WW1 badge Belt - Lovat Scout Badge?

[Advsmt]

Hi, I was wondering about the Lovat Scout badge on my Great Uncle's belt. He served with the Scottish Horse at Galipoli then Egypt. But I was wondering about the Lovat Scout badge. It appears very small so is it a beret badge or collar? Also is it post 1922, but I would find this very odd as he had no connection to the military after he was invalided out in 1918.
I don't own the belt but I do have move photos showing other badges. The belt is stamped RUGBY and has a pouch on it.

Thanks in anticipation.

Bryan

[Alan O]

As a scottish regt they did not wear a beret. They did wear balmoral bonnets and TOS'.

K&K show these small badges as cap badges, There was a tremendous variety of badges and some may be used collars as well.

Alan

[Advsmt]

Thanks Alan, I got beret from Bloomer (298) and should have ignored that! All his badges in his book that have the "Y" at the bottom he has as post 1922. K&K has them as 1908 to 1922 so I guess they are WW1 period. Never seen a Lovat badge in the flesh but some must be very small!

Bryan

[Advsmt]

Any idea about the star? Is it a Cameronians star, maybe a pipers? I have attached the back shot just to the right of the artillery badge where it comes through to a post?

Bryan

[Alan O]

The best badge is the 2nd Volunteer Bn Somerset LI.

The star may not be a cap badge but a TF efficiency star?

There is nothing on there that can be dated post WW1 so I suspect it was put together during his service rather than a later decade.

[Alan O]

The most valuable s/t is the 1st/1st WSY s/t and the NDH cap badge is much sought after.

[Advsmt]

Thanks Alan, just one more question, I promise. Any idea what the button is below the Lanark s/t and the one above the Essex s/t?

Bryan

[Cribyn]

Hello Bryan

The photo is not very good for identifying buttons but the one above the Essex s/t appears to be New Zealand Forces, a 'general service' type button.

The one below the Lanark s/t is more difficult to identify. It could be Royal Marine Light Infantry as it seems to be a crown over an anchor with the title in a circlet.

It could, however, be another similar pattern button, Royal Marine Artillery but there are other similar style buttons. Hopefully someone with better eyesight than me will comment!

Regards
Roger

[Advsmt]

Thanks Roger, you could be right about RMLI as I have a photo of a RMLI man that my great uncle kept.

Bryan

[Advsmt]

Double checked the original photo with on-line images and it is definitely a RMLI button.

Bryan

[Marcus H]

Originally Posted by Advsmt

Hi, I was wondering about the Lovat Scout badge on my Great Uncle's belt. He served with the Scottish Horse at Galipoli then Egypt. But I was wondering about the Lovat Scout badge. It appears very small so is it a beret badge or collar? Also is it post 1922, but I would find this very odd as he had no connection to the military after he was invalided out in 1918.
I don't own the belt but I do have move photos showing other badges. The belt is stamped RUGBY and has a pouch on it.

Thanks in anticipation.

Bryan

Hello Bryan,

In my opinion, the inaugural use of this particular pattern of badge (''Y'') stem's from an inception date of around 1908 and was in use until the at least the late 1930s as a collar for ORs (piper & trooper), and for an unknown duration - perhaps only in the incipient months/years of the Great War - as a cap badge also. I believe there was a suspension in the use of, or perhaps rather subsequent issue of collars (OR) during WW1 from a date unknown to me, but the LS being yeomanry and indeed TF, as such, there seems to be an element of ''de facto'' standards pertaining to the regulations of dress. However, the preferred head-dress would seem to be the distinctive ''Scout Bonnet'' and the larger white metal Lovat crest cap badge, so essentially the answer could lay somewhere concerning the use of the bonnet verse service cap...perhaps? I really don't know.

Plus, I can positively attest to this design being worn as an OSD collar post 1939, and as a cap badge for officers when wearing the peaked service caps too; this is also evident in pictures dating prior to 1914 and during the course of the first war, the latter being collars only via pictures.

The ORs cap/collar badge dimensions within tolerances are the same size, in fact they're basically the same badge - most badges have two east and west placed lugs, but it can be seldom encountered with a slider too. I personally attribute the millimeter differences to different manufacturers and this is also evident from the obverse designs being acutely different. Also, from time to time the die-stamped and die-cast badges have makers tablets or marks, so it is potentially possible to even identity some unmarked badges by their design features.

The larger size badges of a very similar design I am yet to be convinced are genuinely intended cap badges, although published references and dealers refer to these as cap badges. In my limited and amature study so far, I strongly feel these could actually be sporran devices only.


See this Forum link here and further down the page for a few pictures of interest:http://www.britishbadgeforum.com/for...ad.php?t=45305


Best,

Marcus

PS Check out post 8 in the link above for a couple of additional links where the images are better than the one I display.

[Advsmt]

Thanks for that very detailed explanation Marcus, I appreciate the information.

Bryan