WW2 NAZI PARTY LEADER PISTOL VARIATIONS

Hey guys and welcome to a very special day here at Legacy Collectibles because I'm going to do a video, part of our educational series and it's a really important one.  If you don't have a lot of time, I think, I don't know how long this is going to be but let's just guess, it's going to be about 17 minutes, 18 minutes. You might want to come back and watch this later because this is going to be hot and heavy. 

I’ll Be Doing a Re-Do, So this is Take 2
I'm re-doing the Party Leader PPK video. That was the first one I ever did. First one I ever did, if you remember I'm standing next to a mannequin of Fritz the Party Leader and I go through them. The quality of the shoot wasn't that good and we've also gained some more information. So I'm re-doing that first video we ever did and I'm going over some new information that I've learned, having done some more research. 

New Info Available
I also want to thank Joe Wodka who has written an article about Party Leaders and published it in Auto Magazine. We can make that available to you if you would be interested in even more detail, but he did a lot of research into the Party Leaders and I want to clarify a few things. In fact I'm going to say some things today that you probably have never heard before. You thought you knew everything about Party Leaders, I'm going to guess that you're going to learn something new because I did, so I wanted to redo the video.
 

The First Variation Was the RZM PPK

So the first part of this video I want to talk about who were the Party Leaders. Well, when we did the video before we talked about variation one being the RZM PPK. Most of you are aware of that, most of you recognized that there's a solid block of 30,000 RZM PPKs that were issued in 1934 through about early 1935. 

Party Leader vs Party Officials

This is where I'm going to amend the information a little bit because people think of that as a Party Leader and I think the term is a little bit misleading because they were given out to party officials. So it's fine to say Party Leader but probably a better word would be Party Officials. 

Do You Remember Karl?

Because as we've researched this more and more and we did a video, if you remember the video about Karl. Karl you can see here we have his RZM PPK and in the holster it has his name, it also has the serial number matching the PPK. So we did a little research on Karl and we have envisions of this Party Leader who's at the front of a parade and he's leading the charge in the Nazi party, when in fact it turns out he was a school teacher. 

Let's Talk About Fritz Too
And the more we looked at it a lot…and I got another Party Leader, we’ll call him Fritz because his name is Fritz. This is the red book that belonged to Fritz and we have his name in here and there's a picture of him in here. We’ll get a close-up of the picture. I also have another picture of him. If you notice he's got that little tiny Hitler moustache going on but it actually looks a lot more like the moustache, you know Laurel and Hardy, he looks like the skinny one maybe it's Charlie Chaplin I'm not sure. But anyway he's got that skinny little moustache. We have a lot of information about Fritz and we have the serial number of the gun he carried and he was a firefighter. So again, he joined the party, he wasn't really a leader of anything but he joined the party early on. 

Here's My Conclusion
Now, why is a school teacher joining the Nazi Party and carrying a gun or getting a permit to carry a gun. So I have to conclude that early on you joined the party but as the war breaks out and you're teaching young children, the only way to get ahead…and you want to become the principal or the headmaster of the school, you've got to be a party member. In a lot of interviews with people after the war they would all say, and of course they're going to say, well I only joined because I had to in order to get a raise or I had to, to be part of the Union or I had to, to be a part of this different group.  So we know that people join the party in order to fit in and to be welcome in the German society. So it wasn't necessarily the best of the best if you go to Wikipedia and you look at the list of Party Leaders, it is who's who in Nazi Germany. I mean they all joined the Nazi Party, they all wore that little pin and I'm told that Hitler's pin was number one. And everybody wore that little pin on their lapel. They may not even wear a uniform but they did have their red book, they had their little Party Leader pin and they were eligible to buy a gun.
 

The Nazi Purchasing Department

Now RZM. I have the word down here what did that mean. I'm not going to say it because the Germans have a way of taking three words and putting it into one and so this is basically the Nazi purchasing department. If you collect any kind of daggers or medals, most of the things that were procured for the Nazi Party were marked with the RZM, the purchasing department. 

 

What was the RZM PPK?

