Royal Cyphers found on Canadian Forces badges

Royal Cyphers found on Canadian Forces badges in the York Sunbury Historical Society, Fredericton Region Museum Collection

The earliest official Canadian Militia units after 1867 were raised in the reign of Queen Victoria. The badges found in the YSHS, FRM Collection begin with Queen Victoria's crown, followed by the King's crowns for King Edward VII and King George V. Badges worn by Canadian Forces with the crown of Queen Elizabeth II were worn after her coronation in 1952. Badges with the crown of King Charles III follow from his coronation on 6 May 2023.

Royal Monogram, Queen Victoria.

Victoria (Alexandrina Victoria; 24 May 1819 – 22 January 1901) was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until her death in 1901. Her reign of 63 years and 216 days, which was longer than any of her predecessors, is known as the Victorian era. It was a period of industrial, political, scientific, and military change within the United Kingdom, and was marked by a great expansion of the British Empire. In 1876, the British Parliament voted to grant her the additional title of Empress of India.

Victoria was the daughter of Prince Edward, Duke of Kent and Strathearn (the fourth son of King George III), and Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld. After the deaths of her father and grandfather in 1820, she was raised under close supervision by her mother and her comptroller, John Conroy. She inherited the throne aged 18 after her father's three elder brothers died without surviving legitimate issue. Victoria, a constitutional monarch, attempted privately to influence government policy and ministerial appointments; publicly, she became a national icon who was identified with strict standards of personal morality.

Victoria married her first cousin Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha in 1840. Their nine children married into royal and noble families across the continent, earning Victoria the sobriquet "grandmother of Europe". After Albert's death in 1861, Victoria plunged into deep mourning and avoided public appearances. As a result of her seclusion, British republicanism temporarily gained strength, but in the latter half of her reign, her popularity recovered. Her Golden and Diamond jubilees were times of public celebration. Victoria died on 22 January 1901 at Osborne House on the Isle of Wight, at the age of 81. The last British monarch of the House of Hanover, she was succeeded by her son Edward VII of the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha.

Queen Victoria and the Prince Consort at Aldershot, 9 July 1859. (Painting by George Housman Thomas, 1859-1864, in the Royal Collection)

Royal Cypher of Edward VII of the United Kingdom.

Edward VII (Albert Edward; 9 November 1841 – 6 May 1910) was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India, from 22 January 1901 until his death in 1910.The second child and eldest son of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, Edward, nicknamed "Bertie", was related to royalty throughout Europe. He was Prince of Wales and heir apparent to the British throne for almost 60 years. During his mother's long reign, he was largely excluded from political influence and came to personify the fashionable, leisured elite. He married Princess Alexandra of Denmark in 1863, and the couple had six children. As Prince of Wales, Edward travelled throughout Britain performing ceremonial public duties and represented Britain on visits abroad. His tours of North America in 1860 and of the Indian subcontinent in 1875 proved popular successes, but despite public approval, his reputation as a playboy prince soured his relationship with his mother.

Edward inherited the throne upon his mother's death in 1901. The King played a role in the modernisation of the British Home Fleet and the reorganisation of the British Army after the Second Boer War of 1899–1902. He re-instituted traditional ceremonies as public displays and broadened the range of people with whom royalty socialised. He fostered good relations between Britain and other European countries, especially France, for which he was popularly called "Peacemaker", but his relationship with his nephew, the German Emperor Wilhelm II, was poor. The Edwardian era, which covered Edward's reign and was named after him, coincided with the start of a new century and heralded significant changes in technology and society, including steam turbine propulsion and the rise of socialism. He died in 1910 in the midst of a constitutional crisis that was resolved the following year by the Parliament Act 1911, which restricted the power of the unelected House of Lords. Edward was succeeded by his only surviving son, George V.

King George V cypher.

George V (George Frederick Ernest Albert; 3 June 1865 – 20 January 1936) was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India, from 6 May 1910 until his death in 1936.

