Re: Why English Officers Wore Red Coats

That would put the Marine officers pretty much in line with the majority of the British army at the time.

However, all joking aside, why *did* the British army wear red coats?

-snip-

It dates to Cromwell's New Model Army of the 1640s.

Exactly -why- red was selected isn't clear but in an era when army battle maneuvers were in carefully drilled lines and columns in open country and when the ability to quickly distinguish friend from foe in the smoke and confusion of battle was more important than blending into the landscape, the virtues of having all troops clad in a uniform and readily distinquishable color (rather than a motley of individual regimental uniforms) is apparent.

In the American Civil War, both sides began the war with large numbers of state militia regiments clad in a bewildering assortment of uniforms and uniform colors which led to several unfortunate incidents where friendly units were mistaken for foes and vice versa.

The Union forces rather quickly standardized on the Federal blue uniform to avoid such occurances - the confederacy also attempted to standardize on gray uniforms although its supply and logistics problems meant that confederate troops tended to be clad in a variety of uniforms (and non-uniforms) throughout the war, including captured Union uniforms and civilian clothing.

Cheers and all,

Because it was cheaper than blue.

I bet it would be if they were home or away. The away army always wears the dark uniforms and the home army always wears the whites. You know........like shirts and skins. Like cowboys and indians. The cowboys were the bluecoats (or the shirts) and the indians were the skins, that is the Redskins (:>

zoaves especially. what is mindblowing it that there were still zoaves in ww1!

Thanks Bill!

I once read that the reason the RAF has light blue uniforms is that thousands of bolts of light blue cloth had been produced for the Russian Imperial Air Service when the Russian Revolution started. The cloth was never delivered and was therefore very cheap to buy. It was therefore used for the uniforms of the new RAF.

The RAF started off making do with cast-offs and cheap stuff. Seems like some things never change!

I just happened to be reading a book on military history 1588-1814 last night and it had a little aside on that. The book claims some little group forming a regiment wanted to pick the color for their uniforms, and felt that red was a very "dashing" color, and dashing is the image they wanted their group to convey. Apparently they had a very excellent tailor, and the coats were very attractive, and copies gradually caught on. This was somewhere in the early seventeenth century (thirty years war). I have no idea how accurate this is.

Not quite. They went to a blue-gray uniform. The Army and Navy officers who made up the new RAF thought it too light a shade--Navy working and Army dress were both dark blue--it was darkened somewhat to the present shade, but the actual difference is small, like the same color seen in sunlight and then in shadow. Other stories have it being selected by a music hall actress. In fact the main idea was to find a color that wouldn't show the wear and stains from working with airplanes. The US Navy aviation green-grey is similar in purpose.

One V-bomber squadron had to rely on a flight of Hastings to make up the numbers until replaced by Tornadoes. During the TSR2/F-111 fiasco a flight-sergeant told me they seriously considered using Valettas and Varsities as nuclear bombers. The theory was they were so old and slow they could fly right under soviet radar.

(kim)

Red dye was cheap to make and red has always been an "aggressive" colour - think of which strip the England football team was wearing for the World Cup final in 1966!

Seriously though, the Yeoman Warders uniform is predominantly red, which was the Tudor livery of Henry VIII's Household

Chris

Zouaves were an elite within the French Army. Actually, the French Army, in general, began WWI wearing red pants! There's a famous saying by a French politician, some years earlier, when the red pants were questioned, that "the red pants are France!" (This was in line with the French tactical doctrine that tradition, morale, and elan (read: mass suicide charges) would always win the day. Verdun changed that thinking.)