WW2 Tower Hamlets Rifles Officers/NCOs silver plated cap badge.

WW2 Tower Hamlets Rifles Officers/NCOs silver plated cap badge. Please note that this badge looks silver with a subtle age patina in real life and the photo does not do it justice.

1st Battalion (became 9th Rifle Brigade)
It fought as a motor battalion in the Western Desert campaign 1941–42, including the Battles of Mersa Brega, Gazala, Mersa Matruh and First Alamein. It was part of the 2nd Support Group of the 2nd Armoured Division, later serving with the 4th Armoured Brigade in the 7th Armoured Division — the famous Desert Rats — before being disbanded in August 1942.
2nd Battalion (became 10th Rifle Brigade)
It fought as a motor battalion in the Tunisian campaign, including the Run for Tunis and the Battle of Kasserine Pass, and then in the Italian Campaign from Monte Cassino to the Apennines, including the seizure of the Muraglione Pass. It landed at Naples in March 1944 and fought its way up through Italy.
So between the two battalions, the Tower Hamlets Rifles covered North Africa, Tunisia and Italy — a significant operational record for a Territorial unit from the East End. 

The Tower Hamlets Rifles used the King’s Crown throughout their entire existence as a named unit. The badge was in use from 1926 , when the unit was redesignated Tower Hamlets Rifles, through to 1949. After the war the unit was reconstituted in 1947 before being converted to artillery as 656th Light Anti-Aircraft Regiment RA in 1947 , at which point the Tower Hamlets Rifles identity — and with it this badge — effectively ceased.