5.H rank slide.
 

I am struggling to identify the regiment that wore 5H rank slides. There maybe an Indian Army connection as I know the name of the officer whose trunk these came from and he appears to have served in the 31st Indian Armoured Division. It is not certain that all the rank slides belonged to the same officer despite them all coming from the clearance.

Hi, Probyn's Horse became the 5th Probyn's Horse in the Pakistan army. Mike

Probyns Horse?

Edit: echo echo echo.......

There is very strong evidence that this rank slide was worn by an officer of Probyn's Horse (5th King Edward VII's Own Lancers). It seems strange that the title is 5H and not 5L as Probyn's Horse were officially Lancers. It may be that 5th Horse was used to avoid confusion with the 5th Lancers.

I am quite sure these are for the 5th Probyn's Horse as mentioned. Most of the cavalry in the Indian Army tended to prefer the use of the word horse in their titles. A very nice grouping indeed.

CB

Excellent, thank you. He obviously stayed on with the regiment after partition.

It appears that he had been a Trooper before being taking an Emergency Commission on the 19th September, 1943. I was delighted to find that he had joined the Burma Star Association and gave them his Army Number on his application form. Having bought a trunk full of his airtex uniforms, I can confirm that several of the collars have the number 7948491 alongside his name.

I have just looked in my 1943 copy of 'Field Service Pocket Book (India) Part I pamphlet No. 3 ABBREVIATIONS'
It shows verbatim ' Probyns Horse (5th KEO Lancers) Abbreviation '5 Horse'

So Im confident that's what it is for.

Steve

Steve,

thank you for the clarification. If 5H was used as an abbreviation for Probyn's Horse before Partition and transfer to Pakistan, it would suggest that he didn't need to have remained with the regiment after transfer in order to have these rank slides. Therefore, these were very likely worn in Burma before the Japanese withdrawal and very possibly at Meiktila in March 1945.

Some more items that once belonged to the owner of the Rank Slides have surfaced.