The pipers of 15 PARA wore kilts and plaids in the MacKenzie tartan, but wore a Hunting Stewart tartan patch behind their cap badge (as the rest of the battalion did as well).
It was quite weird seeing them in the ceremonial uniform of pipers but wearing the beret rather that a full feather bonnet or glengarry.
I don't know what the origins of them wearing the MacKenzie and Hunting Stewart tartans.
The 5th (Scottish) Battalion, Parachute Regiment also had a Pipes & Drums from at least 1944, their Pipe-Major being P/M George Stoddart, BEM between 1944 and 1946 and then again between 1947 and 1949.
There is a fairly well known photo purportedly of the Pipes & Drums of the 5th (Scottish) Parachute Regiment in Athens/Greece in 1944 or 1945, wearing what is very clearly the uniform of the RHR Black Watch (their sporran pattern, the Royal Stewart kilts and even the Black Watch cap badge!); however given that the 6th Bn. Black Watch were actually in Athens at the time, I suspect that the photo has been wrongly attributed to the 5th Parachute battalion. However I do have to admit that although rather poor quality, the Pipe-Major in the photo does bear a close resemblance to P/M Stoddart.
I suspect that the 5th (Scottish) Para are more likely to have worn the uniform, or one based on it......of the Cameron Highlanders, give that the battalion (5th Parachute) had originally been the 7th Bn. Queen's Own Cameron Highlanders. Furthermore, Pipe-Major Stoddart actually served as a piper in the 2nd Bn. Cameron Highlanders between 1926 and 1939.
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