Beautiful Part-Röhm Dedicated  SA Dagger

Only Name Removed | Lovely Condition

The SA dagger with part Röhm dedication, made by  E.P & S, Solingen. The mid-toned fruit wood grip with solid nickel-silver eagle & swastika motif and SA Runes eye. The part Röhm dagger with solid nickel-silver mounts thoughout, as expected. The lower guard with gruppe designation 'Nm.'

The  blade with part dedication;the name Ernst Röhm, removed, the dedication strap-line complete.  The obverse with full Alles für Deutschland motto. The reverse with the part Röhm dedication, and the E.P & S. full name and trademark. The area with the Ernst Röhm name obliterated evident. The scabbard with dark brown anodised finish.

Condition report: The fruit wood dagger grip in near-excellent condition. The grip  tight with both the upper- and lower- crossguards along with a perfect fit. The top fastening-nut clean and free from damage. The blade in near-excellent condition with 98% of its original polish and crossgrain. Just light runner marks visible.The 'Alles für Deutschland' motto particularly sharp and clear. Reverse to blade with good polish and crossgrain, and designation 'In herzlicher freundschaft....... ' clear and sharp. The E.P & S trademark clear and sharp.

The scabbard with 98% original anodised brown finish, and with some original lacquer. The scabbard body free from dents. The bottom ball near-perfect. All screws present and un-molested.

Background to the Röhm Purge: The Night of the Long Knives, or the Röhm Putsch,was a purge that took place in Nazi Germany from June 30 to July 2, 1934, when the Nazi regime carried out a series of political extrajudicial executions intended to consolidate Hitler's absolute hold on power in Germany. Many of those killed were leaders of the SA (Sturmabteilung), the Nazis' own paramilitary Brownshirts organization.

The most notable victim was  S.A. leader Ernst Röhm,  one of Hitler's long-time supporters and allies. Leading members of the left-wing Strasserist faction of the Nazi Party (NSDAP), along with its figurehead, Gregor Strasser, Establishment conservatives and anti-Nazis (such as former Chancellor Kurt von Schleicher and Bavarian politician Gustav Ritter von Kahr, who had suppressed Adolf Hitler's Munich Beer Hall Putsch in 1923) were also killed. The murders of Brownshirt leaders were also intended to improve the image of the Hitler government with a German public that was increasingly critical of 'thuggish' Brownshirt tactics.

Hitler moved against the SA and its leader, Ernst Röhm, because he saw the independence of the SA and the penchant for its members to resort to  street violence as a direct threat to his newly-gained political power. Hitler also wanted to conciliate leaders of the Reichswehr, the official German military who feared and despised the SA—in particular Röhm's ambition to absorb the Reichswehr into the SA under his own leadership: Hitler was also uncomfortable with Röhm's outspoken support for a "second revolution" to redistribute wealth (in Röhm's view, President Hindenburg's appointing of Hitler as German Chancellor on January 30, 1933 had accomplished the "nationalistic" revolution but had left unfulfilled the "socialistic" motive in National Socialism). Finally, Hitler used the purge to attack or eliminate critics of his new regime, especially those loyal to Vice-Chancellor Franz von Papen, as well as to settle scores with old enemies.
 

At least 85 people died during the purge, although the final death toll may have been in the hundreds;  more than a thousand perceived opponents were arrested. Most of the killings were carried out by the Schutzstaffel (SS) and the Gestapo (Geheime Staatspolizei), the regime's secret police. The purge strengthened and consolidated the support of the Reichswehr for Hitler. It also provided a legal grounding for the Nazi regime, as the German courts and cabinet quickly swept aside centuries of legal prohibition against extrajudicial killings to demonstrate their loyalty to the regime.

The Night of the Long Knives was a turning point for the German government. It established Hitler as "the supreme justiciar of the German people," as he put it in his July 13, 1934 speech to the Reichstag.

Directly after the purge, an order was issued  instructing the removal of the dedication from all  daggers bearing the Röhm Honour Dedication. This was achieved in a variety of ways;

Many owners simply ran a grinding wheel over the dedication, removing the entire wording; other individuals used a grinding wheel to remove the name only; a few owners returned their daggers to the maker who removed the dedication professionally, and a number of owners  disobeyed orders, and left the dedication intact.