Born during the reign of his grandmother Queen Victoria, George was the second son of the Prince and Princess of Wales (later King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra), and third in the line of succession to the British throne behind his father and his elder brother, Prince Albert Victor. From 1877 to 1892, George served in the Royal Navy, until his elder brother's unexpected death in January 1892 put him directly in line for the throne. George married his brother's fiancée, Princess Victoria Mary of Teck, the next year, and they had six children. When Queen Victoria died in 1901, George's father ascended the throne as Edward VII, and George was created Prince of Wales. He became king-emperor on his father's death in 1910.

George's reign saw the rise of socialism, communism, fascism, Irish republicanism, and the Indian independence movement, all of which radically changed the political landscape of the British Empire, which itself reached its territorial peak by the beginning of the 1920s. The Parliament Act 1911 established the supremacy of the elected British House of Commons over the unelected House of Lords. As a result of the First World War (1914–1918), the empires of his first cousins Nicholas II of Russia and Wilhelm II of Germany fell, while the British Empire expanded to its greatest effective extent. In 1917, George became the first monarch of the House of Windsor, which he renamed from the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha as a result of anti-German public sentiment. He appointed the first Labour ministry in 1924, and the 1931 Statute of Westminster recognised the Empire's Dominions as separate, independent states within the British Commonwealth of Nations.

George suffered from smoking-related health problems during his later reign. On his death in January 1936, he was succeeded by his eldest son, Edward VIII. Edward abdicated in December of that year and was succeeded by his younger brother Albert, who took the regnal name George VI.

King George VI cypher.

George VI (Albert Frederick Arthur George; 14 December 1895 – 6 February 1952) was King of the United Kingdom and the Dominions of the British Commonwealth from 11 December 1936 until his death on 6 February 1952. He was also the last Emperor of India from 1936 until the British Raj was dissolved in August 1947, and the first head of the Commonwealth following the London Declaration of 1949.

The future George VI was born during the reign of his great-grandmother Queen Victoria; he was named Albert at birth after his great-grandfather Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha and was known as "Bertie" to his family and close friends. His father ascended the throne as George V in 1910. As the second son of the king, Albert was not expected to inherit the throne. He spent his early life in the shadow of his elder brother, Edward, the heir apparent. Albert attended naval college as a teenager and served in the Royal Navy and Royal Air Force during the First World War. In 1920, he was made Duke of York. He married Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon in 1923, and they had two daughters, Elizabeth and Margaret. In the mid-1920s, he engaged speech therapist Lionel Logue to treat his stutter, which he learned to manage to some degree. His elder brother ascended the throne as Edward VIII after their father died in 1936, but Edward abdicated later that year to marry the twice-divorced American socialite Wallis Simpson. As heir presumptive to Edward VIII, Albert became king, taking the regnal name George VI.

In September 1939, the British Empire and most Commonwealth countries—but not Ireland—declared war on Nazi Germany, following the invasion of Poland. War with the Kingdom of Italy and the Empire of Japan followed in 1940 and 1941, respectively. George VI was seen as sharing the hardships of the common people and his popularity soared. Buckingham Palace was bombed during the Blitz while the King and Queen were there, and his younger brother the Duke of Kent was killed on active service. George became known as a symbol of British determination to win the war. Britain and its allies were victorious in 1945, but the British Empire declined. Ireland had largely broken away, followed by the independence of India and Pakistan in 1947. George relinquished the title of Emperor of India in June 1948 and instead adopted the new title of Head of the Commonwealth. He was beset by smoking-related health problems in the later years of his reign and died at Sandringham House, aged 56, of a coronary thrombosis in 1952. He was succeeded by his elder daughter, Elizabeth II.

(IWM Photo, TM 2832)

HRH Princess Elizabeth in Auxiliary Territorial Service Uniform, April 1945.

Queen Elizabeth II cypher.

