QRWS - Core Variants & Search Request

['Ticker' Riley]

Hi JT

Many thanks indeed for taking time to explain the rationale behind your classification system in such a thorough and comprehensive way. I can certainly appreciate everything you say about defining particular characteristics, and then using these to arrange badges into your ‘core variants’. All I can say is that, regarding my own work, the principal consideration for me are makers’ variants and distinguishing these.

To my mind no two manufacturers produced exactly the same Leicesters badge, even though these badges conform to the same overall ‘Design’, i.e. with a capital ‘D’, as laid down in the official Patterns. So yes, you are correct – I am trying to categorise these badges by each maker’s own interpretation of the Patterns, their own ‘design’, i.e. with a small ‘d’, by which I mean the distinctive artistic modelling which exists in the tigers, the grassy mound and the scroll lettering that you get in these, and which altogether may be described as ‘die characteristics’.

You make a pertinent observation in this regard, about the ability, or rather inability, to attribute each variant badge to a specific maker. It is also the case that one maker’s type may well display similar physical attributes to another’s, making them almost the same. I have found that there are a number of makers’ types for the Leicesters that I cannot attribute to a manufacturer, as some makers only ever seem to have made ORs’ badges and no maker-marked examples exist for these – or at least I haven’t yet found them! Other maker’s types are identifiable by manufacture: J. R. Gaunt & Son, Firmin & Sons (‘old’ & ‘new’ types), Bent & Parker, Ludski/Ludlow, Jennens & Co., Smith & Wight and Gladman & Norman (notwithstanding copies and fakes).

There are obviously different ways to note difference, and different badges to a regiment will undoubtedly be differenced by having different fixings, or being made of different metals, or having different finishes. There will also be differences in voiding, though in my mind non-voiding versus voiding can be very much a variable, sometimes dependent on maker, sometimes on period of production. For instance, I have examples of the Firmin & Sons ‘old’ type as bi-metal ORs’ badges, both with loops (lugs) and vertical shank (slider), as OSD with blades, and as S/G with loops (I think the ORs’ bi-metal with loops comes with voided and un-voided tail loops too, but I haven’t got them to hand at the moment). Presumably, therefore, under your ‘core variants’ system, if extended to include officers’ badges, each of these would be a separate ‘core variant’ (incidentally, I don’t think that officers’ badges have separate Pattern numbers, do they? I assume that these come under the same Pattern number as the relevant ORs’ bi-metal badges?)

I can definitely see value in this ‘core variant’ approach, but for my research, at present at least, I prefer to keep things together under a maker, such as the Firmin & Sons type badges I’ve just mentioned, rather than placing them into discrete categories based on characteristics they have in common with other manufacturers’ badges. Having said that, your broader categorisation very much has its merits, and I think Julian, to some extent, does use a system of physical attributes, though I do not know if he does so in exactly the same way as you do, nor do I know how Griff M-J defines and arranges the makers’ types/variants in his research. Perhaps I need to re-examine my work in the light of your methodology? In the meantime, I’d best stop there, as it seems my postings are distracting us from the original purpose of this thread, which was for you to get fellow members to contribute examples of QRWS badges!

Very best regards

Martin