EMERGENCY RESERVE DECORATION

[Mervyn Mitton]

[Mervyn Mitton]

This attractively mounted group was awarded to Lieutenant Colonel H.R.MOULTON R.E..

The group consists of the : 39/45 Star ; France and Germany Star ; Defence Medal ; War Medal ; Officers Emergency Reserve Decoration. + Mins..

This last award was instituted in 1952 and discontinued in 1967. It covered the WW2 years and of course into Korea and Vietnam. Mostly the Awards were given to the Royal Engineers. Lt.Col. Moulton was also awarded a M.I.D.

The lovely case was made by Spink's and can be wall hung - or, stood like a photo frame with a rear bracket.

[Chris Boonzaier]

Would he have ERD behind his name? Better than the Volunteer Decoration initials I guess.....

[Mervyn Mitton]

No - just plain old 'VD"

[Strapper]

VD? When he got the decoration he probably told everyone the Queen had just given him VD. OOOPs..thats not funny is it.

[Tony Farrell]

The post-nominals for the decoration are ERD.

[Mervyn Mitton]

Thanks Tony - I didn't think they varied.

[Tony Farrell]

The reason being that Supplementary Reserve and AER officers were not volunteers (territorials) - rather reservists under Regular Army authority. Whilst the ERD looks like an Efficiency Decoration (TD/ED), it is a totally seperate award. It was born out of the whinge that the ORs received the Efficiency Medal (Militia), yet the officers received no equivalent award, as there was no Militia variant of the Efficiency Decoration, due to the policy of not rewarding regular officers with long service medals.

As an aside, the post-nominals 'VD' continued to be used for the colonial & Indian officers' decorations after the discontinuance of the Volunteer Decoration in the UK.