Band c1896


The musicians are in dress uniform but wearing pill-box forage caps instead of bearskins. The zig-zag cap-band is yellow in contrast with the rest of the regiment who wear white, and they have the special brass badge of the flaming grenade which the rank and file do not. The officer sitting behind the kettle drum on the left, looks like Lieut the Hon Robert Lindsay, and behind the other kettle drum sits the bandmaster wearing a forage cap with a peak. The men all have white pouchbelts on the left shoulder; these hold large white pouches for sheet music. One man standing next to Lindsay, holding drum sticks, has a white belt on the right shoulder. This is a drum carriage for the small snare drum that sits on the bass drum. The other side of Lt Lindsay is a senior NCO who has rank badges for sergeant-trumpeter but he holds a clarinet so he probably plays several instruments. The rank of sergeant-trumpeter was down-graded from trumpet-major in1881 and not changed back again until 1928. He and another seated sergeant, holding a euphonium, have silver Eagle badges above their stripes.The drum banners are the pre-1897 banners which can be identified by the grenade badge in the lower corner. It has a small pointed flame whereas the later red banners had a larger flame and shorter title scroll. A coloured chart (see below: this shows the right hand side of the chart only) showing all the cavalry drum banners at this time gives the colour of the banner as blue, but not dark blue. The trumpet banners, held by the regimental trumpeters, look pale enough to be red but may well be the blue ones prepared for the 1897 Diamond Jubilee.


Regimental Details | Band


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by Stephen Luscombe