So the RZM PPK, what it really was, it was basically the Nazi Party went to the Walther Factory and said hey we want to order 30,000 of these, what's your best deal? Okay, so they negotiate a good deal. Then they go out to all their members, they didn't have the internet but they go out to all their members and they say would you like to own an official gun of the party? And they were marked with an RZM. And that will be the first variation, I'll mention that in just a minute. 

 

You Could Actually Buy The RZM PPK

But what's interesting and Joe Wotka goes into this he finds the records where you could purchase your own RZM PPK back in 1934, early '35 there was catalogues, you could buy them on time, on a layaway plan. It was like 5 Reichsmarks a month and you could buy a party leader PPK. They actually were selling them at a discount. So if you look at the catalogue, a PPK in that time might cost 44, 45 Reichsmarks but if you're a party leader you can get the RZM for I think it was about 32 Reichsmarks. So it's like a 25% discount if you buy it through the party. 

What Are The Perks of Joining The Party?

So one of the perks of joining the party is you get promotions, you're well-liked in political circles, you fit in with all your party leader buds. They had shooting competitions, you hang out with all these guys, you go and have a beer with them and you can buy a gun at a discounted rate. Not as sexy as most people thought including myself but the truth is, if you join the party there were perks and one of them is you could buy an RZM PPK. 

 

Listen Up! Another Clarification

Just one more clarification I wanted to make because there are RZM guns issued to the SS, RZM guns issued to the SA and so I want to clarify that you may or may not have a party leader uniform, we're going to talk a little bit about the uniform. But if you're in the SA you have an SA uniform but you are also a party leader. And some people think oh well if you joined the party then you can't be in the SS. Actually army officers join the party, SA officers were almost all party members, SS officers were almost all party leaders. And so if you go through you would be a member of more than one organization and for every one of them you pay dues. That was how the party made their money. 

 

Evidence of Fritz Paying His Dues

In here you can see Fritz was paying dues all the way to nineteen… He started in ’37, you can see the little booklet and the stamp was him paying his dues throughout the war, maybe that helped to pay for his gun as well. But in 1944 his dues were about 10 Reichsmarks. So you can see that joining the party, paying your dues, you would present this upon somebody saying are you a loyal member? Oh here you are, I paid my dues, I'm on board.

Re-framing to the Official Gun of The Party

So let me jump into the first variation of the party leader PPK. Now I've reframed a little bit and called the official gun of the party, not necessarily a leader. So the RZM PPK, most people know that there was a solid block in 1934 through early 1935, a solid block of 30,000 that were ordered by the Nazi Party and then sold to party members. Most likely at a profit but again they were buying them cheaper than they could buy a commercial gun direct from Walther. 

 

Where Do I Get My Information

Now I'm going to let you in on a little bit of the secret sauce. You're about to see something that I've never shown to anybody before, it's my super, super, secret database. But it's where I get a lot of my information from. I've been collecting serial numbers for about 15 years because the factory records were all destroyed. But I have 20,000 serial numbers recorded that I personally observed or have been reported to me. And please send me your serial numbers if you have wartime serial numbers or pre-war serial numbers.

 

My Secret Sauce

But let's take a look at the secret sauce. Now when I go to my computer I have a list of the serial numbers of the RZM PPKs. So if I start where they begin you can see as I page down there's a solid block every single gun is an RZM marked PPK. And I have the serial ranges and then all of a sudden there's a blank and it says nine-millimetre, it doesn't fit. So in my notes I'll say mismatched gun, meaning somebody took the slide off and put a different slide on because it has to be an RZM.

That's what helps me when I'm at an auction and I see the serial number and it's not RZM and it should be, I'll say oh that's a mismatched gun. And the auctioneer will say how do you know that? And I go, secret sauce. And I keep going and I say here's an RZM that's engraved. My personal opinion only one engraved RZM in the middle of nowhere, I would say that was done after the war. Some GI embellished it or the party leader with a little bit of money could have had it done themselves. But in my opinion not a factory engraved gun. I'm going to keep going, you just see RZM after RZM it goes on forever. 

