The Governors, High Commissioners or Administrators of British colonies and dependencies were afterwards authorized to place upon this white escutcheon on the Union Jack the arms or emblem of the colony in which they served. In this way it has come that the arms of _Canada_, the southern cross constellation of _Victoria_, the red cross and British lion of _New South Wales_, the black swan of _Western Australia_ (67), and the other special distinctive emblems in each of the British colonies are now displayed upon the centre of the Union Jacks which form the _Governor's flag_ in each.
_Victoria._ _New South Wales._ _Western Australia._]
In 1865, when Colonial Navies were first established, the vessels of war maintained by the local governments in Australia were authorized to use the blue ensign, with the seal or badge of the colony in the centre of the fly,[187] and thus the escutcheon being transferred from the centre of the Jack to the centre of the "fly," was given another position, and the local stories of the Australian colonies, which established these fleets, became embodied in the British blue ensign.[188]
[187] Colonial Defences Act, 28 Victoria, Cap. 14.
[188] Warrant of the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty.
A similar privilege, although they are not commissioned as vessels of war, was afterwards extended to the "fishery protection" cruisers of Canada, so that these and all other vessels which are owned by the Government of the Dominion carry the blue ensign with the arms of Canada in the centre of the fly.
Authority was also given to all these vessels owned and commissioned by the colonial governments to fly a blue pennant of the same shape as that of the British navy (Fig. 22, page 108), with the white ground and red cross of St. George at the head, but having the fly blue instead of red.[189]
[189] Pennants having this blue fly were worn by the English navy almost two hundred years previously, as shown in a picture, painted by Vandervelt, of the action off the coast of Holland on August 11, 1673, between the English, French and Dutch, now the property of His Majesty the King.
By such successive steps the Imperial idea became attached to one of the ensigns of the British navy.