I show my age, I guess, in being rather sentimentally attached to the old Red Ensign, having been born under the 1922 version, and growing up with it and the slightly altered 1957 version.
In fact, the 1922 version was the first one which was officially our national flag, though as you can see a much earlier version came into semi-official use the year following Confederation, and continued with changes thereafter. A study of the above images will explain the 1868 through 1907 variations. Canada had no official Coat of Arms until 1921/22, so the crest in the fly of the earlier Ensigns was to be the crest from the Great Seal of Canada - which was made up of the Arms of the constituent Provinces of Confederation.
Thus:
- the 1868 version has only the Arms of Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia.
- the 1870 version includes the Arms of Manitoba.
- the 1873 version adds the Arms of Prince Edward Island and British Columbia (earliest).
- the 1896 version incorporates the altered Arms of Briitish Columbia.
- the 1901 version has the surmounting crown changed to the King's Crown, following the death of Victoria.
- the 1907 version adds the Arms of Saskatchewan and Alberta, formed and admitted to Confederation on 1905. (The delay resulted because Alberta dragged its feet awhile before adopting a Provincial Coat of Arms. This, of course, was the Canadian Red Ensign through the Great War .....)
Needless to say, the crest was getting quite "cluttered" .... so, following WWI, steps were taken to design and adopt an official Canadian Coat of Arms, and it is the crest from that which thereafter has appeared on the Ensign. The 1957 changes involved alteration of the symbol denoting Ireland to an Irish harp (from the rather incorrect Celtic harp previously used), and changing the colour of the three cojoined maple leaves (on a white field) from green to red - likely because the official colours of Canada had long been red and white .....
Ironically, such an arrangement of maple leaves does not occur naturally .... which is one reason why the present flag with its single leaf, won out over the proposals which retained the tri-leaf configuration .....
I would dearly love to acquire an affordable Ensign in one of the 19th Century configurations .... preferably the 1873 version, being the one in use at the time of the 1885 North West Rebellion, etc. However, in fact the official flag flown in Canada during that time-frame was the second "Royal Union Flag" (ofter erroneously called the Union Jack .... which technically refers only to the version flown on a Naval vessel) and that is certainly an easy flag to acquire for re-enacting purposes; indeed, it hasn't changed since 1 January 1801!