What we have here is a curious set, issued just three years after the administration and awarding of such "Orders of Chivalry" passed into the hands of the Central Chancery of the Orders of Knighthood. That would oversee another huge change, the creation of a medal called the Order of the British Empire , in 1917, and the date does indeed form the reason why is it recorded as being to recognise contribution to arts, literature, science and the war effort. If it had been set up earlier, or maybe even later, that last section would almost certainly not be there.
The other three medals still awarded are The Order of the Bath, The Order of St Michael and St George, and The Royal Victorian Order.
Our medal is the Royal Order of Victoria and Albert, and it was set up by Queen Victoria on what would have been their twenty second wedding anniversary, if he had not died two months before. The original medal was given to their daughter on her conformation day, but it later expanded into a little present for relatives, friends, and staff of whom she was particularly fond. The medal died with her and has not been issued since.
Curiously, it comes in several forms, all of which were awarded to females only, not to men, and most of which were awarded to her own family.
The top three classes, or levels of importance, of ranking within the family, or of duties performed, were as showing here, though the border and the ornamentation decreased the lower you were thought to be, levels one and two included diamonds, and level three, as shown on card 39 of this same series, was just pearls. In fact the reverse of that card 39 tells us that "The 3rd Class of this order is for peeresses who have held high office at Court, or are personal friends of the Sovereign. The heads of Queen Victoria and Prince Consort in this badge are surrounded with a border composed of twenty pearls and four diamonds, in which respect it differs from those of the first and second classes."
The fourth class, though. which appears on card 44 of this set, is actually only a cipher of conjoined initials. The reverse of this card tells us that "The jewelled cypher V. & A. beneath an imperial crown, differing entirely from the Badges of the three classes above it, all of which bear the heads of Queen Victoria and Prince Consort. Worn at or near the left shoulder, attached to a bow of moire white ribbon, The 4th Class is for ladies who have served as Maids of Honour, &c."
The portraits were taken from the medal for the Great Exhibition, which Prince Albert had organised and been so proud of. And there is a further difference, as the version that the Queen wore herself had his head to the front and hers behind, whilst the ones she awarded had her head in front, with him behind, as showing on this card.
Now you will also find our medal on card 14 of Taddy`s 1911 first series of "Orders of Chivalry", and on Thos. Nicholls & Co. of Chester`s, 1916 version of the same set, also called "Orders of Chivalry". The Taddy version has no descriptive text, it just has an advert for "Imperial Tobacco - A ripe full flavoured fine cut tobacco for the pipe. However the Nicholls text is lengthy, and adds to our knowledge, telling us that : "The Royal Order of Victoria and Albert was instituted in 1862, and was composed of the Sovereign and forty-five ladies; the number of members is now greater. The order is divided into four classes, the first of which is composed entirely of Royal personages, British and foreign. The badge of the 1st and 2nd classes is an onyx cameo, with the profiles of the Queen and Prince Consort surmounted by an Imperial crown, The 1st class badge here shown, is set in diamonds, and the 2nd class badge is set in pearls".
This seems to suggest that whomsoever wrote the text for the Nicholls` card was slightly confused and thought the first and second class medals were one and the same - and to be fair, to a non jeweller they would look alike - and then the pearl one was the second class.
This set is first described in our original Ogden`s reference book, R.B.15 Published in 1949, but not very lengthily, simply as :
128. 50. ORDERS OF CHIVALRY. Fronts lithographed in colour. Backs in blue, with descriptive text. Home issue, 1907
This is further reduced in our original World Tobacco Issues Index, to :
ORDERS OF CHIVALRY. Sm. Nd. (50) ... O/2-107
and with this identical text in our updated volume, but a new card code of O100-438