MERITORIOUS HONOUR AWARD

[Mervyn Mitton]

Your help will be appreciated. I am told this is a Meritorious Honour Award. I have been able to find out virtually nothing about it - which Unit issued it and what for ? Does it have any value? The box is stamped United States Of America.( a little out of focus - sorry.)

[Mervyn Mitton]

[Mervyn Mitton]

[Doc]

It is a US State Department Meritorious Honor Award. NOT military.

3 FAM 4828 MERITORIOUS HONOR AWARD

3 FAM 4828.1 Description

(TL:PER-436; 01-16-2002) (Uniform State and USAID) (Foreign Service, Civil Service, and Foreign Service National Employees)

a. The Meritorious Honor Award is presented to groups or individuals in recognition of a special act or service or sustained outstanding performance. The following criteria are applicable to granting a Meritorious Honor Award:

(1) Outstanding service in support of a one-time event (e.g., support for a major conference or summit meeting);

(2) Innovation and creativity in accomplishing short-term tasks or projects;

(3) Outstanding performance in one or more areas of the employee?s official duties as defined in the Work Requirements Statement (Foreign Service) or Performance Plan (Civil Service); and/or

(4) Contributions that resulted in increased productivity and efficiency, and economy of operations at post or bureau level.

b. The award consists of a medal set and a certificate signed, by an assistant secretary, an official of equivalent rank or the chief of mission.

I have never seen one, nor have I worked for the State Department, so it is hard to correlate with any US military awards, but from the description of the reasons it will be given, it appears relatively low level-- perhaps equivalent to an Army Achievement Medal or (Maybe) an Army Commendation Medal. Certainly not as high as a military Meritorious Service Medal. Doc

[Ulsterman]

That is a rare award and a recent strike(last 20 years).

Apparently they were going to cancel these awards, but maybe they have delayed that now.

There was a comprehensive OMSA article on these @ 3 years ago (indirectly inspired by a friend of mines' medals that I posted on the OMSA site). I spoke at length @ 3 years ago to the seller/designer of these awards. Recently, I got several small rolls of the ribbon, which will be going to the OMSA ribbon bank.

You can find much more information there. (OMSA.org). Not only was there an article but a VERY long discussion on the open forum.

[Mervyn Mitton]

Thankyou both for your time and trouble - I was completely baffled ! I shall follow the info up. Mervyn

[pmargulies]

Thankyou both for your time and trouble - I was completely baffled ! I shall follow the info up. Mervyn

Hey, I work for the Dept of STATE and this medal is no longer being issued, nor is the Superior Honor Award which is one level above this award. It would be hard to truely correlate this to the military system of awards because STATE only has a handful of honor awards: Valor/Heroism, Thomas Jefferson Star ( serious/grievous wounds), Distinguished Honor Award, Superior Honor Award and then the MHA. The OMSA article mentioned earlier is excellent.

It is also worth mentioning that GEN Petraeus can be seen wearing a Superior Honor Award on his ribbon rack just below his last personal award and prior to his campaign/service awards.

The STATE medals are actually fairly difficult to find nowadays. It is a nice set and definately within the last 20 years or so...