Ordnance Corps Crest United States Army Patch

Army ordnance officers were already wearing the shell and flame in 1832, and the version soldiers know today has been in use since 1936. Ordnance work is older than the branch itself. In July 1775 George Washington named Ezekiel Cheever Commissary of Artillery Stores, and in 1776 the Board of War and Ordnance chose Benjamin Flower as Commissary General of Military Stores. Congress established the Ordnance Department on 14 May 1812, in preparation for the War of 1812. The Army Reorganization Act of 1950 made it the Ordnance Corps.

The Corps took crimson and yellow as its branch colors on 14 October 1921, and its motto is "Armament for Peace." When the Corps was reestablished under the regimental system in 1985, Aberdeen Proving Ground, Maryland, was its first regimental home. Redstone Arsenal ran an ordnance maintenance school, and in 2008 ordnance training was consolidated into a single school at Fort Lee, Virginia, where the Chief of Ordnance serves as commandant. Ordnance soldiers repair weapons and vehicles, handle the Army's ammunition and include the explosive ordnance disposal teams. The Order of Samuel Sharpe recognizes people who have served the Corps with integrity and professional competence over a sustained period.

The patch is 3.5 by 4 inches with a cut edge that follows its outline, flames at the top and cannon muzzles and breeches out at the four corners. A crimson cannoneer's belt with a gold buckle circles the center, lettered "ORDNANCE CORPS" and "U.S.A." in gold with a dot between them. Inside the belt, on a white field, a black bomb sits over two crossed gray cannons, its crimson and gold flame rising out above the ring. The crossed cannons point to the Corps' long tie to the artillery, the white field stands for "Armament for Peace," and the belt joins the munitions to the guns that fire them. Crimson and gold carry through the whole piece.

An ordnance soldier might be a small arms repairer, a wheeled vehicle mechanic, an ammunition specialist or an EOD tech walking up to something nobody else should touch. Every arms room, motor pool and ammunition supply point in the Army depends on that work. It goes on in garrison and in the field, in the heat and the mud, and it gets noticed mostly when it is missing. Ordnance soldiers have kept the Army supplied and repaired since the War of 1812. For anyone who wore crimson and yellow, the shell and flame is a mark of a trade learned the hard way.

Put it in a shadow box with your unit patches and a photo from your first assignment, or on a range bag or jacket. It is also a good gift for a son or daughter just out of ordnance school. Measures 3.5 x 4 inches with a cut edge and iron-on backing, and it can also be sewn on. The shell and flame has been the ordnance soldier's mark for close to two centuries.