautiful gold medals. The most desirable is the Distinguished Marksman badge but all three are works of art. I thought they would make a good starting point for a thread on the subject of “gold medals”. (Unfortunately gold is a difficult metal to photograph when it’s highly polished.)

 

The first ten medals are from my collection. The others are ones that I photographed in museums or private collections. Please post any photos that you have.

Distinguished obverse

 

 

Distinguished reverse

Civil War USN vets

Society of Santiago and Military Order of Foreign Wars to a US Army officer who was KIA in the Philippines in 1901.

 

 

Reverse

 

Society of Military Surgeons, pre-WWI. Not marked, but probably 10k.

Naval and Military Order of the Spanish American War.

Reverse

 

 

 

Edge

 

 

Civil War – Army of the Cumberland

Detail of metal work on obverse.

 

Reverse

A Nicaraguan decoration that was awarded to a few Marines who served in that country in the late 1920s and early 30. Probably made in the USA. Marked on the rim 14k.

 

Another Santiago, named to a Rough Rider. (ex AGR collection.)

 

1939 – 1941 Antarctic Expedition. Washington Navy Yard Museum.

 

 

NC-4 Medal for Trans Atlantic Flight. Washington Navy Yard Museum.

“Tiffany Cross” Medal of Honor to Floyd Bennett. Smithsonian Air and Space Museum.

Reverse.

Variation of the Army of the Cumberland. (Unknown online source.)

Here is the one gold medal that I own...not really a medal per se, but sort of fits the bill.

 

This is an award presented for an essay on Morgan S. Gilmer UCV (United Confederate Veterans).

 

The reverse of the medal says:

 

UDC HISTORICAL

Medal

TO

Hassie E. Terrell

A. C. C.

1913

 

Morgan S. Gilmer was a student at the University of Alabama that left the university to go and fight for the Confederacy. After the war, he became a legend in Alabama and organized a group of children, the sons and daughters of Confederate veterans and named them the "Yaller-Hammers". Yaller-Hammers was the nickname of Alabama soldiers during the war. A.C.C. stands for Alabama Charter Chapter, the first chapter of the UDC in Alabama.

 

Hassie E. Terrell was from the Montgomery area of Alabama, and she eventually married a man named Charles Hixon, who became a professor of engineering at what is now Auburn University. Hassie Terrell passed away in 1931.

Awesome stuff.

Adam

 

Here is my only gold and it has been posted before

 

Early Distinguished

 

 

This one belongs to a friend

 

I hope he won't mind my posting it

Beautiful medals and photography, all that gold glitters.