Black Watch Piper's badge query

[Jeff Mc William]

Hi all. Not being (by any means) an expert on Black Watch badges, I wonder can I query this one :
BW Pipers chrome.jpg
It is advertised on Charlie Claydon's "Bluebell Militaria" web site as a KC chrome plated Black Watch Piper's badge and he wants £38 for it, which seems reasonable.
Unfortunately tho' I do not have many authoritative references that deal with Black Watch badges but, in Ted Nevill's book "The Scottish Regiments" (published by Crowood in 1999) the current piper's badge for the regiment at this time was shown as a chrome KC badge with scrolls. As can be seen, this one has no scrolls ?? Fake ? or just another variation ?

[Alan O]

The scrolled badge was worn from 1901 until the 1930s and the scrolless one beyond that up to 1958. The regt reordered its title and the badge changed after that.

But I cannot see how it differs from a standard 1930s-50s pattern black watch badge. What makes it a pipers to command a price £30 above the market rate?

Alan

[davec2]

Hi Jeff,

Here is mine, good or not ( I've been told it is a ' good un ' ), I can not remember exactly how much I paid but I doubt if it were more than fifteen ????

Dave.

[Jeff Mc William]

Hi Alan. Thanks for your reply but my point is that Ted Nevill says that the chrome KC badge with scrolls was worn by the pipers in 1999. It would seem that, in some Scottish Regiments, the old style badges were worn by Pipers as a distinction or a bit of "one upmanship" or whatever, eg The Royal Scots and others. Jeff
PS: Have just seen your post Dave...excellent..I'm sure that's a "good un" !

[Sonofacqms]

I would be interested to know why some pipers badges were chromed and others left as white metal.

The pipers badges of the Cameronians are totally different from the normal badge and very distinctive, mine are both in white metal. My Royal Highland Fusiliers Pipers Glengarry is chromed, although Bloomers book describes it as white metal, whereas there are no references to Black Watch pipers badges.

Could this just have been done privately, I feel it would be an unnecessary expense as there would have been little distinction between polished white metal and chrome.

[Alan O]

Originally Posted by Jeff Mc William

Hi Alan. Thanks for your reply but my point is that Ted Nevill says that the chrome KC badge with scrolls was worn by the pipers in 1999. It would seem that, in some Scottish Regiments, the old style badges were worn by Pipers as a distinction or a bit of "one upmanship" or whatever, eg The Royal Scots and others. Jeff
PS: Have just seen your post Dave...excellent..I'm sure that's a "good un" !

If they did it was entirely unofficial and I still cannot see why you would pay more than £10 for one. In any case the top badge is not the 1901 scrolled version but the later pattern.

Alan

[davec2]

Hi Rob,

Continuing the debate, my Cameronians is as it should be, ie, white metal and my Royal Highland Fusiliers is also a nice white metal version, I only refer to the chrome plated Black Watch as a Pipers' badge because of other peoples reference to it being such ??

My Scots Guards is silver and gilt but as of yet, I haven't managed to acquire one to the Royal Scots Fusiliers nor a couple of more Scottish regiments.

As for chrome plating, for an individual, it would have been very expensive to get one item plated, I can remember in the old days, when I was a metal polisher (in the 60's before I started welding ), we could drop pieces in with a production load etc, several of my mates had plenty of chrome on their motor bikes etc but for a cap badge from a stranger, probably not a chance, a job lot, yes, just my memories of course.

Regards.

Dave.

[Jeff Mc William]

Originally Posted by Alan O

If they did it was entirely unofficial and I still cannot see why you would pay more than £10 for one. In any case the top badge is not the 1901 scrolled version but the later pattern.

