peter monahan

Mickey - what was the significance of the pick, please? Without your comment I would have guessed it to be an engineering or labour units. Thanks.

Excellent! Thansk for sharing this, Mike. I'll steal it to share with my unit.

Actually, Stars are like cats - the number you need is the number you currently own + 1! I'm sure there's a regulation about it somewhere. Thanks for the info. on the date as well!

I hope that helps, Ray, as it sounds like your only hope, short of trawling the bazaars and tailors' shops in Bahawalpur. The joys of collecting truly rare things, eh?

I have in the last several years become a member of a group which re-enacts a Canadian Casualty Clearing Station, part of the 3rd Cdn Field Hospital, 1914-18, and am developing an interest in the CAMC and RAMC. I know we had one unit in the 2nd Boer War - the senior Matron of the CAMC was a veteran of that conflict - so I would be interested in any informatioin on medical service in SA too.

Mike I know this very thing was discussed recently on one forum or other and am racking my brains to remember where. In the meantime, perhaps the Secretary of the Victoria Cross Society can recommend someone. http://www.victoriacrosssociety.com/ Peter

The peacock head is an interesting note. I hadn't gotten any further than 'blurry casting', as I've mislaid my magnifying glass! Agreed that it's pretty clearly not an official unit badge.

My 'favourite' is the current Canadian media practice of converting comments about length from Imperial to metric. If he said it was 'About 10 yards away', which is usually a layman's estimate and probably off by a factor of 50% anyway, what possible purpose is served by removing the quotation marks and informing the reader that it was 'about 8.4 metres' away? Serioulsy?

The Lone Star State. Makes perfect sense!

Sent you a PM.

I can't agree that this is Assyrian Levies, as their badge has kindjal style knives/swords, not the closed hilt that these are. The sword style is fairly Indian - a somewhat exaggerated tulwar style IMO. I'd guess it was a tourist piece made up, with hundreds of others, for sale to the servicemen stationed in or passing through India. Interesting that the maker chose to add the RAF badge. It may be that there were local employees or even a security unit attached to an Indian RAF base, though I'd expect something a little more restarined for even a semi-official badge. Or, it may simply ave been that there were a large number of RAF types shopping in the bazaar where this was made. An interesting puzzle!

I agree with Mervyn that they are perhaps a bit flashy for British issue, which were generally steel, not brass. And, the grenade is a fairly universal symbol - French and Italians used it as well as British and certainly other countries as well. very nice looking items, however. Welcome to the Forum too! [also] Peter

I have to agree with Mike. It is virtually identical to the Italian cavalry badges in my sole WWII badge book, down to the backing colour for the tropical uniform, which would make sense if it was picked up in Africa. The only difference is that my source - Rossignoli - shows the regimnet number in the central circle, but this may be an arm of service patch worn in some dress orders, or an officer's version.

Brett It doesn't look as if there were any recreated Hanoverian units at the battle this time. Here is the British order of battle, as listed in the Napoleonic Association's June 2015 newsletter: http://www.napoleonicassociation.org/downloads/adjutant/Summer2015.pdf The only German units I can see are Brandenburgers and Brunswickers but it's possible there was a battery tucked away in the artillery brigade. I'm surprised, frankly, that no one in the UK is portraying the King's German Legion, but if they are they do not seem to have made the trip to Belgium. OTOH, here is a link to a new monument to the Hanoverians, dedicated by 'The Officers of theKGL", whatever that means and officially unveiled quite recently: http://napoleon-monuments.eu/Napoleon1er/20150424BrunswHan.htm#Han . Peter .

Indeed! Do we know if Igor is still an active member? I see he has posted as recently as 2013 - I looked threough perhaps 50 of his 800+ posts to date. You might get his attention through a PM or by posting on the Russian Awards section, if you wish to contact him.

I think you're right, Egypt.

Lovely! Thank you for sharing.

Brett I'll see if I can find the British order of battle again - when last I checked it it was only to find out who we were brigaded with. That should tell us who else was there.

I would suggest that it is a lapel pin for a Scottish yacht club or sailing organization, based on the thistle, the blue pennant and the enamel work, whichn is not military, in my opinion. Certainly not a RN or RNVR sweetheart pin. The other possibility is a connection to one of the Scottish shipping lines.

Absolutley correct, Paul. Damn science anyway!

The first photo needs no explanation. The secind is of a plaque at Beaumont Hamel commemorating all the Newfoundlanders who fell in the Great War and have no known graves. Edward W. Kendall, killed Oct 9, 1917, was 15 at the time of his death. Sergeant Tommy Ricketts, also of the Royal Newfoundland Regiment, was 15 years old when he joined up in 1916 and 17 and a half when he won the Victoria Cross in 1918, the youngest member of the Empire to win it in battle. I saw 15+ battlefields and cemeteries in 6 days, and am still sorting out my reactions in my head, though how small the battlefields were is one indelible memory. I will likely have more to say soon.

Brett - not sure about the hanoverians, but I suspect yes. There were all sorts of Allied units including a Swedish regiment - mostly composed of Finns in fact - in one of the Allied Brigades. The North American Battalion, of which I had the honour to be an staff officer, was attached to the british 4th Brigade, which also had an attached BBC camerman, so an inordinate number of the shots aired on the BBC in fact showed Canadians, as well as the 2/95th Rifles, the 33rd Foot and the Coldstream Guards, who were brigaded with us. As we also had the only Corps of Drums in the Allied force, they got their share of publcity as well and were employed virtually non-stop, both on and off the field. Sadly, while I was present for the Friday night battle, I went down with food poisioning immediately afterwards and spent 24 hours sleeping, including through the Saturday battle. A few phots attached below. One of our officers and his son, the staff officers inside Hougomont Farm, where we were trapped for an hour by a broken ramp onto the filed, hand to hand combat, His grace the Duke and our Brigade commander, Rob Yuill, with his sone and his father [76] who here portrays their ancestor, a soldier of the Royal Scots. He fell in with the RS in our battalion for the raining sesions.

At the risk of bringing politics into this august forum, the current government of Canada - which refers to itself publcily as 'the Harper government' is very eager to advance Canada's claims to Arctic sovreignty. In fact, a frined on mine has been working on television ads known as 'Heritage Minutes', which encapsulate, allegedly, key moments in Canadian history. One being filmed in May this year - just AFTER all our snow melted - focused on Franklin and other prominent 'Canadians' who explored or lived in the Arctic. The first draft of the script opened with Franklin sitting in his cabin aboard HMS Erebus poring over charts with severakl interested Inuit. My fried, hired to vet the history, wrote on the script 'If he's done this he would not have died!' and sent it back. That scene did not appear in subsequent versions of the script. [face palm]

Pierce If you google 'Royal Artillery uniform' and 'Victorian' you should find a wealth of images. Good luck! Peter

A 64 meter crate would be pretty d*** impressive! When I worked my way through college in a mine - at 18 years old I got paid to blow stuff up! - we routinely blew 500-1000 pounds once a week, but that was safely undergound and I could feel the blast at my house, some 5-6 miles from the mine site. [ Never blew it on my shift. ]