Imperial German Mecklenburg WMF Silverplate Field Artillery 60 Presentation Pad

The piece is an Imperial German regimental presentation note-pad holder by WMF (Württembergische Metallwarenfabrik), given to its recipient by the comrades of the Großherzoglich Mecklenburgisches Feldartillerie-Regiment Nr. 60 (Grand Ducal Mecklenburg Field Artillery Regiment No. 60), the artillery regiment of the Grand Duchy of Mecklenburg-Schwerin garrisoned in the capital at Schwerin. It is a hinged hand-hammered cover enclosing a paper memo block, measuring 4.25 by 6 inches (approximately 10.8 by 15.2 centimeters) and weighing 8 ounces (about 227 grams), executed in the Hammerschlag (hammered-finish) manner of the Jugendstil (German Art Nouveau) period of the early twentieth century.

The cover is worked overall with a dense planished hammer-mark texture and is hinged along the top edge so that it lifts to reveal the paper pad, which is mounted on a backing plate secured by four rivets visible at the corners of the interior. Applied to the upper left of the front cover, beneath a German royal crown, is a separately cast crowned cipher in the form of a mirrored, interlaced F. This is the cipher of Friedrich Franz, the reigning name of the grand dukes of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, and it is the regiment's own device: from about 1906 the men of the 60th carried this same crowned mirrored-F cipher on their shoulder straps, there set above a small single-flamed grenade. Engraved across the lower portion of the front in flowing script is the presentation dedication Deine 60er Kameraden (Your comrades of the 60th), the customary shorthand by which the men of Regiment Nr. 60 styled themselves.

The piece is struck on the reverse with the maker's mark of WMF in the firm's shaped electroplate cartouche. It bears no German silver fineness hallmark, which is consistent with WMF electroplate: the body is silver-plated over a base metal rather than solid silver, as confirmed by the warmer base-metal tone visible on the reverse and interior where the plating has worn. WMF, founded in 1853 and based at Geislingen, was among the foremost German metalware manufacturers of the period and is well known for its hand-finished Jugendstil electroplated wares, of which this is a characteristic example.

The Grand Ducal Mecklenburg Field Artillery Regiment Nr. 60 was a comparatively young regiment, raised with a foundation day of 25 March 1899 and formed that autumn from two detachments transferred from the Holstein Field Artillery Regiment Nr. 24. It took garrison in the artillery barracks at Schwerin, beside the Burgsee, and stood within the 17th Field Artillery Brigade of the 17th (Mecklenburg) Division, part of the IX Army Corps. Equipped with the 7.7-centimeter field gun, the regiment was mobilized in August 1914 and served through the First World War until its disbandment in 1919. Its fallen were honored by the bronze memorial Kriemhild, designed by the sculptor Wilhelm Wandschneider and unveiled opposite the Schwerin artillery barracks in 1923. A comrades' association of former members continued to gather at Schwerin in the postwar years, and it is to exactly this tradition of regimental fellowship that the engraved dedication on this piece belongs.

Condition is honest and consistent with age and use. The hammered front retains a pleasing silver-grey surface with tarnish and handling marks throughout, while the reverse and interior show the base metal coming through the plating, scattered areas of green verdigris, and general wear. The hinge is sound and the cover opens and closes correctly, and the corner rivets are intact. The applied cipher and the engraved dedication are intact, the dedication fully legible. The paper memo block presently fitted is a later replacement and not original to the piece.

The collector appeal rests on an unusually firm chain of attribution. The cipher applied to the cover is the documented device of the regiment named in the engraving, so the maker's mark, the cipher, and the dedication all point to a single unit, the Grand Ducal Mecklenburg Field Artillery Regiment Nr. 60 at Schwerin. To this is added the standing of WMF as a sought-after maker of Jugendstil electroplate. The piece will appeal to collectors of Imperial German regimental and presentation material, of field artillery, and especially to those who collect by state, as identifiable Mecklenburg-Schwerin items are markedly scarcer than their Prussian counterparts. It displays well as a desk object suited to a collection focused on the regiment, on Mecklenburg, or on the culture of the old army.