The Flags of Our Fighting Army: Including standards, guidons, colours and drum bannersJohnson, Stanley C. (Stanley Currie)
History
The Flags of Our Fighting Army: Including standards, guidons, colours and drum banners
Johnson, Stanley C. (Stanley Currie)
Flags -- Great Britain
The battle honours are: Gibraltar, 1704-5; Dettingen; Martinique,
1809; Ava; Affghanistan, 1839; Ghuznee, 1839; Cabool, 1842;
Sevastopol; South Africa, 1878-9; Burmah, 1885-87; South Africa,
1899-1902; Relief of Ladysmith.
=The Prince of Wales’s Own (West Yorkshire Regiment).=—Facings, buff for
all battalions, except the 7th and 8th, which are black.
R.C.—The Prince of Wales’s plume. The White Horse. The Royal Tiger,
superscribed “India” and the motto, “Nec aspera terrent.” This flag is
shown in Fig. 31.
The battle honours are: Namur, 1695; Tournay; Corunna; Java;
Waterloo; Bhurtpore; Sevastopol; New Zealand; Afghanistan, 1879-80;
South Africa, 1899-1902; Relief of Ladysmith.
“Although the West Yorkshires were raised so long ago as 1685, their
Colours had no honours for great early battles until (a few years back)
‘Namur, 1695’ was granted. ‘Corunna’ was the first name to be inscribed
thereon, and, although ‘Tournay’ was tardily authorised in 1836, it was
first placed on the stand issued to the regiment in 1853. Thus the set
issued in 1819 to replace the tattered rags presented eighteen years
before, and which had time and again led the regiment on to victory in
Mauritius, in Java, and in Bengal—hard services which wore the Colours
out so rapidly that they were described as being ‘fairly worn off the
staves’ some years previously—bore only three honours, of which the
third, ‘Java,’ was won by the first battalion; the second, ‘Waterloo,’
by the third battalion; and the first, ‘Corunna,’ by the second
battalion.
“The next honour to be gained by the 14th was ‘Bhurtpore,’ in 1820.
Hardly had the great mine beneath the hostile walls been sprung, when
the besiegers were seen rushing forward to the assault, the Colours of
the regiment beckoning in the very forefront, and being, it is said, the
first to be planted on the walls of the ‘impregnable’ Jat fortress. The
1835 set, therefore, which replaced the ‘Bhurtpore’ Colours, had four
names emblazoned on them, and their successors five, ‘Tournay’ having by
this time been added. These, the Crimean Colours, under whose folds the
additional honours of ‘Sevastopol’ and ‘New Zealand’ were earned, were
not formally ‘presented’ but simply given out on parade without
ceremony, according to instructions from the War Office, which had been
suddenly smitten with a desire to save a pound or two here and there.
They were retired in 1876, and placed in Sandringham, by order of His
Majesty, then Prince of Wales, who had presented the new set to the
regiment at Lucknow.
“The campaign of 1879-80 in Afghanistan was the last occasion upon which
the West Yorkshires carried their Colours into action, and that honour
was, needless to say, added to the many others which the regiment had
earned the right to bear.”[14]
=The East Yorkshire Regiment.=—Facings, white for all battalions, except
the 5th (Cyclist), which are scarlet.
R.C.—The White Rose is the central badge.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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