The early flag is a vertical red-white-blue triband with ETC, white on the coloured stripes and red on white. Cableships dates its use to 1872–1902, although the successor design appears in Griffin 1895.
The later house flag follows the old East India Company ensign with blue ETC in the fly. Lloyds 1904 spreads the letters farther apart and adds dots, while its 1912 version returns to the other arrangement. The ships used the Red Ensign, and Cable & Wireless livery replaced the group’s colours from 1939.
John Pender formed Eastern Telegraph in 1872 by combining Falmouth, Gibraltar & Malta, Marseilles, Algiers & Malta, Anglo-Mediterranean and British India Submarine Telegraph. The group’s companies appear to have kept separate identities while operating together. Eastern formed African Direct in 1885, acquired Direct Spanish that year and controlled West African from 1889. It also held half the Commercial Pacific Cable venture formed in 1901. Vessels passed to Imperial & International Communications in 1929.
Keep the explicit scope label independent; no alias or company identity is inferred.