UBB.threads Forums Edged Weapons Miscellaneous Dagger Forum "Krupp Factory Leader Dagger"?

I was just perusing the "Manion Auction" and came across a sold item, a "Krupp Factory Leader Dagger". Well, this is sure a new one on me. Even the Manion description writer had never seen one. What are your thoughts? I personally am not quite sure of this one.

http://www.manions.com/catpages/realize1.aspx?id=5872838

It's real Lloyd. Johnny knows more about it.
-wagner-

I thought these Krupp daggers were recognised post war fantasy pieces?.

What!!
I can't imagine a 'Krupp Factory Leader' walking around with that thing on his belt! I've seen better shop projects........

Gaspare, you are VERY close to the truth with your "shop project" assessment.

I saw that on manions, and a few weeks ago I saw another on ebay. I dont know if it was the same one though. Sure looked like a fantasy piece to me.

The one on Manions and the one on Eban are NOT the same dagger. The seller buffed the HELL out of the one on E-ban, looked terrible.

quote:

Originally posted by Johnny V.:
The one on Manions and the one on Eban are NOT the same dagger. The seller buffed the HELL out of the one on E-ban, looked terrible.

Not much unanimity so far folks. I am still at a loss. Looked like a shop project to me too. Sooo, what it be? Apparently there have been two sold, Feebay and Manions?

Lloyd

Lloyd,
These are very rare daggers, there are more then just the two that have shown up recently.
please check your PM's.
Johnny

Ive seen that or the like and I think there bs. Since when did the germans use these little wimpy winged eagles on there proud dags? It would take alot of research and provenance to convince me on that , simple cheap easy lathework on that thing doesnt impress me at all.

...

Whats this about? Why does it seem to be some kind of big secret? Can anyone who knows just explain what it is, please? Because I got get it...

What it is is "authenticity unknown". That means, 1.)it is either a very rare treasure that none of us know about or 2.) a fantasy piece made up and not real at all. For the price, I would strongly suggest the second choice.

P.T. Barnum Special. "There is one born everyday".

Mark

I'm with Mark on this, not something for me, just my personal opinion

Jonathan

I have some info on these which leads me to agree with kingtiger... except his first statement, not the second.
If anyone is interested in these daggers you might contact Tom Johnson, he has direct provenance on them.
If they are fake, it was a nice touch that they used solid gold eagles for the blade design. Yep, there not painted or gold leafed, that eagle is a seperate piece set onto the blade about 1/16" thick and is real solid gold.

Thanks

I can only say I have never seen, heard about or read about a dagger like that before.
But, sure, I could buy a fake dagger if its solid gold Thats nice... I think all fakers should use materials that are actually more valuable than the originals.

Hmmm...
Anyone ever notice that these knives are dated "1943".
Anyone know what happened to the Krupp company in 1943....?

In 1943 Hitler granted Mr. Krupps "dearest wish" and signed the paperwork making the Krupp company family owned and operated. Ofcourse before this it was owned (and managed) by the government. Hitler did this to thank Mr. Krupp for his industrial efforts and successes in re-arming Germany.

These daggers (IMO) were in house made momentos of what Mr. Krupp himself at the time called "The greatest single event in this companies 132 year history".

Coincidence? Perhaps, but at least if it is fake, the fakers read a history book and picked a significant enough year with which to date the knives...

If there is a possibility of these being real, why are they not pictured in all of the dagger reference books? And why are they just starting to show up for sale? Im not trying to start an argument, its just that these are the only 2 I have ever seen.

There are a lot of rare things that are not in the books. Not being in a book is not a method of determining authenticity.
Also these pieces are not "just starting to show up for sale". They have always been around. In 5 years I have been actively looking for them I have seen 3. I know dealers who have seen them "all along", they are not new, just very very rare.

The real problem with these knives if we are honest, is the way that they LOOK. They don't look like ANY other dagger. When I saw one for the first time I did NOT like them either. But they were not drawn up by Carl Casburg and they were not made by Eickhorn. The design was not "government approved" and they were clearly never meant to be worn (there is no way to suspend them).
I would say that the best way to think of these is much like the 3/4 mini Heers and Lufts. They were momentos or showy letter openers, not "to be worn dress daggers".
But they are period.
JMO...
Johnny

Now look what YOU did Johnny! How am I going to buy them on the "cheap" now? Huh??
It is always amazed me how that works. Have an unusual dagger and it's not in a book - it's fake! Same dagger in book - it's now RARE with everyone wanting to own it.
There are a lot of unusual pieces that are real. Unfortunatly there are a lot of fantasy fakes out there like the Herman-Historia "Hysterical" collection. And if we have not seen it before, or it just doesn't seem
"right" to you. You maybe right. And it's always better to be careful than foolish. We have all been "had" by a bad piece. Doesn't feel good but it goes with the territory.
However, this thread should be one of the rare educational ones, since most have not seen one. And others dismiss or believe it is a fake.
And it's very rare nowadays when a piece turns out to be "period", after being dismissed by the collecting community as "fantasy".
And just because Johnny and I believe it to be real. Doesn't mean much to anyone. Why should it? But again, take the same dagger and have Tom Johnson give it 100% approval- changes everything. Or does it?
-wagner-

I've seen a few of these pieces, never in hand though. One in recent memory had this stamping on the blade which I discounted because of the overall crummy lettering & swazs.

Johnny...Where are you getting your information on the Krupp Factory. As far as i know is was always a family owned business (since 1500 something).Never taken over by the Nazi Goverment. The Krupps were big supporters of the Nazis and the nazi goverment supplied them with slave labor but. The only big think i can find that happened in 1943 was that Alfreid Krupp took over sole ownership of the company.