 

Here's Where the Block Changes

And then we get to the muzzle numbered RZMs. I'm down in the 840 range and I specifically mentioned these are muzzle numbered meaning the serial number is on the muzzle of the gun and there's a block of SS guns which I'll do a whole separate video on. But the muzzle numbered RZMs we know from records that they went to the SS, so they were party leaders who also were members of the SS. Very cool gun by the way; I have a few to show you. But I will do amendments to this by adding separate videos just on some of this information and then the RZM stop. You'll see right here in 844469, RZM suddenly stopped and then after that you see there's some more muzzle numbered SS guns. 

 

What's Up With These One-sie's and Two-sie's

Okay now for a little bit of the… We don't know everything there’s still some guesswork. Because after that last RZM PPK there's onesies and two-sies, meaning every once in a while randomly out of nowhere there's an RZM. I always put a question mark next to that because I figure maybe somebody took an RZM slide and they just stuck it on another gun. There is a way to tell and we'll show you really quickly but I need to do a whole different video. If you take the slide off and you look inside the last three digits are scratched inside the slide. So whenever I see a onesie, twosie I try to take a look at it and say aha this one is not actually an RZM, it's just an RZM slide. Or the other possibility is somebody could fake the RZM slide. I'm going to go back to faked but let me get through the serial numbers. 

 

Let's Finish Looking at These Serial Numbers

Here I see in the million range, those of you know that serial numbers for PPK's went up to a million and you can see here's a block of RZMs and right in the middle of it there's a Verchromt which is fine if somebody had a special order on a Verchromt gun. But here's a block of RZMs and it has a span of about 400 guns, so I'm going to guess in 1936 or ‘37, it says 1938 but I think it's more like 1936, 1937 there was a block of another 500 RZMs ordered.
 

Oh Wait! Another Block of RZM's

Okay and then we jump to 288, 289 serial range. In 1940 there's another block of our RZMs and I actually don't have one of these right now but I have sold them. They’re Eagle N RZMs. So you know right away when the slide is RZM marked and has an Eagle N, something's not right because they would have been Crown N from 1934. But there's a solid block of maybe another 500 or so RZM's ordered in 1940. Quite a mystery as to why other than the party had more orders and they were running out of guns, so they just said they send us 500 more. 

 

What Does This Data Mean

So all that data is to say that they ordered solid blocks of RZMs and it wasn't just in 1934 like most people thought, but brand-new information -- Actually I've had this information for quite a while but wanted to share it with you. And we will be looking more at my database when we look at other variations. But there's solid blocks in the 1938 time period and then also in 1940 they're solid blocks; and then there's ones and twos all around which need to be investigated. If you're buying an RZM you want to check out the serial number, let us know we'll check it out for you and I'll tell you if I'm not too sure because it's sitting there all by itself. It may not be a real RZM.

First Up with the RZM Marking

So let's take a look at the marking, the RZM marking. The first one I want to look at is in the correct serial range meaning this one is 842, so it's right in the middle of the 1934 range. First of all it's got a high polished finish, the safety lever should be a fire blue color. By the way the fire blue wears away more quickly than any other blue. So the fire blue is often worn away or turned brown. But you can see the RZM. 

 

A Little More About the RZM Marking

I want to say a little bit more about the RZM marking because this was acid etched. The logo on this was acid etched. So by the way when you refinish it, it almost always covers up that etching. It's very light acid etched and if you look at the RZM logo you will see that the RZM is actually in the blue and the background is the part that's etched. So it's actually reversed, I say reversed emboss but it's reversed etched, where the background is frosty color and the RZM -- Normally you would make the RZM etched in. In this case the background is etched in and the RZM stands out. 

 

What If The Gun Was Faked or Re-Blued?

Now if you look at one that's been re-blued or faked, I haven't seen them do that well. I don't have a very good picture but I did find one on the internet that obviously is re-blued. If you don't see the frosting background then it's been either re-blued or faked. 

 

RZM Slide vs An Acid Etched Slide

Also let's take a look at the slide. Here's an RZM slide next to a normal acid etched slide from the same period of time. And you can see they moved the entire logo over to the left and so you can see it lines up a little bit differently. 

