WIGRAM & GREEN.
image by Klaus-Michael Schneider, 24 October 2010
The “Paget Patch” story dates the flag to Sir Edward Paget at Spithead in 1824. Ordered to lower a St. George’s Cross, the master supposedly covered the cross with a blue patch and rehoisted it. Accounts variously identify a handkerchief, sailors’ trousers or an officer’s coat-tail as the material. The flag passed to Money, Wigram & Sons and Federal Steam Navigation, with a variant used by Frederick Green. No funnel is given because the concern operated sailing ships.