1917 Croix de Guerre - WWI French Medal for Bravery

[UnderMiner]

Was bottle hunting today in my 1924-capped landfill when I found a 1917 French Croix de Guerre. It is 106 years old and has been buried for at least 99 of those years.
In situ:

It was in one of my spoil heaps and had been washed out by the recent rains.

This find substantiates the stories I use to hear of WWI soldiers who threw away their medals after returning home from the war. Those medals didn't disappear from this world simply because they entered those landfills though, as this award demonstrates.

The medal was awarded mostly to soldiers of foreign millitary forces allied to France.

Here is a soldier wearing the decoration:

Some more of the things I found today:

The white bowl is 19th century British imported Ironstone Anchor Pottery, it is intact apart from one of the handles being broken off, but easily repairable. Here is the bottom:

That's all for now.

 

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[lenmac65]

How cool is that?!? Nicely done with the medal. I like the bottles too. Congrats!

 

[tamrock]

Rather odd finding something that you'd think would normally be cherished and handed down within a family.

 

[UnderMiner]

Rather odd finding something that you'd think would normally be cherished and handed down within a family.

Yes, but many soldiers were so traumatized that they ended up throwing away their medals. Just think about it, this medal was only given to soldiers who experienced unimaginable horrors in battle, and so it was to many of them a reminder to those horrors that they wanted to forget so they threw them away.

There's a scene in the movie 1917 where the main character explains how he fought at the Battle of the Somme and got awarded a medal for it, but he traded it away for a bottle of wine shortly after. His friend tells him he should have kept it so he could pass it down to his family. The soldier then explains that his friend wouldn't understand why he got rid of it because he wasn't at the battle.

 

[Digger RJ]

Was bottle hunting today in my 1924-capped landfill when I found a 1917 French Croix de Guerre. It is 106 years old and has been buried for at least 99 of those years.
In situ:
View attachment 2111812
It was in one of my spoil heaps and had been washed out by the recent rains.
View attachment 2111813
View attachment 2111814

This find substantiates the stories I use to hear of WWI soldiers who threw away their medals after returning home from the war. Those medals didn't disappear from this world simply because they entered those landfills though, as this award demonstrates.

The medal was awarded mostly to soldiers of foreign millitary forces allied to France.

Here is a soldier wearing the decoration:
View attachment 2111816

Some more of the things I found today:
View attachment 2111815
View attachment 2111817
The white bowl is 19th century British imported Ironstone Anchor Pottery, it is intact apart from one of the handles being broken off, but easily repairable. Here is the bottom:
View attachment 2111818

That's all for now.

Very Cool!!! Congrats!!!

 

[RatherBeDigging]

Great find!! I don't know what is going on in the metal detecting cosmos today. I just was writing about the Croix de Guerre tonight on a different site and one gets found and posted here the same day. Your theory about ww1 stuff getting thrown away is probably valid. I dug a 367th infantry H company ww1 collar disc in a trash pit over the weekend. The 367th was majority African American and won this very award for their bravery at Metz, France.

Between your metal and my collar disk and French m1892 bayonet tnet now has a lot more French ww1 finds.

 

[UnderMiner]

Great find!! I don't know what is going on in the metal detecting cosmos today. I just was writing about the Croix de Guerre tonight on a different site and one gets found and posted here the same day. Your theory about ww1 stuff getting thrown away is probably valid. I dug a 367th infantry H company ww1 collar disc in a trash pit over the weekend. The 367th was majority African American and won this very award for their bravery at Metz, France.

Between your metal and my collar disk and French m1892 bayonet tnet now has a lot more French ww1 finds.

Wow, very interesting. You won't believe this but I also had a strange feeling, what some may call a premonition of sorts while searching my site today.

I was litterally looking at the ground and picking up random bits and bobs when I got to thinking how cool it would be to find a WWI medal, a thought that hadn't ever crossed my mind before at this site. I saw the Croix de Guerre no more than 30 seconds after having this thought.

 

[ToddsPoint]

I was at a friends house and we were in his garage, which was previously his dad’s. I spotted 2 dirty bronze stars laying on a workbench. My friend said they were his brothers from Viet Nam. I couldn’t understand why they weren’t in a frame on the brothers wall. Now I know.

 

[pepperj]

Well done on the recoveries once again.
The medal is certainly a top shelf recovery.
I have always thought about why we find something as the medal and if they were tossed to forget.
What is the () shaped bottle 3rd from the right?

 

[E-Trac-Ohio]

Wow ... great finds !

 

[UnderMiner]

Well done on the recoveries once again.
The medal is certainly a top shelf recovery.
I have always thought about why we find something as the medal and if they were tossed to forget.
What is the () shaped bottle 3rd from the right?

That is a Carl H. Schultz Central Park Mineral Spring water bottle.

 

[pepperj]

That is a Carl H. Schultz Central Park Mineral Spring water bottle.
View attachment 2111858

THat's a really nice embossed bottle, thanks for showing it up close.

Carl Schultz CPMS (Central Park Mineral Springs), New York

Carl Schultz first began producing artificial mineral waters in 1862. At around this time, he met Thomas Walker who had invented the siphon bottle and they went into business together. The business…

baybottles.com

In addition to refreshment on a hot day, the mineral springs offered a cure for everything from indigestion to diabetes to rheumatism. According to a May 2, 1897 story in the New York Tribune:

Carl H. Schultz originated the plan of having in Central Park a place for the sale of mineral water to enable invalids to combine a mineral water cure with exercise in the open air. At the Springs the leading natural waters are kept on hand, and in addition there are the artificial waters, in the manufacture of which only distilled water is used. Many prefer the artificial mineral waters on account of their uniform composition, great effervescence and freedom from bacteria. Some of them contain more lithium carbonate than any natural lithia water contains. The following waters are recommended for invalids:
For indigestion – Carbonic water. For stomach, kidney and liver trouble – Double or quadruple Carlsbad, Marienbad, Kissingen. For catarrh – Obersalzbrunn, Seltzers, Kissingen. For diabetes – Ballin, double and quadruple Carlsbad. For gout and rheumatism – Lithia water, especially when mixed with Carlsbad or Vichy

If refreshment and mineral water cures were not enough, visits to the Mineral Springs could also reduce your weight.

 

[oldmxrat]

Very cool recoveries, all, congrats!