Alan

Alan. I tend to agree with you on the first two points you made, altho' as has been discussed on the forum many times before, it seems that there was a good deal of (unofficial) tollerance given to Scottish Pipers and Senior NCOs when it came to the question of tradition and "hand-me-down" badges and other various accutrements. In consequence there would of course be no official documents to confirm these practices, only word-of -mouth from an ex or serving Piper (a rare breed), or the accumulated knowledge of an experienced collector.
On your final point, I hope you will not take offence, but I fear you have misunderstood me again, since that was the whole reason why I posted this query. Regards. Jeff

[Alex Rice]

Hi All
I have a particular interest in piper's badges and paid quite a lot of attention to what the piper's were wearing in 2000 when I was in Scotland for the Edinburgh Tattoo. The BW bandsmen wore standard badges though a few guys from various regiments wore old family badges, in particular the bass-drummer of the Royal Scots pipe band was wearing his grandfathers WWI economy badge. I manage to get a RHF piper's badge which was chromed, but that was only to save on polishing. I also got a standard WM RHF pipers badge.
I did find out that even the regiments themselves were struggling to get pipers badges, probably due to the cost of small orders. I suspect that if the chromed BW badge was indeed worn by a piper, it was only chromed to either save on polishing or to make it look more like the stabrite badges being worn by others.
Hope this helps.
Cheers,
Alex

[davec2]

Hello Alex,

Yes, what you have written has certainly helped me, particulary with my B.W. badge, until I get a definitive ' No ', mine is now a Pipers' badge.

Jeff,

I'm also appreciative of your endorsement of the badge too ( joachim gave me the thumbs up a long time ago ) but it's still nice to hear his opinion seconded, thanks to you both.

Dave.

[Unknownsoldier]

I have a Black Watch (Cyclist's I think) in Anodised but in both Gold and Silver Anyone any idea, also have a gold Argylls, but can't figure out why...... Any ideas guys, I think I was told band, but heck what do I know...

Tom

[2747andy]

Tom,
if you have got an anodised cyclist's badge, I would be very suprised! Cyclists were a First World War concept. If it is anodised I bet Chris will be chasing you for details!!!

Scottish badges are worn in abundance by civilian Pipe bands, not only in Scotland but all over the world!

Black Watch (Genuine) badges are probably the scarcest of the modern badges, I'm not quite sure since when, but certainly 30+ years prior to their becoming the Royal Regiment of Scotland, they did not wear cap badges and only the Red Hackle was worn in the TOS (without a badge) and also in the Dress Balmoral (Dark Blue/Black TOS type hat). Only musicians and pipers wore Cap Badges in their Glengary. I think the theory that Chromed badges were to reduce cleaning is a very likely answer. The TOS is also widely worn in civilan highland dress on a regular basis, often with a badge and not always with any particular connection to that regiment!

Andy

[Alan O]

A few musings:

It is odd that despite the regt only wearing the hackle in their TOS and in the No1 dress blue bonnets, the a/a version of their cap badge is so commonly found. Clearly some one was wearing them - cadets possibly?

As regards the first badge I still cannot see why you would want to pay £38 for a standard WW2 or even WW1 BW badge, chromed or not. There are 1000s of them out there but only a few could have been worn by the BW Pipers. Unless you personally got it from a piper, who was wearing it semi-officially anyway, there seems to be a huge leap of faith involved.

As one poster highlighted one RS musician was wearing an all brass badge. Does this mean that I have a piper's all brass Royal Scots badge in my collection worth £40 - no, I have a WW1 all brass badge worth £10.

Alan

[Jeff Mc William]

Originally Posted by Unknownsoldier

I have a Black Watch (Cyclist's I think) in Anodised but in both Gold and Silver Anyone any idea, also have a gold Argylls, but can't figure out why...... Any ideas guys, I think I was told band, but heck what do I know...

Tom

Hi Tom. I must say the "Gold" a/a badge to the A&SH puzzled me too, so I wrote to the regimental museum in Sept 2008 to query this...I am still waiting for a reply.(Yes, I did include an SAE) ! Jeff
PS: Alan, I fully agree with you on this one...thank goodness I don't collect anymore, prices today are well above my means.

[Alan O]

Jeff,

I think Chris has a gold A&SH. London Badge and Button company made a number of badges in the 'wrong' finish which were never worn by the Army but sold off. They pop up at fairs now and again and are totally spurious. Examples include the Yorkshire Volunteers, parachute regt, 15/19th Hussars. You even find the Yorks Volunteers ones in black and gold where they have realised their mistake half way through the process and not bothered to finish them off with the silver overlay (and then remove the protective black coat). Despite the fact that these are maker's scrap, the asking prices are several times higher than the correct versions.

Alan