 

Let's Help You Figure Out If the Gun is Faked

So it not an easy thing to fake but they do get re-blued and they do once in a while get faked, so you have to beware of that. And again we would be happy to help you out if you send us pictures. This one is in the million serial range, you can see the picture. This is in the million serial range so it's actually probably more like 1937 maybe ’38 but you can see it's real. Notice the safety lever, it's in its fire blued but it's a 60-degree safety where all the ones from 1934 are 90 degrees safeties. The early safety was 90 degree, I can tell you why they switched it if you're wondering out loud. 

 

Why Did They Switch From a 90 Degree Safety?

If I pop this down it actually hits the grip and so when you go all the way down a lot of the grips are chipped at the top. So both PP and PPK they did away with the 90 degree safety and they went with 60 degree just for the reason that it is less likely to chip the grip. So they changed that, at least that's what I'm told, I wasn't in the factory when these were made. But this is a million series RZM and then you also see the RZM that has a 60 degree safety and it will have an Eagle N proof. I don't have one of those to show you but when I get one I'll do a quickie and I'll show you an Eagle N RZM that's from 1940. 

 

Which Holster Goes With the RZM Variation

One more thing about the RZM variation and that would be what holster goes with it. Any Akah holster, when I did Karl's we showed you an Akah holster and it had his name inside it. This is an Akah holster it will have a brass stud. These came from the early years of Akah. They did a brass stud later, they saved a little bit of money and they made them aluminium so they're bright silver. So you can see this is just a standard tan Akah holster. So this would be a correct holster to put with an RZM PPK.
 

That's a Mouthful

Okay that's a lot on the RZM PPK and just like I said there's onesies and twosies and people have said oh they didn't exist after 1934 they're fake, they can't exist. 

 

Here Comes the Controversy

There's actually a controversial RZM PP. There's a picture of one here and the first time I heard about the RZM PP I only heard about one and I said it's a fake, doesn't exist. In fact years ago probably 5 - 6 years ago somebody offered me an RZM PP and I just laughed. He said oh I found one of the rarest guns ever, it's an RZM marked PP and I said they didn't make them. 

 

The Joke’s On Me

I kind of laughed at the person which wasn't very nice but since then there's been about five reported and they're in the 1940 range. They're not a sequential block but they're in the 200,000 range and there's just five of them reported. I believe some of them have…like the one in the picture it has yellowed small parts and an RZM slide. I am trying to get my hands on one and if I do, I will do a separate video on this. So before I say they absolutely are fake, we're learning new things every day and perhaps there was an order of a small number of RZM PPs but that's controversial. Some people will say that's absolutely crazy but I've learned not to say that. I learned the hard way by passing up some rare stuff. So we'll get our hands on one and get that video to you as soon as we can.
 

Second Variation Party Leader PPK - The Honour Weapon

Okay let me talk about the second variation Party Leader PPK which is probably the more exciting one because this really went to party leaders. In fact this is also more commonly known in the original German manuscripts they would talk about the honor weapon of the party leader. So they called it an honor weapon. I recently had a guy contact me and said they wanted a Party Leader PPK because they know Hitler touched it and he handed it out as an honor weapon to one of the party leaders. 

 

There Is No Citation To GO With It

That never happened. There's no record of Hitler ever handing out one of these guns and they always had citations. Whenever they got awards or medals there's always a citation to go through it. We've gotten a lot of medals and often they come with citations. There's no record of any citation where somebody got an honor weapon and there's a citation to go with it. So it doesn't make sense that these were presented by the Fuhrer or anything like that. 

 

Let's Look at the Uniform

Instead I think, if you take a look at the uniform, these things were absolutely gorgeous. They actually have a white uniform for summer use and then they have the mustard color uniform. I believe they were designed by Hugo Boss. So these were gorgeous uniforms and part of the glory of the Nazis was being able to parade around. 

 

How Did You Get an Honour Weapon?

How did you get a Party Leader PPK, an honor weapon? I'm going to distinguish this from the RZM by calling this the honor weapon and we've these on our sites. We actually did another video on honor weapons. I have a box…a brand new, in the original box video of that. Here I have one that this has…you'll notice it's a little bit different in that it has a box mag instead of the finger extension mag. This is called the box mag, yes it is original, they actually did make these. It's not an extended magazine because it still holds the same number of rounds but it just has an extended grip so that if you have fat hands like Goering - he didn't carry one of these. If you have fat hands it just it helps with the grip. It's a more comfortable grip. But it's a beautiful looking gun. 

