State Ensign 1943-1964 (Malta)

Last modified: 2018-10-20 by rob raeside
Keywords: ensign: blue | disc (white) | coat of arms: per pale (white-red) | coat of arms: canton (blue) |
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1:2 image by Željko Heimer

• Description

See also:

• Historical Flags (Malta)
• Malta

Description

The third badge was a white/red flat top shield with George Cross on blue canton. On a white circle on the Blue Ensign. Source: List of colonial badges in the 1965 amendment to Flags of All Nations B.R. 20(1) [hms55].
David Prothero, 7 February 2000

Until when was this blue ensign used? I would have guessed until 1964 (Maltese independence), but then how does it appear on a 1965 amendment? Maybe the amendment was published 1964 but prepared early in 1964 when independence was not yet clearly envisaged?
Santiago Dotor, 15 December 2000

I had not noticed that the amendment date was after the flag had been discontinued. It was a general amendment listing whether or not badges were displayed on a white disc. As you supposed, an amendment that needed amending.
David Prothero, 15 December 2000

This is a scan of the arms/badge shown in Strickland 1992 [str92]. The dexter should be white, the sinister red, the canton blue and the George Cross white.
David Prothero, 4 March 2001

If I have interpreted the information correctly, the George Cross was awarded to the people of Malta on 15th April 1942, but it was only on 28 December 1943 that the decoration was added to the badge.
Željko Heimer, 2 June 2002

In the 1953 version of "Flags of the World", edited by H. Gresham Carr on p.73 is the following additional information:

His late Majesty King George VI signed a Royal Warrant on 28 December 1943, granting Malta G.C. permission to add a blue canton containing, in natural colours, a representation of the George Cross, which had been awarded some twelve months earlier to the island fortress "to bear witness to the heroism and devotion of its brave people" during the first half of World War II.
The Governor uses the Union Flag with this shield on a white disc surrounded by the garland, and the Blue Ensign is defaced (cherged) in the fly with the shield on a white circular background without the garland.
The Island Flag has a shield bisected vertically white (at the hoist) and red, and, like the Arms, now has the George Cross on a blue canton.