Victoria Cross missing from museum seized by RCMP

[bossi]

(yah gotta admit - the design is a work of art, unlike some latter day pieces of merde ...)

CBC article (with graphic)

Victoria Cross missing from museum seized by RCMP
Last Updated Mon, 05 Apr 2004 19:43:35
WINNIPEG - The RCMP have seized a missing war medal from an Ontario auction house.

The Victoria Cross medal was reported missing from the Canadian War Museum more than 30 years ago. It belonged to Filip Konowal, a Ukrainian Canadian, who won a medal for bravery in 1917.


Courtesy: Vistoriacross.net


The Canadian War Museum purchased the medal in 1969. Four years later it was reported missing.

Winnipeg MP Inky Mark says he found out on Friday that the medal was up for auction. Mark says the circumstances raise disturbing questions about security:

"Especially today when we are talking about security of the country as a whole, terrorist activity around the world, and we can‘t even secure what we have under lock and key."

One of the owners of Jeffrey Hoare Auctions in London has confirmed the medal has been turned over to the RCMP to determine ownership. Exactly how it got to the auction remains a mystery.

"In this case, it isn‘t clear what the trail was that led the Victoria Cross to Jeffrey Hoare Auctions. Until we know that, we don‘t know if it was stolen, or how it landed in someone else‘s hands," said Mark O‘Neill, who speaks for the Canadian War Museum.

Those answers aren‘t expected to come any time soon. O‘Neill says the employees who worked at the museum more than 30 years ago are no longer there. Some have died.

The RCMP says it will take months before they are able to piece together what happened, and when, and how the medal disappeared.

 

[LilMissChicky]

Glad it‘s back in good hands

 

[LilMissChicky]

Does anyone know if the medal sustained any damages while being into public hands?
And is it gonna go back onto display at the War Museum (Ottawa???) anytime soon?
Thanks

 

[bossi]

Wow - there‘s a LOT more to this story ...
(and, I‘m surprised the auction house didn‘t realise the history of this medal - thank goodness for the RMC prof!)

Rare medal seized before auction
Canadian won prestigious Victoria Cross

Ottawa museum says hero‘s award is missing
PAT CURRIE
SPECIAL TO THE STAR

LONDON, Ont.â ”RCMP officers have seized a rare Canadian-won Victoria Cross from a London auction house that was preparing it for sale.

Canadian War Museum spokesman Mark O‘Neill said yesterday the museum wants one of its experts to examine the medal to determine whether it was one taken from the Ottawa museum in 1973, saying, "If it‘s the same one, we want it back."

The RCMP was tipped off by Dr. Lubomyr Luciuk, a political geography professor at the Royal Military College in Kingston, Ont.

Luciuk, who co-wrote a book on the exploits that won Cpl. Filip Konowal the Commonwealth‘s highest award for valour, said a war buff friend in England alerted him after seeing the medal listed for sale on a Web news release.

Konowal, then 30, was one of 10,000 Ukrainian-born immigrants who enlisted in the Canadian forces to fight in World War I. War records show that in August, 1917, at Hill 70 in France, he single-handedly took out three gun positions and killed 16 German soldiers.

Konowal‘s medal was pinned on him by King George V, as he lay in an English army hospital "after half his face was shot away by a German sniper" the day after his heroic exploit, Luciuk said.

Luciuk said the war hero left the medal to his widow "who fell on hard times and sold it to a collector," who in turn sold it to the war museum for $3,750.

Wendy Hoare, owner of Jeffrey Hoare Auctions in London, said a medal was "consigned to us" for sale in Hamilton on May 29-30 but would not identify the consignee "because the matter is now in the hands of the RCMP."

Konowal‘s Victoria Cross is one of 95 won by Canadians since Lt. Alexander Roberts Dunn earned Canada‘s first for his part in the charge of the Light Brigade in the Crimean War shortly after the Queen instituted the award in 1856.

Konowal was born in Kedeski, Ukraine, in 1887. He came to Canada in 1913 after serving five years in the Russian army. Two years later, he enlisted in the Canadian Expeditionary Force.

After recovering from WWI wounds in England, he saw service with the Canadian Siberian Expeditionary Force before returning to Vancouver in 1919.

In Ottawa, the day after a peace parade marking the war‘s end, Konowal killed a man who was attacking a friend.

"All three were Ukrainian," Luciuk said. "Konowal was tough, a bayonet instructor who‘d spent 2 ½ years in the trenches. The attacker barricaded himself behind a door but Konowal grabbed a knife from a restaurant and stabbed him right through it."

He spent six years in a Montreal hospital for the insane before being released after his actions were attributed to his wartime head wound. He was a janitor to Parliament when then-Prime Minister Mackenzie King learned of his VC and hired him as a special custodian, his job until his death in 1959.

 

[Michael OLeary]

KONOWAL, Filip (Page at Victoria Cross Reference)

 

[Michael Dorosh]

Konowal was, like many VC winners, no saint. Falling into near poverty, he was spotted by a fellow GGFG veteran and VC winner and employed as the personal janitor to the Prime Minister‘s personal office. Quite an interesting story.

The whole discussion of authenticating the VC is a story into itself. While the problem of reproduction medals was not a problem in the 1850s, there are some excellent copies being made today. There are allegedly a handpicked few throughout the Commonwealth trained in authenticating VCs via "secret" marks left on the originals. Don‘t know if that is true or if it will be brought to public light in this case. There is a discussion of this going on at my own forum right now that has been interesting.

 

[mattoigta]

That‘s a pretty interesting story

If anyone here lives in Toronto, you can see a plaque on the wall for Filip Konowal beside the 360 club on Queen St W. (Which is under the Ukrainian Branch of the RCL)

 

[bossi]

Would-be seller wants anonymity
CP, Wednesday, Apr. 7, 2004


London, Ont. -- The person who tried to sell a rare Victoria Cross medal at auction wants to remain anonymous until its disappearance from the Canadian War Museum has been investigated, an auctioneer said yesterday. Wendy Hoare, owner of Jeffrey Hoare Auctions in London, said the person who wanted to put Filip Konowal‘s Victoria Cross up for auction next month "has requested to remain anonymous until the matter is resolved." Hoare refused to say where the person is from or how they obtained the medal reported missing by the war museum in 2001, though it could never prove it had been stolen. The medal has been missing since the 1970s.