United Kingdom: Queen's Colours of the Royal Navy

Last modified: 2012-01-21 by rob raeside
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image by Martin Grieve, 21 July 2006

• Detail of central defacement
• Construction details

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• United Kingdom
• Ministry of Defence and army
• Royal Navy

Construction Details

Christopher Southworth remarked on the different Union Flag (or Jack, if you prefer) cantons which appear on the Colours of the Royal Marines, RAF and RN. Christopher's conclusions on the matter were that the Union cantons on the colours of the RAF and the Royal Marines were identical (4:5 ratio), whereas, that of the Royal Navy differed (52:113 ratio). Christopher wrote "the QC's of the RAF and Royal Marines are the only two sets which use the standard 'Admiralty pattern' of Union Flag, whereas those of the RN and Army each have their own unique variation".

Indeed - Let us delve into the graphics in greater depth here, and with a great deal of help from Christopher here too, we have constructed:

• Queen's colours of the Royal Navy construction sheet
• Queen's colours of the Royal Navy Union canton construction sheet

Queen's colours of the Royal Navy construction sheet

image by Martin Grieve, 21 July 2006

Queen's colours of the Royal Navy canton construction sheet

image by Martin Grieve, 21 July 2006

Compare to the Queen's colours of the RAF Union canton construction sheet

The actual differences between the Union Flag on the QC of the RN and the standard Admiralty pattern are:

• the saltires are of even width with a fimbriation added to the St. Patrick, rather than it being taken from its width.
• the St George and saltires are slightly narrower at 2/11 the width of the Union, rather than 1/5, and finally that the St George is fimbriated at 2/9 the cross, rather than 1/3.

Christopher Southworth, 19 August 2006

Detail of central defacement

        image by Martin Grieve, 21 July 2006