✚9886✚ German Bavarian Army pre WW1 Landwehr Long Service Award clasp II. Class

Original pre WW1 Bavarian Landwehr Long Service Award for Non-Commissioned Officers, IN VERY NICE WORN CONDITION, GOOD EXAMPLE WITH WORKING PIN DEVICE, RARE AWARD

HISTORY OF THE AWARD:

Bavarian Reserve and Territorial Army Service Award, II class (Landwehr-Dienstauszeichnung II. Klasse), 1876-1913 - Rectangular badge consisting of a light blue ribbon with the face embroidered in white thread ‘L. II.’ (for King Ludwig II). The Award was created on 13 January 18416 by King Max I. and and was awarded to non-commissioned officers and soldiers of 40 and 24 years of service in the Bavarian army. It was awarded for impeccable fulfilment of service in the Reserve or Territorial Army (Navy) to officers, medical officers, non-commissioned officers and other ranks who participated in a campaign or as an exceptional reward for those who spent a total of three months on active conscripted service without leave (‘Nach vorwurfsfrei erfüllter Dienstpflicht in der Reserve und Landwehr (Seewehr) diejeningen Offiziere, Ärzte, Unteroffiziere und Wehrmänner …, welche einen Felgzug mitgemacht haben oder bei außergewöhnlichen Veranlassungen, im ganzen mindestens drei Monate, aus dem Beurlaubtenstande zum aktiven Dienst einberufen gewesen’). On 21 January 1876 new service awards in three classes for non-commissioned officers and soldiers were introduced. This Award was superseded in 1913. Landwehr, or Landeswehr, is a German language term used in referring to certain national armies, or militias found in nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Europe. In different context it refers to large scale, low strength fortifications. In German, the word means "defence of the country"; but the term as applied to an insurrectional militia is very ancient, and lantveri are mentioned in Baluzii Capitularia, as quoted in Hallam's Middle Ages, i. 262, 10th edition. The Austrian Landwehr was one of three components that made up the ground forces of the Austro-Hungarian Dual Monarchy between 1868 and 1918, and it was composed of recruits from the Cisleithanian parts of the empire. Intended as a national defense force parallel with the Hungarian Honvédség, the Landwehr was officially established by order of Emperor Franz Josef on December 5, 1868. Yet while the Hungarian force was generously supported early on by the parliament in Budapest, legislators in Vienna generally failed to advance the cause of the Landwehr, leaving it by the 1870s as a skeletal force with only the appearance of parity. In 1887, Archduke Albrecht wrote that Landwehr units were not ready, in terms of training or discipline, for use in the first two weeks of a war.[4] Yet the 1880s saw an expansion in the force's numbers, as the high command was unable to obtain increases in manpower for the joint Imperial and Royal army and sought to increase overall numbers through the Landwehr. Additionally, Austrian fears of the development of the Honvédség caused the Austrian Reichsrat to vote to increase the Landwehr's strength to 135,000. These nationalist interests led to a gradual strengthening and improvement of the force, so that by the start of the First World War, Landwehr units were considered equal to the units of the joint army in readiness and equipment. Additionally, in Tyrol and Carinthia, three units of the Landwehr were specially trained and equipped for mountain warfare. The Austrian Landwehr and the other components of the Austro-Hungarian Army were all full time standing armies. The landwehr in Prussia was first formed by a royal edict of 17 March 1813, which called up all men capable of bearing arms between the ages of eighteen and forty-five, and not serving in the regular army, for the defence of the country. After the peace of 1815 this force was made an integral part of the Prussian army, each brigade being composed of one line and one landwehr regiment. This, however, retarded the mobilization and diminished the value of the first line, and by the re-organization of 1859 the landwehr troops were relegated to the second line. During the Weimar republic, Germany was not allowed a standing army of more than 100,000 men. Thus conscription had been abolished. In the course of the remilitarization of Nazi Germany, the Landwehr was reestablished on 21 May 1935 comprising all Germans liable for military service under the new law older than 35 years of age and younger than 45 years. In effect only one Landwehr division (the 14th Landwehr Division) was called up, the remainder of the Landwehr was used either to fill out the 3rd wave infantry divisions or formed Landesschützen battalions used for guard and occupation duty.