Volunteer Long Service Medal

Volunteer Long Service Medal
Queen Victoria version
Awarded by the Monarch of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, and Empress of India
Country	United Kingdom
Type	Military long service medal
Eligibility	Other ranks and Officers who have served in the ranks of the Volunteer Force
Awarded for	Twenty years service
Status	Discontinued in 1908
Statistics
Established	1894
First awarded	1894
Last awarded	1907
Total awarded	45,000
Order of Wear
Next (higher)	Volunteer Officers' Decoration
Next (lower)	Volunteer Officers' Decoration for India and the Colonies
Related	Volunteer Long Service Medal for India and the Colonies
Regular & Honourable Artillery Company ribbon bars

The Volunteer Long Service Medal was instituted in 1894 as an award for long service by other ranks and some officers of the United Kingdom's Volunteer Force. Award of the medal was discontinued when it was superseded by the Territorial Force Efficiency Medal in 1908.

The grant of the medal was extended in 1896 by the institution of a separate new medal, the Volunteer Long Service Medal for India and the Colonies, that could be awarded to other ranks of all Volunteer Forces throughout the British Empire and India.

More than sixty years after a medal for long service was introduced for the Regular Army upon the institution of the Army Long Service and Good Conduct Medal in 1830, the first such awards were instituted for the part-time Volunteer Force.

The Volunteer Long Service Medal was established by Queen Victoria in 1894 and its regulations were published in Special Army Order no. 85 of June 1894, as amended. The medal could be awarded to other ranks in the part-time Volunteer Force of the United Kingdom, as well as to officers who had served in the ranks but who had not qualified for the award of the Volunteer Officers' Decoration.

The qualifying period of service was twenty years and the medal could be awarded upon the recommendation by an individual's present or, if retired, former commanding officer. Service had to have been consecutive, with allowance being made for special circumstances. Officer recipients who were subsequently awarded the Volunteer Officers' Decoration would have to surrender the medal.

On 13 June 1896 the grant of the Volunteer Long Service Medal was extended by Queen Victoria to members of Volunteer Forces throughout the British Empire, defined as being India, the Dominion of Canada, the Crown Colonies and the British Protectorates. A separate new medal was instituted, the Volunteer Long Service Medal for India and the Colonies. Institution of this medal was not, as usual, by Royal Warrant but in terms of a special Army Order. This medal was similar in design to the Volunteer Long Service Medal, but bore different inscriptions on the obverse of each monarch's version to include India, the Dominion, the Colonies and the Protectorates as subjects of the reigning monarch.