|
Military
art prints of Royal Warwickshire Regiment, 6th of Foot. These
Royal Warwickshire Regimental uniform print by military artists Harry
Payne, Richard Simkin, Hamilton Smith are available direct from Regimental
Art, a subsidiary of Cranston Fine Arts. |
|
In 1673 the States-General of the Netherlands received permission to
employ, for the second time, a British contingent. A new
"Holland Regiment" was then formed, and commanded by Sir Walter
Vane, formerly colonel of what is now the Buffs. Between 1674 and
1678 it saw its first active service at Grave, Maestricht, Mont Cassel,
and St Denis; and, accompanying the Prince of Orange to England in 1688 as
"Babington's Regiment", it afterwards took part in the Irish
wars at Charlemont, Boyne, Athlone, Ballymore, Aughrim, Galway,
Castleconnell, and Limerick. In the Netherlands campaigns of 1692,
etc, it served at Steenkirk and Namur; in 1702, as a sea-service regiment
it was at Cadiz, and helped to storm the forts at Vigo, receiving £561
10s as prize money; in 1705 it formed part of the army despatched to
support the claim of the Archduke Charles of Austria to the Spanish
throne, and fought at Barcelona, where the regiment, under Colonel
Southwell, behaved with the greatest gallantry; it took part in the
storming of Fort Monjuich; in Valencia it was at many 'affairs'; it fought
at Requena, Cuenza, Almanza, and Saragossa, when thirty standards were
taken by the British; and finally the regiment was taken prisoner at
Brihuega after a brave defence, but its 'honour was preserved
untarnished'. It saw no further active service until 1719, when it
shared in the capture of Vigo, Rondondella, and Pontevedra; and, in 1740
was at Cuba.
It fought against the Jacobites in 1745, when Sergeant Molloy and
twelve men, left in charge of Fort Ruthven, repulsed the attack of 300 of
the enemy, replying to the summons to surrender that 'he was to old a
soldier to surrender a garrison of such strength without bloody noses';
when two companies made almost the last stand at Prestonpans; and when
other detachments bravely held Forts Augustus and William. In 1761
it was officially entitled 'the 6th', to which the name '1st Warwickshire'
was added thirty years later; and 1793 found it again in the West Indies -
at Martinique, St Lucia and Guadaloupe. In 1798, in the Irish
Rebellion, it fought at Castlebar; and, in 1808, in the Peninsula, where
it served at Roleia, Vimiera, and Corunna. After the Walcheren
Expedition, when it was so reduced by sickness that it was unable to
'furnish the usual reliefs of the ordinary regimental guard', it returned
to the Peninsula in 1812, and added "Vittoria", "Almanza",
"Pyrenees", "Nivelle", "Orthes", and
"Peninsula" to the colours, besides fighting at Echalar,
Bidassoa, Nive, Hastingues, and Oyergave. In 1814 it was engaged in
Canada, at the siege of Fort Erie, for which "Niagara" was added
to the battle roll; and since then it has seen service at Aden in 1840;
and in Africa, for which the Royal Warwicks bear on the colours the name
of "South Africa, 1846 - 47" and "South Africa, 1851 -
53". It saw some service in Oude in 1858, in Sikkim in 1860,
and in the Hazara campaign in 1868. Second battalions served from
1804 - 15, from 1846 till 1851 and lastly from 1858 to now.
The regiment had green facings from 1735 and yellow facings from 1751
to 1832, "when it became Royal". In 1839 men are shown
with royal blue facings, coatees, and epaulets, white trousers, and bell
shaped shakoes. The antelope (white, "ducally gorged and
chained or," the badge o Henry VI, but supposed to have been assumed
after Saragossa in 1710, or as suggested in the "Royal Military
Chronicle" of 1811, after the battle of Almanza, whn the standard of
the Spanish "Royal African Regiment", bearing the antelope, was
taken), with a crown and within a circle having "Royal Warwickshire
Regiment", is worn on the button, the helmet plate, the waist plate,
and forage cap, and the bear and ragged staff (which, with the exception
of the added chain, was the badge of the house of Warwick, and was borne
by the 1st Warwick Militia) is on the tunic collar; but, by special
permission, the "Antelope" is worn on the collar of the mess
jacket. The other badge is the rose, "slipped and leaved"
- unlike that of the Buffs, which has the flower only. The motto "Vi
et armis" appears at one time to have been used; according to Cannon,
it was borne on the knapsack until 1825.
The Militia battalions are the 1st and 2nd Warwicks (1759) and they
served on board ship at the time of the Mutiny of the Nore, in Ireland in
1798, and were embodied in 1854. The Volunteer battalions are the
1st Birmingham (in green and scarlet), and 2nd Coventry (in scarlet and
blue), formerly the 1st and 2nd Warwickshire. The regimental pet is
naturally an antelope, "Billy" by name, who marches past at the
head of the regiment, led by two drummers. The horns are tipped with
silver, and he wears a silver collar with chains, by which he is
led. On full dress parades he wears a blue coat, gold embroidered
and bearing the regimental honours. At one time a bear was adopted
as the regimental pet. The Royal Warwicks were once called
"Guise's Geese", from the name of one of their colonels and the
facings at the time. They have also the names of the
"Warwickshire Lads" and the "Saucy Sixth". The
depot is at Warwick. Extract from "The British Army and Auxiliary
Forces, Vol II" c.1898
|
| Officer, 6th Foot 1735
by P H Smitherman This image, taken from a contemporary portrait, shows an officer of the
6th Foot. He is wearing neither gorget nor sash, and so is not on
duty. His very elegant coat bears little resemblance in design and
lacing to those worn by the men of the regiment. This officer is wearing
an aiguillette on his right shoulder. This was commonly worn as the
mark of a commissioned officer, or non-commissioned officer in the
infantry, and was worn by all ranks in some cavalry regiments. The
origin of these shoulder knots is obscure and has been the subject of much
speculation. they have been said to have been originally, among
other things, picketing ropes for horses, no doubt on account of the pegs
at their ends, similar to the pegs used today on picketing ropes, and
ropes for tying up hay for horses used by foraging parties.
Such explanations are hardly satisfactory because it is difficult to see
why an infantry officer or N.C.O. should want such things, and in the
cavalry one might have expected them to be worn by troopers, but not by
officers or N.C.O.s. They were at this time worn by servants in
private houses - they still appear in some of the royal liveries - and we
have records of opinion from those who had to wear these adornments, more
fit for flunkeys. They could obviously not have originated for the
servants in either picketing or foraging ropes, and it is possible that
they were merely decorative additions to the dress, added during a time
when such decoration was not considered unmanly. They disappeared
during the Napoleonic wars, but were revived in the dress of some cavalry
regiments afterwards and are now worn by officers and N.C.O.s of the
Household Cavalry and by some staff officers. The 6th Foot were
another of the Six Old Corps and retained their ancient badge of an
antelope on their grenadier caps. They won this badge at Saragossa
in 1710 where they won a resounding victory over French and Spanish
cavalry, capturing, among other things, a Moorish flag bearing the device
of an antelope and, as the Royal Warwickshire Regiment, they have retained
the badge to this day. |
|
