Friday 13 March 2015

Scottish armed forces uniforms

Yes I know this is a flag blog and yes I know the referendum ended with a No vote, and I accept that. However I want to experiment with uniforms since my UK football kit and a hypothetical Scottish Defence Force in an fictional independent Scotland seems like a good start, especially after I designed ceremonial and working flags for such a force before the referendum. Again this is fiction and based on units that would use the flags in the above link.

Full Dress Uniform

First of all is the ceremonial full dress uniform:
This is the traditional uniforms for ceremonial parades and public duties (like the guard at Edinburgh Castle etc). The Royal Guards Regiment uniform is unchanged from the uniform of the current Scots Guards, with bearskin cap and scarlet tunic (with the buttons grouped in threes). The uniform of the 1st Infantry Battalion features a traditional Glengarry cap, Blue Tunic with green and red facings and Government Tartan Trews. This Battalion would be successor to the Royal Scots Boarders (1st Battalion Royal Regiment of Scotland), who themselves are descended from the Royal Scots (The Royal Regiment) and the King's Own Scottish Borderers who as Lowland regiments did not wear the Kilt, (with the exception of pipers) hence the tartan trews. 
The Uniform of the other infantry battalions are practically the same except they wear a Kilt rather than trews as they would be descendant from the Highlander regiments (the Highlands is the region of Scotland were the kilt was traditionally worn). These are based on No 1 Dress Uniform of the Royal Regiment of Scotland.
There are two forms of Full Dress Uniform for armoured regiments, as these are successors to the Cavalry and adopt cavalry traditions, as such it would fall to them to provide a mounted escort during a state visit or some other grand occasion. The mounted uniform consists of a blue cavalry tunic complete, black riding trousers and boots, and a white cross belt. I actually based this on the Blue Hussars Uniform who were the mounted escort of the Irish President, but substituted the busby with a pillar box cap. The full dress uniform for non mounted troopers is a black tunic and trews with gold facings and stripe, with a forage cap. The caps of the two squadrons are different, The Royal Scots Dragoon Guards, have a red cap with the distinctive gold chavron pattern, the Armoured Corps have a green cap. The dismounted uniform is based on No 1 Dress of the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards.
The "Army Standard" refers to the  Artillery, Medics, engineers etc who support the combat units. They all wear a similar uniform and only distinguished by cap and collar badge. This is a glengarry cap. Blue tunic with green and red facings and black trews with a red stripe. 
The Air Force Full Dress Uniform is sky blue. It features a tunic with navy collar, and trews with a gold stripe and a forage cap, the cap badge of a winged thistle, is inspired by the logo of the modern "Flying Scotsman" the morning express between Edinburgh and London. 
The Navy Uniform consists of the traditional sailor uniform worn by navies everywhere. Full dress has a white belt, gaiters and a chin strap on the cap. The Cap simply reads Scotland rather than the ship or unit name, similar to the Irish Navy cap which reads "Eire." It also has a blue Toorie. The Marine Infantry wear a similar uniform to the army but with red facing and white helmet similar to that worn by Royal Marines.
Not included in the above picture are musicians who wear their own variants of Full Dress Uniform:

The Infantry Band wear the Victorian style Uniform currently worn by the Band of the Royal Regiment of Scotland.  The Cavalry Band Uniform is also based on that of the Band of the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards (the regimental band not the pipe band). The Army Central Band whic is the reserve band, which provides music to the support units and others, is the same as the infantry band but wear the  blue standard army tunic. The Air Force Band wear a blue tunic with gold facings and a busby. The Pipe band wear the feather bonnet, sky blue tunic and complete highland dress which is in RAF tartan. Similar to the current pipe band of the Royal Air Force.. The Navy band are distinguished by white trousers, and marine pipers wear a black tunic and glengarry with full Highland dress in government tartan. Army Pipers are not included as each battalion has its own pipe band who with dress the same as the private soldier or dress the same as the army central band but with Royal Stewart tartan rather than government tartan

Class A (Dress) Uniform

Class A Uniform is the more modern form of dress uniform, consisting of a green/khaki for the army. It is not as traditional as Full Dress Uniform, but still formal enough to b worn at certain functions and events instead of full dress uniform. Its a cross between full dress uniform and working uniform.
  All forms of Class A uniform in the Army are pretty much the same, the only difference being the head gear and collar and cap badges. For the army either a forage cap or glengarry is worn. Military Police wear a crimson forage cap and "MP" arm band. The Royal Guard forage cap has red, white and green dicing (as does the glengarrys of the infantry), This is the same fore Marines but with a white cap (and slightly darker green). The Air Force wear a jacket rather than the tunic of Full Dress Uniform without a belt. The /navy Class A Uniform has only slight changes which are no belts, gaiters and chin strap on the cap is worn.

Class B and C (Working) Uniforms.

These are the everyday uniforms. Class B Uniform is a barracks uniform, worn when in camp by officers and senior NCOs or those employed in more administrative roles. Class C Uniform is designed to be worn outside in the nitty gritty.
Class B consists of combat trousers and boots, a shirt, tie and jumper (which is not worn in daytime in the Summer). There is also a tartan belt in the regimental tartan. Class C Uniform consists of the same but with combat shirt and/or jacket replacing the jumper, shirt and tie. And a black tactical belt replacing the tartan one. The Combat Shirts and Jackets also have a nation flag patch on the left arm and unit patch on the right. The Unit patches are (with one or two exceptions) the same as the camp flags I made, see here. The Infantry wear khaki Sham O Tanter bonnets The rest of the army wear berets, which with the exception of the military police are either khaki or black. In most cases a regimental tartan patch is worn behind the cap badge. The Armoured Units wear black overalls as their Class C uniform, they also wear black in Class B. The Air Force Class B Uniform id the same as the army but blue. The Air Force Class C consists of flight uniform. The Navy Class B Uniform is a white shirt and black trousers. Officers and senior rates wear a tie. The Navy Class C Uniform is blue overalls and no cap, and only worn by those in Engineering or seamanship roles. 
This is my first proper designs for uniforms and I would like to know what you think, so feel free to comment. Again this is hypothetical independant Scotland, Not a pro independence or political post personally I am glad Scotland is still in the family of British nations, so no political comments please. 

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