Difference in Wappen Cipher

W

W.Unland

New member
Hello,

My name is William Unland and this is my first post here. I am a police collector and have a growing interest in police pickelhaube. I would beg someone to tell me the difference in two Prussian police plates. They are both shown as police officers, but one has a simple "W" cipher and the other a very ornate cipher "W".

Were these from different periods, different organizations, different ranks?

The helmets themselves look otherwise identical.
Any help or shove in the direction of a proper reference would be most appreciated.

Sorry, I had planned to post an image, but I haven't figured out how to do that yet!

Regards,
William Unland[/img]
 
Hi Willian, and welcome.
Sorry, but I can not help on you cypher question, but to post images, you need to have the image hosted by another site, such as photobucket or imageshack, then after you type the text, click on the img button, copy the address of the image and click on the /img button, and it should work.
Bes twihse
Gus
 
do not worry, there will be an answer tou your question with a little time.
Gus
 
William,

There is a real shortage of printed references on nonmilitary helmets. I think James has the only real one there is and my understanding is that it is not very good. So it is very difficult to answer your questions if you don't know the answer! Many of these kinds of helmets belonged to police departments, however fire departments and customs officers had similar helmets. There are many kinds of police that I don't even know about. Sorry I cannot be definitive but these elements are not military and I just do not know.
 
William- according to the books I Have on Police and Municipal helmets these are both Prussian Wachtmeister helmet plates.

The more fancy one with extra scrollwork etc. is for Higher ranking officers. The more plain one is for the rank of Sergeant or below.

Both were used from 1866 until 1918.

Hope this helps!

James
 
Gentlemen,

Thank you most kindly for taking the time to answer my question.
I have gotten conflicting information from the dealers involved, and was just not sure who was right.

Thank you.

Bill Unland
 
One reference on police pickelhaubes is Erich Radecke "Polizei-Abzeichen"; the book comes in three parts (first part deals with pre-1918) and is often quite cheap on ebay.

Several types of Prussian plate types with the "w" are listed, e.g. for the Kommunale Executivpolizei, the Schutzmannschaft or the destrict of Berlin. Regretably I could not access the pictures on that site (probably authentication is required).
 
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