Lost Fovant badges

A Note on The Fovant Badges by Terry Crawford

Extant in 2001:

  1. Map of Australia (cut by October 1917 at Compton Chamberlayne) *
  2. Royal Wiltshire Yeomanry (cut c1950)
  3. YMCA *
  4. 6th City of London Regiment (cut April 1916)
  5. Australian Commonwealth Military Forces (cut between February and October 1917) wrongly called the “rising sun” – actually a trophy of swords and bayonets); at the time of the Great War a photographer’s name “BAILEY IVI…” was marked immediately under this badge
  6. Royal Corps of Signals (cut 1970)
  7. Wiltshire Regiment (cut 1950)
  8. London Rifle Brigade (cut 1916)
  9. 8th City of London Regiment (Post Office Rifles) (cut before February 1917)
  10. Devonshire Regiment (cut after February 1917)
  11. 7th City of London Regiment) (at Sutton Mandeville) *
  12. Royal Warwickshire Regiment) (at Sutton Mandeville) *

* In 2001 the Fovant Badges Society reluctantly decided it could no longer maintain this carving

LOST:

  1. Possible initials east of map of Australia
  2. ?AN to west of map of Australia
  3. Royal Army Service Corps (not seen in any photograph; “Royal” was not included in the Corps title until November 1918; any badge would have been very ornate; confused with RAMC badge)
  4. Possible badge east of RAMC badge
  5. Four-legged animal (dingo?) close to RAMC badge (“reversed” i.e.. animal’s body is turfed, with chalk background)
  6. Royal Army Medical Corps east of YMCA badge (cut before February 1917)
  7. Square close to RAMC badge
  8. Initials P O R (Post Office Rifles) close to Square
  9. Red Cross (said to have been made by Australian patients, possibly an embellishment of the RAMC badge)
  10. 7th City of London Regiment. Symbol said to have been cut next to that of the 6th City of London Regiment, before being re-cut at Sutton Mandeville, but is not visible in photographs
  11. Machine Gun Corps – no photographic evidence
  12. Four-legged animal (dingo?) looking over shoulder (under ACMF badge; no such badge has been found in reference works on British Army badges)
  13. King’s Own Yorkshire Light Infantry (with “M B” above French horn) *
  14. 9th Royal Berks[hire Regiment] – later the 37th Training Reserve Battalion (title) *
  15. 35th T[raining] R[eserve] [Battalion] (title), with faint “R” to east of “35” *
  16. 37th T[raining] R[eserve] [Battalion] (title) (all TR badges cut after March 1917) *
  17. Cross & crown – possibly Queen Victoria’s Rifles (cut before March 1917) *
  18. Part of animal’s body *
  19. Kangaroo (cut before February 1917) *
  20. 35th Training Reserve Battalion – Drums (between Post Office Rifles and Devonshire Regiment badges)
  21. Voluntary Aid Detachment (possibly carved in 1919, but no photographic evidence; I have yet to trace an illustration of this badge)
  22. In July 1916 ‘a series of regimental crests’ was noted, suggesting that many of the above had been cut by then.

* all between ACMF and London Rifle Brigade badges

Various white marks appear on photographs, mostly reproduced on postcards, taken during the Great War or shortly after, but it is not possible to tell whether these were attempts at further badges or merely marks in the chalk.

T.S.C.
2003

Content last updated
4 January 2007