With the development of military science and the growing scale of armed conflicts, the issue of keeping records of the killed and the wounded on the battlefield became more and more relevant. At the turn of the 20th century, various systems of personal identification appeared in many armies of the world, which contained information on the soldier.

In the Red Army, the identification system changed several times. At first, these were tin medallions of a flat-box shape measuring 50×33×4 mm. Soldiers often called them “ladanki” (as in “frankincense”). A special printed letterhead was inserted into it. During the Winter War of 1939–40, it turned out that the medallion was leaky and the letterhead, which was often printed on plain newsprint, quickly fell into disrepair, so the “ladanki” were canceled.

They were replaced before the Great Patriotic War by new medallions in the form of a plastic case with a paper insert. But even in the new medallions, the safety of the paper containing particulars strongly depended on the conditions in which the case was found, and on how well the lid was closed. This new case contained either a special form or an ordinary handwritten note. The form was filled out in two copies. In the event of the soldier’s death, one copy was sent to the office while the second remained with the body and was handed over to the relatives of the deceased after the burial.

By the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, there wasn’t enough time to equip the entire army with new medallions, so many soldiers and commanders of the Red Army had the old “ladanki”. When conducting search operations on battlefields, both can be found. If the soldier for whatever reason didn’t get a pencil case, they used empty Mosin-Nagant shells. After pulling out the bullet, the soldier poured out the powder, put the note in the shell, turned the bullet upside down and used it to plug the shell. Oftentimes, medallions were made of wood or other suitable materials like, for example, the case for the anti-fog stick found in gas mask bags.

Some soldiers were afraid to fill out the particulars for medallions or carry them with them, believing that this could bring trouble.

In November 1942, this medallion was removed from the supply of the Red Army but they are often the only way to determine the identity of the deceased soldier during search operations to this day.