The mystery of crown jewels ?

[alco]

DAVID B HOWELL
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Hi Paddy

The subject of a blue or red jewel as per E C Colemans book should be taken as a comment and further enquires should be explored I have yet to be convinced of his dates having collected RN items for over 40 years I have yet to find anything which substantiates these dates.

David
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Following David's post, I would like to open this new thread to collect infos about this change of jewel colour on the crown of naval badges :

1)- we can observe the reality of the change (on officer & CPO/PO badges) :
rn po.jpg 7a_1_b.JPG

2)- except Coleman's I have no doc abt this change ;

3) available sources does not mention this detail
(May / Jarett / 1937 regulations / rosignoli / ... ) ;

4) is this change observed in other fields (land forces, air force, ...) ?
for my side, I have example for Merchant Marine !

As usualy, everybody with confirmed source is welcome to share info ...

All the best, mates .............................. o|--}

[RCN]

I take note from Coleman's 'Rank & Rate' book the following statement:

"With the accession of King Edward VII the crown was changed to the 'Tudor' crown completed with embroidered representations of the red and green jewels above the ermine band. Around 1920 the centre red jewel was replaced with a blue version."

How accurate this statement is I cannot say & am unable to corroborate it anywhere else.

I am of the personal opinion that it would make sense for the change to have been made when Edward VII ascended the throne in 1910. that is to say when the Victorian crown changed to the Tudor (or Kings) crown


I have variants of the jewels in the crowns & will try to post some of them in this section.....

Bryan

Bryan

[54Bty]

Although not Naval, I have checked all my British Army crowns (VC, KC & QC) and they all have the same jewel colours of Red-Green-Blue-Green-Red.

Marc

[Danny]

Hi,
A couple of pages from a file dated 1921 that might be of interest to you.

Regards

Danny

Crown (1)e.jpg Crown (2)e.jpg

[alco]

Hi,

Many thanks, Danny, for this interesting document.

I understand that 1921 was not a change of regulation
but only a warning from a technical level (paymaster cder & techn examining officer) to the Director of victualling certainly in charge to place the orders to the badges makers.

I suppose that the badges produced by manufacturers are to be conform with the technical specifications given by this Director of victualling ;
and so from time to time these specifications are to be precized ;

the correct heraldic crown after 1902 should be this one :
>Tudor_Crown_(Heraldry).jpg

with red, green, blue, green, red jewels.

I understand that before this warning of 1921, some or most of the manufacturers produced wrong design of red, green, RED, green, red.
Situation was certainly corrected after 1921 ...
but the result is that both design are possible during all this period (1902~1930 ?) !!!
Is this the origin of this (small) nightmare for collectors ?

Thank you mister Director of victualling !!!
with more attention, you should have corrected this from the beginning of the story in 1902 .......... !!!


.../...

[HMS-Troutbridge]

Originally Posted by RCN

Simon prior to 1915/1918 the RN was divided into two Divisions - the Military branch & the Civil branch- the Military branch being made up of Seaman officers such as Gunnery, Torpedo, Navigation, Signals;, these were the Officers that were eventually going to become Ship Commanders & Captains & eventually Admirals commanding Fleets & Shore establishments. These Officers wore the Executive curl above their sleeve lace & their cap badges were embroidered in Gold & Silver, both Officers & CPO's.

The Civil branch consisted of the Paymaster, Engineering, Medical(Surgeons), Constructor, Artificer Officers, Naval Instructors & Schoolmasters, & Wardmaster branches. These Officers had no curl above their sleeve lace & had distinctive colours between the lace to distinguished which branch they belonged to. Their cap badges were embroidered in gold (no silver), again for both Officers & Chief PO's.


I gave two yrs above as in 1915 the Engineer branch became part of the Military branch & added the Executive curl above their sleeve lace (retaining the purple colour between their lace) & in 1918 the Paymaster & the other Civil branches became also part of the Executive branch, also retaining their distinctive colours between their sleeve lace. Both branches were to wear the former Executive branch Gold & Silver embroidered cap badges.

