TOPIC:

Hi Iain.....

I think that they would have followed the British style..... A form of badge on the side of the helmet if they had any helmets instead of on the front.....

Had a quick look in Owen's and it does not really say one way or another but I would not want to wear a badge on the front of my helmet as a perfect target for the Boers....

And a helmet badge would have been too big to wear on the side. Could have been a collar dog????

Mike

Mike,
Interesting to note the two large maple leafs are quite differant!
Frank

Hi Frank.....

This badge was also worn as a General Militia badge in Canada....

Here is an article that I did for the British Badge Forum.....

www.britishbadgeforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2050

I am not at home now as this is Thanksgiving Weekend and at family for supper so I cannot send the pictures here....

Mike

I wonder at what point the helmet plate ceased to be used in the field. Maybe with the switch from redcoats to Khaki?

Iain

Very much the case! some infantry regts in the British army in Zululand in 1879 had removed their 1869-78 shako plates, brass spikes and chin chains and dyed their white helmets with tea, coffee, boiled mimosa bark and cow dung etc!
Can't say as I blame them really!

iaindh wrote: I wonder at what point the helmet plate ceased to be used in the field. Maybe with the switch from redcoats to Khaki?

Iain

I wasn't aware of that!
The helmet plate was a sort of "shoot me" sign, particularly on a white helmet.
Moving the insignia to the side made a lot of sense.
I thought it may have been after the 1st Boer war that Khaki was adopted but seemingly it was 1897, just before ABW.