Chelsea Pensioners

Coming up to Remembrance Sunday I wanted to do something veterans related. My first thought was the Royal British Legion, who support ex service men and women, the wounded and their families and those bereaved as a result of war through the poppy appeal.  However as they already have a standard design for a flags and ceremonial colours, this seemed a little pointless.
So my attention turned towards the Royal Hospital Chelsea, which is a retirement and nursing home for old soldiers. Its in-pensioners (affectionately known as the Chelsea Pensioners)  are famous throughout the country and are easily identified by their long scarlet coats and tricorne hats and shakos. Chelsea Pensioners contain many Second World War Veterans and often play a key role in Remembrance events across the country, they also have their own local parade called founders day, when they celebrate the hospital's founder Charles II. Despite their long history and military based culture, I was surprised that the Chelsea Pensioners don't have any colours (although their is a ceremonial mace that is carried on Founders Day). So I had ago at designing a colour for the hospital:

Its pretty basic, its a gules field with the hospital insignia in the centre (I overlooked the fact their is no Welsh or Irish representation!) The cyphers of Charles II and the current patron of the hospital are counter changed with dates, in the coroners. 1682 is the year the hospital was founded and 2002 was when the Sovereign's Mace was presented. Below the insignia is the date 11.11.11.18 (Hour. Day. Month. Year) the exact time and date WW1 ended and the time and day of the national silence every year.  I wasn't completely satisfied so I changed some things:

My aim here was to make things more simple, I kept one cyher, that of Charles II and moved the time and date of the WW1 armistice to the bottom fly. I changed the field to a brighter scarlet to better reflect the Chelsea Pensioner uniform. (I also put Irish and Welsh representation into the badge ;-) )

here is link to the Chelsea Pensioners website or for their blog click here.