I will show below an example of a Victorian Civil branch Officer cap badge (the entire badge including the anchor is gold), unfortunately I don't have an Executive branch example to show - some day I may get lucky enough to aquire one - but I will show a Military branch Victorian crown worn on a rear Admiral's epaulette. I do have a Victorian Military branch CPO example & will show that as well. The central anchor for the Military branch was silver as was most of the crown & ermine below.

Bryan

Hi Bryan,

Thanks for this and all the emails, I'm aware of the Military vs. Civil branches and the cap badge and anchor differences but I should perhaps have been more specific, I'm talking about substantive and non-substantive rating badges.

PO badges and the crowns on rating badges are all gold in every Victorian example I've seen (including of course the ones in your collection.) So it would be safe to assume at some point rate badges went from having all gold crowns to full colour.

What seems to be indicated by the PO2 badge above is that the change happened after 1901 or some companies simply continued manufacturing the KC rating badges with an all gold crown for a time...

I was hoping someone might know, as per the central jewel, when the full colour crown was standardised on substantive and non-substantive rate badges.

-Simon

[RCN]

Readers pls note that this topic was split from the allied topic:

"The Mystery of the Ermine colour in the Naval Crown"

http://www.britishbadgeforum.com/for...ad.php?t=36496

As both the Ermine colour & the Jewels in the crown are certainly related interested parties should consult both topics.

RCN Bryan

[RCN]

I will show below an example of a Victorian Civil branch Officer cap badge (the entire badge including the anchor is gold), unfortunately I don't have an Executive branch example to show - some day I may get lucky enough to aquire one.

I will also how a Military branch Victorian crown worn on a RN Rear Admiral's epaulette. I do have a Victorian Military branch CPO example & will show that as well. The central anchor for the Military branch was silver as was most of the crown & ermine below.

& an example of the crown of a Victorian pre 1890 CPO's rank badge....

Bryan

[RCN]

Here is a PO2 Rank insignia worn in the RN circa 1910.

The jewels in this crown appear to be yellow, but the badge is very old (over 100 yrs), & dates from the 1901-1913 period, so it possible they might have faded over the years.

I say it is from this period as this rank badge was abolished in the RN in 1913, however it was certainly worn in the 1WW period, likely by pensioned RN ratings & Coast Guard ratings who pensioned in this rank & were subsequently recalled for 1WW service.

Bryan

[RCN]

I got May out & had a read of the section on Officers Cap badges he makes no mention of the jewels in the ermine of the crown - so no help there.
Then I got "Rank & Rate" out as well & here is what Coleman has to say on this -

"With the accession of King Edward VII the crown was changed to the 'Tudor' crown completed with embroidered representations of the red and green jewels above the ermine band. Around 1920 the centre red jewel was replaced with a blue version."

How accurate this statement is I cannot say & am unable to corroborate it anywhere else.

Then I had a look at all of the PO gold wire embroidered rank badges that I have in my collection (approx 25) & I see I have only one example with RED jewels in the ermine.
So I am thinking then that this one must belong to the pre 1920 period.

All the others I have the central jewel in the ermine is BLUE & I will show one of those below as well,,,,,,

Bryan

[RCN]

Then I went to my circa 1WW gold wire embroidered badges to have a close look at the crowns,

these two examples are 1WW period & possibly earlier (ie: Edward VII period), the crowns have some colour in them now including the jewels but are quite faded.

Chief Yeoman of Signals & Torpedo Instructor.....


Bryan

[RCN]

Closeupsof the crowns in the previous badges:

Chief Yeoman of Signals - All of the jewels appear yellow embroidery, but they may have faded over time:

[RCN]

Closeups of the crowns in the previous badges:

Torpedo Instructor & Torpedo Gunners Mate- badge appeared circa 1909 & survived until circa 1932.

I have three examples of this badge & will show all of the jewels in the crowns...

First one is CPO crown, two types, both with yellow embroidered jewels....

[RCN]

Two more TI, TGM examples:

the first one is a larger badge, possibly a PO sleeve badge, jewels are, again, yellow embroidered.....

the second one is a CPO collar badge, this time with red embroidered central jewel; & green, red on either side of the central jewel.....

[RCN]

Torpedo Coxswain examples. This rate badge (crown above, star below) did not appear until 1932, both examples have the blue central jewel in the crown: