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The Emilio collection of military buttons
The Emilio collection of military buttons Author:Essex Institute Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: British. 1754-1773. From early days armed bodies of men were distinguishable, one from another, by their banners, emblems, badges, devices, or clothing. Thus ... more »was used the white cross of the English, a relic of the Crusaders, as early as 1366, while in 1415 their bowmen were dressed in leathern jackets and hose, and at the seige of Boulogne in 1542, some of the English for the first time, appeared on the field attired in red. From accounts of clothing worn by the British army in Ireland in 1599, officers were garbed in doublets of canvas with silk buttons, the common soldiers in cossocks of Kentish cloth, trimmed with buttons and loops. In 1685, the officers of the 1st (now Grenadier) Foot Guards, had buttons covered with silver thread, and those of the 2nd (now Coldstream) Guards, of gold thread. The Royal Regiment of Artillery at about the same time had buttons of brass. About 1696, the soldiers wore long coats, the skirts of which, coming below the knee, for convenience, were at times looped back and the corners secured by a button. Buttons on a close boot are shown in 1715 in a picture of a dragoon, just as worn on gaiters at a later date. A board of officers appointed by the King in 1694, determined the numerical designation of the then existing regiments in succession by seniority of service, and thereafter the regiments raised or attached to the English Establishment took number and rank for precedence as they were embodied. Except in the cases of some of the earlier regiments this rank did not always indicate comparative age. Previous to 1753 the regiments of the British Army were known by the names of their colonels, but after that year the numerical title became more and more the one used. But-it was not until 1767 that the number of the regiment appeared upon th...« less