"Frankfurt Collection (Ludwig Scharf)" Topic

This collection of over 200 drawings of German uniforms in Spain was copied by Ludwig Scharf during one day and evening in 1944 in Frankfurt/Main, and allegedly lost by allied bombing the following day. If it took Scharf 5 minutes to complete one copy, he needed rougly 16 hours for that. But he was a skilled artist and maybe quicker.

Only Ludwig Scharf's copies survived, and the original owner's name – he was an officer of the Wehrmacht – is not known.

The collection was described by Donald Fosten in issue no. 3 of the journal "Tradition" and in 1988 in the journal "Military Illustrated". The latter can be downloaded here:

PDF link

91 illustrations were published by Friedrich Herrmann in the Zeitschrift für Heereskunde between 1989 and 1991.

I am searching for the article in Tradition No 3.

29 or 30 other illustrations, depicting Westphalian troops, are said to have been published by Robert Marrion in a journal (?) named Vincit at an unknown date. Some of them (ten of the infantry and two of the artillery) have been reproduced in 2001 in the French Tradition Magazine, N° 163. As source is given (erroneously, I presume) "dessin du musée de Cassel".

I am also looking for this original Vincit publication.

This is very useful uniform information. The historical background to obtaining the drawings is most interesting.
Thank you very much for posting the link here.

He was quite an artist to reproduce these in such short order. If these were truly based on eyewitness testimony, then they are still invaluable, even with the loss of the originals.

Is it not surprising, considering the stated date, that several of these Confederation troops are wearing what I would call "Bardin cut" coats?

This very question will tell you I am profoundly ignorant of anything before June 1815 (except First Restoration Royalist Uniforms)

Friedrich Herrmann in the Zeitschrift für Heereskunde produced 10 articles. They covered the following:
The first was a scene setter & covered the uniforms of Waldeck.
The second covered the troops of Lippe.
The third covered the troops of Sachsen-Coburg-Saalfield.
The fourth covered the troops of Sachsen-Weimar.
The fifth covered the troops of Sachsen-Weimar.
The sixth covered the troops of Sachsen-Gotha-Altenburg & Sachsen-Meiningen.
The seventh covered the troops of Sachsen-Gotha-Altenburg & Sachsen-Meiningen.
The eighth covered the troops of Schwarzburg-Rudolstadt & Schwarzburg-Sondergausen.
The nineth covered the troops of Anhalt.
The tenth covered the troops of Reuss & the 6th Rheinbund Regiment.

I note the scene setter mentions ;Vincit' and the company name "Norman Newton Ltd" who traded from the 1950s. Apparently they changed their name to "Tradition" in 1968.

The French Tradition Magazine No 163 has the date 1961 against Vincit after one of the illustrations on page 37.

Below from a French website:
Roy Belmont-Maitland was the founder of Tradition, a company that began in 1953 as Norman Newton Ltd with Charles C. Stadden as sculptor. At the time, there were three important manufacturers; Tradition, Hinton Hunt Figures and Rose Miniatures. Tradition experienced a good period of expansion with several increasingly important stores and a quality magazine, the magazine "Tradition" specialized in uniformology and military history. The main production was on 54 mm scale under the leadership of Charles C. Stadden, who later created 90 mm miniatures, and Edward Suren in the 80s for the 30/35 mm for wargames. Other sculptors involved in the various historical series include Ron Cameron, David Scheinman, Alan Caton, Jeff Willis, and Andrew C. Stadden. This is how David Scheinman introduced the famous "Toy Style" in the 80s. Andrew C. Stadden took over the new creations after the departure of D. Scheinman. In 1988, Roy Belmont-Maitland wanted to retire from business. The Swede Anders Lindstrom became the new owner. The name was changed to Tradition International Ltd which changed to Tradition of London in 1993. Gunnar Lindstrom, Anders' brother, took over the company in 2000 with the help of his son Magnus. In 2008, production at the Royston, Cambridge plant was awarded to RP World Models. Mayfair's iconic London store on Sheperd Street closed its doors on December 31, 2012. Orders can now only be made by email sent to Sweden. traditionoflondonshop.com or on the RP World Models website toy-soldiers.store/index.php.

Just to add the scene setter by Friedrich Herrmann in referencing Tradition (UK version)
"Furthermore, the description of posts contained a reference to a previous publication by Norman Newton Ltd under the title 'VINCIT', in which Robert Marrion dealt with a larger number of Westphalian troops. The term 'Frankfurter Sammlung' does not appear there yet, but this source has very likely served as a template for it. This publication was made available to me some time ago in the form of a typewritten copy of the text and photocopies of the drawings by R. Marrion."

This was in Zeitschrift fur Heereskunde Nr 341 dated January/February 1989.

Following some further online research – it appears via ebay that uniform prints were printed by Vincit with the text supplied by Norman Newton Ltd (that is how some prints of Prussians are described & shown). These were produced as single sheets – one showing 5 or 6 figures and various pieces of equipment e.g drum, tassels, shoulder pads etc & an accompanying type written text. So probably not a booklet, but could be wrong..

Many thanks for the additional info !

Only a few types of the Frankfurt Collection were described in the Tradition magazine – in nos. 3, 4, 5, 22, 26, 29, 41, 42 and 75. The drawings were made by Donald S. V. Fosten, except for those in no. 75, which were made by R. J. Marrion.

Here the Vincit print which can be seen at ebay:

And the accompanying cheet with the descriptions:

I have uploaded a merged version of the Zeitschrift für Heereskunde articles onto Mediafire. A copy can be downloaded via link

They say size isn't everything, but wow that shako plume!!

@ Prince of Essling, the links leads to a download for Opera?

@vW,

Have rechecked the link, it does take me to the correct file.

Try this one as an alternative PDF link

Ian