Howdy from Houston, y'all.
I'm hoping some eagle-eyed collector with much more experience than I'll ever have may be able to help my family solve the mystery of Grampy's cap badge
My great grandfather served in England in the 1st Battalion Grenadier Guards prior to WWI, was allowed to enter reserve service prior to the end of his term of commitment and emigrated to Canada during that time, was recalled to active service at the start of the Great War (1914 Star recipient in France) then was discharged while the war was still ongoing and sent home to England, where he joined the Guards Machine Gun Corps and served in that unit, in England, until demobilization. I originally just wanted just to get copies of the cap badges of the two units in which he served, and thought I'd succeeded in doing so, until I saw a photo of him in a uniform that is just plain perplexing:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/12Qg...ew?usp=sharing
The photo was taken at the start of WWII, and the two men on either side of Grampy are two of his sons-in-law, preparing to depart for their own rendezvous with destiny. Apparently someone in the family thought they ought to get photos of the men in their uniforms, and somehow convinced the old retired soldier, Grampy, to put on a uniform of his own for the photos.
Grampy is clearly wearing his 1914 Star Trio medal bar, and the jacket he's wearing definitely looks military (it has three chevron stripes on one sleeve and something over it--a crown maybe?--no photos show it clearly) but the jacket has just two breast pockets and it looks to be blue or black. But by far the most confusing thing is the badge on his hat.
What is that? That's what's driving me nuts, and I'm hoping someone here can help me ID what it might be, and point me to where I can get a copy.
This photo was taken in Canada so maybe it might be some Canadian reserve unit, though I find no record of him belonging to a militia or civil defense group, serving on a police force, etc. I've been told he did serve as a street car conductor after WWI in the Toronto area but I don't find any photos of TTA employees wearing anything that looks this military, and certainly not with chevron on their sleeves.
The badge seems to have a clan crest style belt and buckle encircling whatever the central device might be. Can anyone help identify it? Needless to say, the cap seems to be lost to history, so we can't just go find it to get a better photo--this picture and the information provided above are all I have to go on, and I'm clearly out of my depth, so thought I'd search for (and I found!) a forum for people who are far more knowledgeable about such matters than me, and throw myself on their mercy.
Any help would be much appreciated.
Thanks--