White enamel Maltese cross with a fan of three red enamel flames between each arm; the reverse plain gilt; overall length 52.16mm (2.05 inches), diameter of the cross 16.21mm (0.64 inch); with stick pin for wear. The Order was created in 1875 on the initiative of Don Eduardo Palou y Flores, a Spanish Senator and member of the Executive Council of the Spanish Red Cross; its first hospital was that of Our Lady of Atocha in Madrid. In 1876 King Alfonso XII approved of the statutes and rules of the Order. The Sovereign Military Order of Malta had been suppressed in Spain earlier in the 19th Century but after it was again recognised in 1885, the Order of the Knights Hospitaller of St John the Baptist slowly declined until by the mid-20th Century it consisted of a single chapter in Cádiz. All insignia of the Order are rare.
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