The following information taken from National Archives files DEFE2/992 and ADM 1/25158 sheds light on these badges and their use.
Jon
In December 1947 just twenty months after the Combined Operations badge was abolished because all peacetime service personnel might in future serve in Combined Operations Command and no longer be the specialists they had been in war, Combined Operations Headquarters asked for its reintroduction.
This proposal recognised that by 1947 the Army personnel of Combined Operations came from so many regiments and corps that reviving the sign for COHQ personnel, staff of the School of Combined Operations, Combined Operations Experimental Establishment and Combined Signal School in North Devon and for 267th Bombardment Battery, Royal Artillery would promote esprit de corps. It would however only be worn by soldiers as the Royal Navy and Royal Air Force did not wear such signs. The War Office approved its reintroduction for Army and Royal Marine battle dress in February 1948 with the proviso that it could be used by all three services if required.
With no supplies of wartime printed badges available COHQ approached George Kenning Ltd, manufacturers of the woven wartime badge to be told that as the badge design was Admiralty property it could only be supplied with their authority. Once obtained a School of Combined Operations letter announced its introduction in May 1948, its ‘background to be cut to form a circle three inches in diameter’.
In July 1953 the RAOC in Hong Kong queried with the War Office a request they had received to supply the Amphibious Warfare badge to naval personnel serving with 95th Amphibious Observation Regiment, RA. Created the previous year with 7th and 267th Amphibious Observation Batteries, this successor to the wartime Combined Operations Bombardment Units supplied shore spotting parties to observe and control fire from ships supporting amphibious operations. Enquiries revealed that in September 1949 it had been agreed that naval telegraphists would take over some communications roles in RA Bombardment Batteries, the Army issuing them with uniforms similar to that of the soldiers they worked alongside, 21 naval telegraphists serving with 95th Regiment, a further two with 18th Naval Beach Signal Section. Combined Operations HQ confirmed that no authority existed to issue the badge to the Royal Navy but a supply was obtained from an Army source after protracted negotiations. The 95th Regiment wore the badge on battle dress and in action on the Denison smock. A Territorial sub-unit of 95th Regiment, 881 (Amphibious) Observation Battery also wore the badge as did the Malta-based No 1 Headquarters Ship Signal Troop aboard the Royal Navy’s Amphibious Warfare headquarters ship HMS Meon. In 1960 95th Amphibious Regiment was retitled 95th Commando Regiment, Royal Artillery.
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