Selling Nazi artefacts

[greencurtainshanging]

I was in an antique shop last week and was surprised to spot a cabinet full of Nazi artefacts for sale. There were original armbands, some swastika cufflinks, Reich coins and original amateur photos of Hitler as well as a Nazi officer uniform.

I actually (mistakenly) thought it was illegal to sell Nazi memorabilia but apparently it's not. It's really bothered me though and while I think it's important to preserve these things so that future generations can learn, I hate the idea that someone is trading in this stuff and potentially selling it to neo Nazis. I think these items belong in a museum or an archive but they should not be up for sale.

But it got me thinking, should the trade of some things like this be regulated/banned?

Well exactly. If you have distaste at war memorabilia due to it's nazi/Hitler associations why isn't there similar distaste to those companies born from Hitler's time and his actual desires. Where is the line we (as a society) don't cross?

EDIT - I'm still absolutely fascinated by the idea of crab forks and how the nazi ones managed to find their way to someone's garden.

I'd wager the crab forks dated from before the war and were part of a set given as a wedding present or something like that. As a PP pointed out, many wealthy Brits were quite keen on the Nazis in the 1930s.

As a PP pointed out, many wealthy Brits were quite keen on the Nazis in the 1930s.

Likewise newspapers. Lord Rothermere, owner of the Daily Mail, was a friend of Mussolini and Hitler.

When you lay the table does the crab fork go on the far right? I'll get me 🧥

🤣🤣🤣

The problem for me is where does it end? I mean... Volkswagon has done pretty well considering it was Hitler's brainchild (with Ferdinand Porsche).

Yep, that was the thought process in my head too. There's no end to it.

I think for me the line is the sale/trade of items that have been used in the process of hurting/killing other people. So in the same way it'd be considered sick/ghoulish to buy a weapon from a murder scene, I'm not going to buy items that might have been worn by someone who killed someone (if that makes sense). So the Nazi armband or helmet etc.

I'd rather that stuff was saved and documented in an archive not in a display cupboard in someone's house.

But then again, I also don't
want a government dictating what artefacts are 'acceptable' and what aren't. It's complicated in my brain. 😂

There's a statue of Lemmy from Motörhead recently erected near Stoke on Trent.
He was a well known collector of Nazi memorabilia.
I wonder if that was considered when they decided he needed a statue?

I find it distasteful too, mainly because I think we are moving into an age where hard right ideology is becoming normalised again, particularly in the US.

It is naive in the extreme to thing that this sort of thing isnt collected and idolised by actual modern Nazis rather than Grandad Joe who is interested in the war.

Nazicrabfork would make a great username...

It's not history though is it? Neo-nazism is alive and well & by some accounts, growing. It's not like collecting viking or medieval artefacts, it still signifies something about the collector and their beliefs. That's why it's problematic.

DH collects militaria stuff. He has bits and bobs from nearly every involved power in WW1 and 2 including Germany. Why should part of his collection be banned from sale and others not?

It is mainly history buffs and proper collectors who buy this stuff. DH has joked with me that most collectors tend to avoid the politcal nutters and the frequent government types who pretend to be political nutters for entrapment purposes.

Anyone else disappointedly scroll right down for a glimpse of a Nazi crab fork?

Do you just use your regular, Allied crab forks instead?!

People, perfectly nice people, have all sorts of arguably ghoulish interests and hobbies. There's a whole industry around the Ripper.

But I'm mostly here for the nazi crab fork.

It's not a crab fork as far as I can tell. From a quick google I have found a lobster fork picture, it's part of a seafood set, generally paired with an oyster spoon. Something I never knew, there is a thriving industry in 3rd Reich fine dining silver tableware.

Anyway, the fork... I don't think selling one is going to inspire a load of skinheads to rise up and instigate a national socialist revolution but you never know. All it has inspired in me is the wish to eat lobster.

Finally I can now awe DH with my newfound knowledge of dodgy 1930's cutlery.

@Insertdeadcatsnamehere / just my usual communist lobster fork

That was worth the wait, @TheNoonBell. Seemingly quite discreetly Nazi at first glance, but zooming in on the emblem that's ... quite something.

Communist lobster forks surely mark you out as a champagne socialist.

Yes! My grandad was a pow and after he died, my mum found a Nazi dagger in his loft!

Guilty as charged

I think the sale should be banned - it was an evil regime, and there are enough artefacts in museums, the rest should be destroyed.

Most flea market and antique shops that I have been to have a few third reich bits and pieces on offer be it hats, buttons and daggers. To be honest it's pretty mild in the UK compared to continental Europe where some of the army surplus shops could supply a whole regiment of wermacht troops if they had to.

I was at the Battersea boot fair the other week and you can still buy a VW badge with a swastika on it there.

We have some, including a certain book that would be worth up to £1000 but we would never sell them.
I do find them interesting from a historical perspective but they arent something we would ever profit from as we inherited them from German family If we ever decide we dont want the items we will try and donate them to a museum.
I do think its a bit odd when people buy these things though

A few years ago I went to San Marino and was quite shocked at the quantity of Mussolini memorabilia on sale. What was particularly horrifyjng is that lots seemed to be replicas, not just antiques. Quite coloured my view of a tiny country.

I do own a number of Nazi stamps (a small fraction of my collection). I bought them in a mixed bag of older European stamps purchased as a teen, and remember being fascinated that they still existed. Thinking about it I probably have stamps with a few different dictators featured...