Re: Veteran and National Reserve Lapel Badges.

[Breaker02]

1911 Veteran and National Reserve Lapel Badges.


Over the years I like most collectors have seen both veteran and national reserve badges to all UK counties, at all sorts of places from flea markets, to militaria and medal fairs and now even the internet, but has anyone really taken time to wonder about this organisation.
I’ve been collecting these badges since the early 1980’s when you could pick up a nice badge for anything from £5 to £10, even the rarer one’s were not too expensive, now these days when you seen them, they cost much more.

Some counties for example issued both veteran and national, Kent being a very well know example, but there are other counties like Oxfordshire, Northamptonshire and Isle of Wight which are good examples. Cities like London also issued badges in class I and II and these are quite well know. In fact they even had their own military band in London. As far as I am aware each county association issued at least a national reserve badge. Even New Zealand had their own national reserve system and badges as well.

I have added a few examples of the London class I and Class II

[Peter Brydon]

Breaker,

The only article I have ever come across that seeks to both set out the background to the formation of the various reserves and which illustrated a cross section of Veteran and National Reserve badges of various types was by John McKenzie in Crown Imperial magazine of Summer 1999.

You may already have a copy but if not it is worth trying to find one. A couple of scans from the article are attached.

P.B.

[DANIEL BRINSON]

I have over the past few months documented all the badges of the reserve and am just completing the drawings.
There are to date about one hundred and sixty (Not counting all the different butt numbers on London Badges.
New varients crop up all the time and there are still gaps to where one would expect a badge.
As you state the prices are a tad high for the smaller more rural counties.
I like you started collecting because of the fun and low cost............big mistake. I see badges going for fourty pounds plus!!
My best find was a Liecestershire and Rutland Veteran Reserve very cheap and rare.
The badges had to be approved by the war office and it was a great shame so many County Associations did not bother to design a badge and stuck to the stadard blue oval
Hope this helps. Daniel

[Graham Stewart]

Originally Posted by Breaker02

1911 Veteran and National Reserve Lapel Badges.



I have added a few examples of the London class I and Class II

Are you sure they're Class I and Class II badges, because if I remember correctly those areas which had large populations, could form them into Battalions. Had they been "Class" badges the scheme would have been extended universally to each County.

I have a copy of the formation order for Northumberland, but it makes no mention of different badges for each Class. However those men recruited in Newcastle, were formed into a Battalion of their own.

[Graham Stewart]

For further information concerning the National Reserve 1911 & 1913, I would suggest a visit to this excellent website, where I deposited two sets of documents concerning them from Army Orders;-
http://armyservicenumbers.blogspot.c...ions-1911.html