Megan

To reawaken this thread, here's the First Class: The reverse shows Ferdinand's heritage, with the Saxe-Coburg-Gotha arms.

Here's the group in question:

Of course, or at least there is the "Medal for the Return of the Crimea"... instituted 25 March 2014.

Waaah....

Just in case you meet a passing riot, this is what you have to say: "Our Sovereign Lord the King chargeth and commandeth all persons, being assembled, immediately to disperse themselves, and peaceably to depart to their habitations, or to their lawful business, upon the pains contained in the act made in the first year of King George, for preventing tumults and riotous assemblies. God Save the King!" (I learned this in the early 1980s when working in a school... it stopped playground fights even if the kids were more puzzled than anything else!)

For those who like the images, they are now on Invaluable: http://www.invaluable.com/catalog/searchLots.cfm?scp=c&catalogRef=WICICSW2FJ

By the way, the print catalogue arrived a couple of days ago - many thanks, Paul - really appreciated!

Grrr. It's really annoying as I have been looking for pictures of those for ages and now some come along which I can use (Morton & Eden are kind enough to permit me to use their images on my site, you see)... they turn out to be fakes Thanks for the masterclass on what to look out for, Michael.

Ooooh... lovely Will there be pictures on Invaluable in due course?

The key phrase is "tasked to carry out the will of the people" - whilst politicians may have ideas and should attempt to convince the electorate of their merits, they are hired to act on citizens' behalf. What did the citizens of the UK want during the 1930s? History is always blighted by hindsight. We know what was to come and it is easy to say that things should have been done differently. Good historians dig down to find out what was known at the time and to whom, and what the 'will of the people' was... Did Chamberlain do what the citizens of the UK wished him to do, based on the information he and they had?

It is indeed, thank you for sharing.

That's a fine array! Did you know that there's a 'Post Your Own' thread in the Lounge area where GMIC members put pictures of their own medals? Please come and share yours with everyone there.

Windu has now very kindly sent me some nice pictures, so I shall be working on the Indonesian section of my site for a bit... delayed by having just got a job which is boding fair to be a real dream job at the University of Aston, creating distance learning courses! As things progress, I'll post on GMIC as well, though.

The key concept they introduced from the outset was 'policing by consent' - this was not imposed on citizens, but done for and by them.

Loads that I have never heard of let alone seen, thank you for sharing.

Interesting... must go over the piece on my site to see if I have it right!

Good to hear from you Windu... glad that you are OK. Any chance of some pictures of individual awards (as in, ones that would work on my website)?

Fascinating thread - fortunately those nice images were still on the Poly website (and now reside on my hard drive too). Thank you, folks.

Aargh.... scampers off to website.

Thank you, Nick. Claudius, may I very gently make a 'thin ice' warning... so far the Russians have denied their involvement in what I think we'd all agree was a tragedy, and it's not an appropriate topic for discussion on this forum. Let the accident investigators do their work. Time will tell (maybe) who was responsible for that, but there is enough debate on the matter elsewhere - visit the BBC website for some of the more restrained comments! We here are interested in a high Russian award and its recent bestowal on a unit of their military that has, in their high command's opinion, served their nation well. Shall we leave it at that? Please.... (especially as I have to go out in half an hour, which is NOT an excuse for you lot to start bickering again... )

Gentlemen!!! I'm awake now and no, you are not going to bicker like this. Please stop it AT ONCE!!! Nick, do you have any further FACTS about the circumstances of the award, please? (Yes, I do read Russian by the way...)

Gentlemen, please! It seems I'm not allowed to go to bed: as soon as I go offline for the night you start bickering. In stating the reasons for which an award has been made you are not being political, it is only if you were unwise enough to say what you thought of those reasons that you would be treading on thin ice, GMIC rules-wise. Award ceremonies and documents help put a particular 'gong' into context, and are appropriate subject matter.

Do you have a date for these regulations, Antonio?

I have also found this badge: Now this says 'Order of the Sea Eagle' but looks very like the Order of the Eagle shown on the previous page. Perhaps it's the same order? No idea what class it's supposed to be, but it was made by Spink & is hallmarked 1995 - it's from the DNW website, dear souls have given me the run of their catalogues

President Jonathan wearing Grand Commander of the Order of the Most Ancient Welwitschia Mirabilis. I believe the lady in the blue dress is his wife. I can only find references to a Grand Commander of this order, so am not sure if it is a one-class order - as it seems to be for the President of Namibia and other heads of state it may well be. Yet references often refer to Grand Commander as the 'First Class' - why say that if there are no others?