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Bailwick of Guernsey

by Vincent Morley

Guernsey
Seignory of Alderney
Seignory of Sark
Herm
Brechou

See also:

Dependencies of the Crown

Guernsey

by Vincent Morley

The flag is white with St George Cross, and a cross with ends pattée - a cross which appears on a gonfanon of William the Conqueror on the Bayeux tapestry. There is also a red ensign, with this cross in the fly.

Pascal Vagnat, 14-MAR-1996

The gold equal-armed cross overlaying the red cross was added to the flag in 1985 to distinguish it from England's. The gold cross also appears in the fly of the Guernsey Red Ensign. The Lieutenant-Governor's flag is as Jersey's except that Guernsey's arms are distinguished from those of Jersey (and England) by the addition of a golden sprig of leaves issuing from the top of the shield.

Guernsey has two dependencies: Alderney and Sark. Alderney has its own States and Sark has a Court of Chief Pleas as its legislature. Both have representation on the States of Guernsey. Herm also has a degree of independence as a feudal tenancy leased from the States of Guernsey.

Roy Stilling, 14-MAR-1996

Seignory of Alderney

by Vincent Morley

The flag is white with a St George Cross and the badge of the Island in the middle.

Pascal Vagnat, 14-MAR-1996

The badge is a green disc bearing a crowned gold lion rampant holding a sprig of leaves. The badge has a sort of scrolled border, in gold.

Roy Stilling, 14-MAR-1996

Seignory of Sark

by Vincent Morley

Sark (in French Serq) is one of the Channel Islands in the English Channel. It comprises Great Sark and Little Sark connected by an isthmus. The flag which is at the same time the flag of the island and the flag of the Seigneur, is white with a red St-George cross and a red canton containing two yellow lions.It has the proportions 1:2. This canton is like the arms of Normandy, not far from Sark.

Pascal Vagnat, 14-MAR-1996

Herm

by Jaume Ollé 1-OCT-1996

The arms are azure, between two dolphins argent a bend or bearing three cowled monks sable - i.e. blue field with a silver heraldic dolphin (i.e. looking nothing like the aquatic mammal of the same name!) in the bottom left and top right. From top left to bottom right there is a yellow diagonal stripe bearing three cowled monks in black robes. I believe this may also be a personal, not an island flag.

Roy Stilling, 14-MAR-1996

Flagmaster no. 43 gave news of the adoption of the flag. The ratio is 3:5. It is the usual Cross of Saint George, also used by Guernsey, with a banner of the arms of Herm in the canton. The blue symbolizes the sea that surrounds the island, and the yellow the island itself. The three monks are a reference to the past, since the island was colonized by Benedictine monks from Mont-Saint-Michel in the 11th century and later by Augustinians; for some time Herm was the site of a monastery and monks lived alone on the island. The shield of Herm was adopted in 1953, designed by the Reverend Percival of Guernsey.

Around 1951 the island used a blue flag with the heraldic shield of Guernsey near the hoist (three leopards in red field with a green foliage above and the words 'HERM ISLAND' below.)

Jaume Ollé, 1-OCT-1996

Brechou

There was also a flag granted to the former owner of Brechou, a minor island in the jurisdiction of Guernsey, by the Lord Lyon King of Arms during the 1980s. I have no more details to hand, except that this is a personal flag of the individual in question, rather than a flag of the island and was taken by the former owner with him when he sold the island on.

Roy Stilling, 14-MAR-1996