Elizabeth II (Elizabeth Alexandra Mary; 21 April 1926 – 8 September 2022) was Queen of the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth realms from 6 February 1952 until her death in 2022. She was queen regnant of 32 sovereign states over the course of her lifetime and remained the monarch of 15 realms by the time of her death. Her reign of over 70 years is the longest of any British monarch and the second longest verified reign of any monarch of a sovereign state in history.

Elizabeth was born in Mayfair, London, during the reign of her paternal grandfather, King George V. She was the first child of the Duke and Duchess of York (later King George VI and Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother). Her father acceded to the throne in 1936 upon the abdication of his brother Edward VIII, making the ten-year-old Princess Elizabeth the heir presumptive. She was educated privately at home and began to undertake public duties during the Second World War, serving in the Auxiliary Territorial Service. In November 1947, she married Philip Mountbatten, a former prince of Greece and Denmark, and their marriage lasted 73 years until his death in 2021. They had four children: Charles, Anne, Andrew, and Edward.

When her father died in February 1952, Elizabeth—then 25 years old—became queen of seven independent Commonwealth countries: the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Pakistan, and Ceylon (known today as Sri Lanka), as well as head of the Commonwealth. Elizabeth reigned as a constitutional monarch through major political changes such as the Troubles in Northern Ireland, devolution in the United Kingdom, the decolonisation of Africa, and the United Kingdom's accession to the European Communities, as well as its subsequent withdrawal. The number of her realms varied over time as territories gained independence and some realms became republics. As queen, Elizabeth was served by more than 170 prime ministers across her realms. Her many historic visits and meetings included state visits to China in 1986, to Russia in 1994, and to the Republic of Ireland in 2011, and meetings with five popes and fourteen US presidents.

Significant events included Elizabeth's coronation in 1953 and the celebrations of her Silver, Golden, Diamond, and Platinum jubilees in 1977, 2002, 2012, and 2022, respectively. Although she faced occasional republican sentiment and media criticism of her family—particularly after the breakdowns of her children's marriages, her annus horribilis in 1992, and the death in 1997 of her former daughter-in-law Diana—support for the monarchy in the United Kingdom remained consistently high throughout her lifetime, as did her personal popularity. Elizabeth died aged 96 at Balmoral Castle in September 2022, and was succeeded by her eldest son, Charles III.

King Charles III cypher.

Charles III (Charles Philip Arthur George; born 14 November 1948) is King of the United Kingdom and the 14 other Commonwealth realms.

Charles was born in Buckingham Palace during the reign of his maternal grandfather, King George VI, and became heir apparent when his mother, Queen Elizabeth II, acceded to the throne in 1952. He was created Prince of Wales in 1958 and his investiture was held in 1969. He was educated at Cheam School and Gordonstoun, and later spent six months at the Timbertop campus of Geelong Grammar School in Victoria, Australia. After earning a history degree from the University of Cambridge, Charles served in the Royal Air Force and the Royal Navy from 1971 to 1976. In 1981, he married Lady Diana Spencer. They had two sons, William and Harry. Charles and Diana divorced in 1996, after they had each engaged in well-publicised extramarital affairs. Diana died as a result of injuries sustained in a car crash the following year. In 2005, Charles married his long-term partner, Camilla Parker Bowles.

As heir apparent, Charles undertook official duties and engagements on behalf of his mother. He founded the Prince's Trust in 1976, sponsored the Prince's Charities, and became patron or president of more than 800 other charities and organisations. He advocated for the conservation of historic buildings and the importance of architecture in society. In that vein, he generated the experimental new town of Poundbury. An environmentalist, Charles supported organic farming and action to prevent climate change during his time as the manager of the Duchy of Cornwall estates, earning him awards and recognition as well as criticism; he is also a prominent critic of the adoption of genetically modified food, while his support for alternative medicine has been criticized. He has authored or co-authored 17 books.

Charles became king upon his mother's death on 8 September 2022. At the age of 73, he became the oldest person to accede to the British throne, after having been the longest-serving heir apparent and Prince of Wales in British history. His coronation took place at Westminster Abbey on 6 May 2023.