WW2 British Officers Armlet Armband Reference

[Harry Davey]

Hi all, a while ago I had an officers armlet, red and blue with a yellow O, I searched online and was unable to find any information. Recently i purchased a booklet printed during the second world war for the public to identify insignia, rank and medal ribbons called Ranks & Medal Ribbons of the fighting services. Inside i found each type of armlet and which letters represent each department. So i wanted to share the information here and make a reference page to help anyone else who is having the same problem as i did to identify WW2 British armlets. (Sorry if a similar page is already on the forum, i was unable to find it if there was).


Types of Armlet:

1. Officers on staff of the War Office
This armlet is divided in colour, red and blue with a Kings Crown emblem on the top half (the red half), with a letter which represents a branch in red on the blue half.

The branches represented by these letters are as follows:

M.S - Military Secretary's
T.A - Territorial Army Directorate
G - General Staff
P - Army Pay Corps
A - Adjutant-General's
P.R - Director of Public Relations
Q - Quartermasters-General's
D.J.A - Deputy Judge-Advocates

(These letters apply to 1. type armlet only)





2. H.Q.'s Home Forces, B.E.F and Middle East Armlet
Similar To the war office armlet, however it is without the emblem and the lettering in Yellow.





3. Command Headquarters Armlet
This armlet is striped, red, black and red, with Red lettering to the central Black strip.




4. Divisional Headquarters Armlet
This armlet is red with black lettering.




5. Brigade Headquarters Armlet
This armlet is blue with black lettering.





6. Area, District and Garrison Headquarters Armlet
This armlet is green with black lettering.





7. Movement Embarkation and Transport of Troops armlet
This armlet is white with no lettering













(Branch Letters and insignia are for no. 2,3,4,5 and 6 type armlets only)

A.M.S. - Assistant Military Secretary's
A.D.C.- Aides-de-camp
G. - General staff
A.D.Mn. - Officer in charge of administration
A.&Q. - Combined Adjutant-General's and Quarter-Master-General's
A. - Adjutant-General's
Q. - Quartermaster-General's
A Gun Insignia. - Royal Artillery
E - Royal Engineers
S. - Signals
S.T. - Supply and Transport
M. - Medical
O. - Ordnance
V. - Veterinary
P.M. - Provost Marshal's
P. - Royal Army Pay Corps
A.E.C - Education Officer's
C. - Assistant-Chaplain-General's
C.G.M. - Camp Quartermaster's
B.M. - Brigade Major
S.C.- Staff Captain
G.A. - Garrison Adjutant


Hope this reference can help anyone having trouble with British Army Armlets.

Cheers
Harry