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A bronze cross pattée bearing a lion and crown, the highest British gallantry award.
Also known as: VC, For Valour medal, Bronze cross with a lion
A plain bronze cross pattée with a lion standing on a crown and the words FOR VALOUR. Deliberately austere: its value is explicitly not in its material, and the crimson ribbon is worn by every recipient regardless of service — a change made in 1918.
A bronze cross pattée bearing the royal crest — a lion statant guardant upon a crown — above a scroll inscribed FOR VALOUR, suspended by a V-shaped link from a plain bar.
United Kingdom and Commonwealth · Contexts: History
Instituted in 1856 by royal warrant and awarded for conspicuous gallantry in the presence of the enemy; it takes precedence over every other British order, decoration and medal.
From 1856
Struck in bronze rather than a precious metal, and the plainness is the point: the decoration's standing comes from the criteria rather than from its material.
The crimson ribbon is worn by recipients of every service. Naval awards originally used a dark blue ribbon; this was unified to crimson in 1918 when the Royal Air Force was formed, so a blue-ribboned VC indicates a pre-1918 naval award.
Ribbon unified in 1918
Widely said to be struck from the bronze of cannon captured at Sebastopol. Metallurgical examination of the surviving gunmetal has complicated the account, and the origin of the metal is not fully settled.
A well-known story that is partly supported and not established in the form usually told. Recorded as contested rather than repeated or dismissed.
A dark bronze cross with four arms widening outward, a lion standing on a crown at its centre, and a curved scroll below bearing raised lettering.
Both are the highest British awards, one for gallantry before the enemy and one for gallantry not in the face of the enemy.
The Victoria Cross takes the heraldic cross pattée form.