"In our eyes, the German boy of the future must be slim and slender, as fast as a greyhound, tough as leather and hard as Krupp steel."
ADOLF HITLER


Friedrich Krupp (1787 – 1826) launched the family's metal-based activities, building a small steel-foundry in Essen in 1811. His son, Alfred (1812 – 1887), known as "the Cannon King" or as "Alfred the Great", invested heavily in new technology to become a significant manufacturer of railway material and locomotives. He also invested in fluidized hotbed technologies (notably the Bessemer process) and acquired many mines in Germany and France. He invested in subsidized housing for his workers and started a program of health and retirement benefits. The company began to make steel cannon in the 1840s - especially for the Russian, Turkish, and Prussian armies. Low non-military demand and government subsidy meant that the company specialized more and more in weapons: by the late 1880s the manufacture of armaments represented around 50% of Krupp's total output. When Alfred started with the firm, it had five employees. At his death twenty thousand people worked for Krupp - making it the world's largest industrial company.

In the 20th century the company was headed by Gustav Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach (1870-1950), who assumed the surname of Krupp when he married the Krupp heiress. During World War I some criticized Krupp's policy of selling cannons to the Entente as well as to the Central Powers, a policy which generated high profits. (Ford and GM allegedly acted similarly during World War II - however, the American parent companies did not control the German GM and Ford subsidiaries during hostilities.)

After Hitler came to power in Germany in 1933, the Krupp works became the center for German rearmament. In 1943, by a special order from Hitler, the company reverted into a family holding, and Alfried Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach (1907 - 67) took over the management. After Germany's defeat, when Gustav proved incapable of going on trial, the U.S. Nuremberg Military Tribunal convicted Alfred as a war criminal (in the so-called "Krupp Trial") for his company's use of slave labor. It sentenced him to 12 years in prison and ordered him to sell 75% of his holdings. In 1951, as the Cold War developed and no buyer came forward, the authorities released him, and in 1953 he resumed control of the firm.

In 1999, the Krupp Group merged with its largest competitor, Thyssen AG; the combined company — ThyssenKrupp AG, became Germany's fifth-largest firm and one of the largest steel-producers in the world.

Not much of an advert for a steel factory of this size, unless they were made by the tea ladies

Wouldn't matter if Johnson,Wittman or whoever blessed it that's rank amateur hour junk.. Gold eagle means nothing, and so does a authentication letter..

One of the largest factories, probably employing some of the finest machinists and thats what they turned out?
I might not be a dagger collector or understand 'dagger logic' but to celebrate something important as a law changing that enables the last family member to keep the business in the family you'd think something grand would have been made up..

Gustav Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach

The rising demand for weaponry created by World War I soon overshadowed all other production and caused the firm to grow rapidly. The field gun "Big Bertha," introduced in 1909, played a vital role in the German advance in 1914 and at Verdun in 1916. In 1918 a new cannon, the "Paris Gun," shelled Paris from a 75mile distance.

At the end of the war, under severe strains of revolution and Allied pressures, Gustav reconverted the firm to the production of railroad equipment and heavy machinery. The major expansion was in the exploration of new types of metals and machinery, which led in 1926 to the invention of sintered tungsten carbide.

With the rise of Hitler, armaments production once more became an important branch of the firm, although it remained less than 10 percent of the total production until 1939. During World War II the Krupps were again Germany's major arms suppliers--the best-known were the Krupp U-boats, the "Tiger Tanks," and the huge railway gun "Dora," used to bombard Sevastopol with 80-centimeter shells in 1941. The firm expanded rapidly and became intimately tied to Nazi policies through the use of some 100,000 slave laborers from occupied eastern Europe. Meanwhile, with Gustav's health failing, the firm passed to the eldest son, Alfried (Aug. 13, 1907-July 30, 1967), who became director in 1942 and sole proprietor of the reconverted family firm in 1943.

Ok i get it now in the last sentence it states reconverted.

These surface once in a while and are either sold or go back into hiding waiting for the next generation of collectors. As such they have been discussed in the past more than once. My best recollection is that there was more than one version and some may have been later “tweaked” to try and make them more believable. Regrettably, I don’t remember all the specifics from the discsussions. But I would not recommend to anyone that he buy one because I think that he would be wasting his money. FP

All those posts and discussions are now gone!
Virus they say. Is it intentional.?
-wagner-

I finally got around to looking at the one for sale at Manion’s. If Manion’s says: ‘Authenticity Unknown’ that should be a red flag the size of an aircraft carrier!!

One of things I remember were some not much better quality fitted cases. Sometimes inlaid with medals, coins, badges, whatever. Some examples had cases and some did not. Probably most got “lost” because they were so obviously fake.

Also, did anybody notice that the handle and scabbard are brass?? A severely restricted war material from the 1930’s being used in a “1943” dagger ........... from a steel maker!!

Guys can spend their money however they want to. But I put them in the same general category as the fake 98K bayonets, just scratch built and not as common. And I would not be at all surprised if they came from the same postwar geographical area like all the fake brass handled “SS” folding knives.

Nuff said, FP

OK OK.
The real trouble here is that no one KNOWS the answer to this question DIFINITIVELY.
Yes, they are made from brass, which was rationed in the war, this could also be seen as a display of the companies importance in these knives and how the "finest" materials were used for these knives despite the war (including the gold).
Look, I VERY much respect the opinions of the people who have spoken on both sides of this "Krupp" debate and I accept that I am on the side which must attempt to "prove" its case against the current negative general consensus and assessment of these pieces.
I will still stand on the side which supports the originality of these knives and although the money that I spent to buy my own example may well turn out to be the worst investment that I have made in this hobby, I still enjoy the piece and believe in it's historical provenience...
In the end, that's what were all here for...
Best of the hunt to you all, and THANKS for the input from everyone!
Johnny

Bump.