 

Mystery, Not Fact

I believe that the honor weapon was probably the way you got one and by the way this is more of a mystery, I'm not saying this is fact, but I'm saying that if your boss recommended you for one you would get permission to go and buy the grip and put it on your gun. Could you buy the gun and grip together? Yes. I think it would probably go the same way as the RZM. You would buy it through the party and you would probably get it at a discount, maybe they have a layaway plan but you needed to get permission. 

 

These First Came Up In 1938 Catalogue

The first time these show up is in a catalogue from 1938. So 1937 catalogue doesn't have one of these, 1938 catalogue does have a party leader grip and the party leader holster. I actually have an excerpt from 1938 you can see here, I have just one page and it has the party leader holster and I can tell you they were four and a half Reichsmarks. So there's a party leader holster advertised in the ‘38 book, I believe it was also in the ‘39. So for two years you could buy this party leader grip along with the holster to go with it. 

 

You Had To Get Permission To Make The Purchase

The honor was your boss or the leader of your group, and again party leaders could be national leaders, they could be leaders from specific areas or states but they could also be local leaders. If you qualified as a good Nazi and you had to qualify in terms of shooting proficiency, then you were given permission to purchase the Party Leader PPK honor weapon. 

 

What's The Going Price?

The complete rig you see here when we sold it on our site these can go from anywhere from 12,000 - 15,000. Actually on some auctions I've seen them go for 25,000 and these truly are magnificent guns. But anything that is this valuable is also faked.

 

Is It a Fake?

So I did a whole video on how can I tell if my gun is a fake. I'll just show you a line up really quick. Here's a fake that we have. I'll put it in the middle of other grips. Now the party leader grip looks exactly like all the other grips of the time. The same color, the same style, the same weight, the same thickness, everything would be exactly the same except for the Eagle. So when you see a line-up of grips, I don't have that many party leader Eagles to show you, but if I just show you a bunch of grips and right in the middle I put one fake, I hope you can see that there's a slight difference. There is a difference in the weight, the thickness, but if you're going to buy a party leader you want to make sure that it's real because these are heavily faked. 

Be Careful When Purchasing

And I just also want to clarify these are only made for our PPK. You can find them on gun broker or sometimes eBay with the swastika blurred out. But they do sell party leader Luger grips, they saw a party leader P.38 grips, they sell party leader PP grips, all fake. And they'll say these are reproduction and they sell for 50 bucks, so you know they're not real. The real honor weapon was always a PPK. So these were first offered in 1938 and if you go to our sheet we actually have detail on the serial ranges for the RZM and also the serial ranges. The acceptable range from researchers is 170,000 – 250,000. That doesn't mean every gun in that range was a party leader, it just means it's a commercial gun in that general range. You could extend it either way meaning somebody could buy that a little bit late in the game, but I would say it started in about 170,000 and goes up to about 250,000, maybe a little bit further but in that range is considered the acceptable range.

Reach Out To Us, We'll Help

If you'd like a copy by the way of the detail of this, we'd be happy to send you one. Just comment and give us your email and say you would like the serial ranges for the party leaders, we'd be happy to send that to you.
 

Let's Look At These Holsters


So what holster came with this? Well we know from the catalogue that they sold a holster also in 1938. Let me just show you a bag of fun. I've decided I'm going to go get some party leaders from my basement and so I pulled these up and I just want to show you two different colors of party leaders. This is what they call a coffee brown party leader. Look at that party leader. By the way notice that now we have an aluminum stud instead of the brass stud. They smell delicious by the way, they're like chips you can't have just one, you got to have more than one. These are the tan ones, again they’re shiny, beautiful. This is a little bit darker and beautiful one; and one last one just for good measure, all beautiful party leaders. I know that excited you because it's -- You know it's not fair that I would have so many, but they're going to stay with me until I die. 

