Thiel of Danzig

[koppel71]

Danzig Fire Defense by Thiel

[Mr Piter]

Thiel DJ and HJ buckles.







GZM HJ buckle


regards
Piotr

[NortonI]

Piotr,
wow - never saw these before ! great buckles, is that all ground dug ?
cheers Thomas

[Ben Evans]

Piotr, what I like about these buckles is the variety of them is it leaves no doubt as to the existence of GZM marked buckles, absolutely great

[Mr Piter]

Thomas - Yes all these buckles are ground dug, all were found near Gdańsk(Danzig).

Ben - When I have shown GZM buckle on WAF forum few years ago most of collectors said that it is a fake one.
From the begining I was 100% sure that GZM is wartime original buckles - I was able to see on my own eyes when my friend recovered one of GZM HJ from the ground in place where german soldiers and people from Danzig surrender to Russians. After I have noticed that this are odd HJ with GZM I have been asking my collectors friend which also use metal detector to check their HJ buckles and I have found in their collections more GZM, not only HJ but also SS.
Topic of GZM is very interesting but as I have wrote on WAF it is very hard to find any info about GZM R. Reich and Thiel.

best regards
Piotr

[David North]

On a personal note and as the proud owner of a Thiel SA, I truly hope that this thread may continue and furthermore, explore and explain so many past unanswered questions about aspects otherwise not touched upon.

Thankyou to both Gerolf and Piotr for showing some quite remarkable, little documented and misunderstood buckles. I know that Piotr in particular has been deeply hurt by some of the adverse comments and questions to his collecting integrity that he has suffered when the subject has been discussed on another forum. I should add that I was once a doubter and now, fully support Piotr.

It is the GZM which greatly interests myself and now especially that a consensus supports the period presence of the quite distinctly marked SA, DJ, HJ and SS buckles to name but 4 and of course, Gerolf’s wonderful and extremely rare, City of Danzig police/fire protection buckle.

Is GZM the obvious acronym for Gau Zeug Meisterei?

Perhaps the special status of Danzig in the 1920’s and 1930’s is sometimes forgotten. Fellow members much cleverer than I will hopefully correct me, however I think that Danzig due to the high German population, held a Free and Sovereign city status under the protection of the League of Nations. There is however a pre 1939 change of status to Reichsgau Westpreussen and a post 1939 change of status to Reichsgau Danzig Westpreussen, although I do not know the chronological aspects.

Reichsgau as with Wartheland and Sudetenland.

Why not a token pre 1939 affiliation with NSDAP Germany by the introduction of a mirror and in simpatico system to the RZM by the three manufacturers (at least) of (1) M4/111 Robert Thiel und Cie., Danzig, (2) M4/112 Rudolf Reich GmbH, Danzig Langfuhr and (3) M4/113 Eichenholz und Sohn, Danzig.

Again, I hope that this thread continues to flourish and grow.

Regards,

David

[Jean Pierre Redeuilh]

Danzig Fire Defense

"GZM" maker (whoever he could be) also produced one but it is totally unmarked.

[aechols83]

Hello All,

Reviving this very interesting discussion with my latest HJ addition. This is a great thread which I for one will have to revisit and further absorb.

Best,
Adam

[Mr Piter]

hello

I have bought to my collection another Hj by Thiel of Danzig, here it is.

This is ground dug example, it seems that it was polished, prongs and bar could be replaced.

regards
Piotr

[Ben Evans]

Piotr, very nice for a ground dug example, good find my friend