 

They New Brocade Holster

So that was ‘38 and ‘39 they’re in the catalogue and then they stopped. And then in 1940 they come out with a brocade party leader holster. I don't even have one. There's a picture of a brocade one. The brocade party leader holster looks phenomenal. Here you can actually see one on a uniform. I think the honor was just going to parades and stuff wearing this, all this stuff. It was such an honor and it was such a part of their culture very, very proud to defend the fatherland. But the Brocade holster can sell for as much as the gun. I've bid on them in auctions never came close they went well over, I mean they can be as much as $10,000 just for the Brocade holster. But you can see how magnificent they are. 

I've got a Shooter Prize Here

One other party leader that I've had was actually a shooter prize. We know that the party leaders had to prove proficiency to the Nazi ideology but also proficiency with a gun. They would they would regularly train, I think there was an annual a proficiency test you had to go out and make sure you knew how to use the gun properly. Including safety instructions and you would have to have a permit to carry the gun. Normal citizens can't carry a gun and I think the average party leader didn't carry his gun around, other than for special occasions, banquets, parties and parades and things like that. But I have seen 1938 and 1939 there was a shooter prize. So all the party leaders would come together in their province and they would have a competition. And I have seen an inscribed party leader PPK that was a prize given at the shooting competition in ‘38 and ’39. I will get that for you and do a whole separate video just on that shooter prize PPK.
 

Finally! The Final Version 

Okay, so let's go to the final variation of Party Leader PPK and this one is also kind of like the RZM PP. This is a little controversial because there's many collectors and experts who I respect who say there's no such thing as a black party leader grip. If you get this sheet I talked about there are black party leader grips when they were made that is just conjecture. They often come with a black party leader holster but it's basically a tan holster that's just been dyed black. I can tell because I can look down inside and I can see it was tan, dyed black and they usually are with a black party leader.

 

Take a Look

So let me show you one. I don't own one, I've chosen not to buy them because they're a little bit controversial and I'm not sure and when you're spending close to $10,000 on a gun you like to be sure. This one is beautiful, I believe it is all correct, period correct, black party leader and it would just go on a late war gun. So you know which one should it fit on? You didn't see, this is in the 400,000 range made in 1944, so there I added 1944 on the sheet. 

 

I Can't Prove This Information

I also say 1945 because there are GIs…I have personally talked to somebody who was 85 years old and he said I had a friend who was in the factory at the end of the war and he said these black party leader grips were in barrels -- there was a barrel of black party leader grips and all the guys were grabbing them and sticking them in their pocket. That's what he reported, I got that second-hand, I can't prove it but it was reported that these black party leader grips were in the factory at the end of the war. 

Other Research says....

Another researcher said that the GIs came in, the equipment that was all set up to make the molds of a party leader grip and everybody wanted one but the only material they had was black because the late war guns all had black grips. And so the GIs had them made at the end of the war. If you watch that video we know what happened at the end, we know that the Polish forced labor workers were making guns in exchange for either money or cigarettes or food. They were making guns for the GIs and it's very possible that they said hey, I love the party leader grip can you make me some? And they had this material. 

 

We Know For Sure They Are Faked

So either they were made in ‘44, ‘45 or they made after the war but for sure they are now faked, because this one is available for about 20 bucks. You can see the quality is a lot worse and we'll get some close-ups of that but I believe that the black party leader grip is real from ‘44 or ’45. And again they just put them on any late war gun and probably was a presentation to loyal Nazis in 1944, 1945. Was that important? Yes. I'll do some other videos. 

Interesting Stuff

Interestingly in 1944 in 1945, Hamler, Goering and Hitler were going out of the way to hand out presentations and meet with people and give out medals for everything just because they were trying to build morale when everything…they were being bombed and everything around them was falling apart and it was easy to get demoralized.

Buyer Beware

So at the end of the war there was a real push to honor people with these kinds of gifts. So I think it's highly possible at the end of the war they did create these, I can't prove it and there is some mystery around it. So if you're going to buy one be very, very careful. Buyer beware, but they are no doubt, they are very cool-looking.
 
That's It for My First Re-do
So guys that's my first redo of the party leaders. Some new information there and I'm sure we're going to have a lot more to show you and we'll kind of dovetail it into what we've already done. But hopefully you survived the entire tape, I don't know how long this was but we got through a lot of material. Thanks for hanging in there with me and stay tuned for a lot of really good guns that we're going to be bringing your way.