Tag Archives: Grenadier Guards

The Beards Are Back, in British Service Anyway

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With the British Army recently repealing the 100-year ban on beards, the first members of the King’s Guard to have the whiskers arrived on post this week, and personally, I think they look great.

Via the Welsh Guards:

Like it or lump it, the beards are here! Members of Number 2 Company proudly took up their posts on Kings Guard this morning, marching from Wellington Barracks to Buckingham Palace and St James’s Palace.

The new Army regulation says beard length must be between grade 1 (2.5mm) and grade 8 (25.5mm) and well-kept, which, sadly, means you won’t have a return to the days of the old “grenadier’s beards” of the 19th century.

British Colour Sergeant and Private of the Grenadier Guards 1855 Buckingham Palace 1853 enfield IWM Q 71602

1861 India Agra Black Watch 42nd Regiment Royal Highlanders with Enfields, P53 Alkazi Collection

CRIMEAN WAR 1854-56 (Q 71630) Charles Manners, William Webster and Henry Lemmen of the Grenadier Guards. Copyright: © IWM. Original Source: http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205018817

Joseph Numa, John Potter and James Deal, three soldiers of the Coldstream Guards. Crimean War, 1854-56

Grenades, Tommy Guns, Whatever…

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Official caption: “Tommy Gun Motor Cyclists. Grenadier Guards, famous the world over, are now, as part of their mechanization, equipped with motorcycles on which Tommy guns are mounted. A guardsman on his Tommy-gun-equipped motorcycle. A guardsman of 1st Battalion, Grenadier Guards, 7th Guards Brigade, 3rd Division, 5th Corps, Swanage, 9 April 1941.”

Taken by LT. E G. Malindine IWM H 8827

Livgarde and Livgardet in Reception

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We’ve talked about the Swedish Livgardet and Danish Kongelige Livgarde a few different times over the years, as, well, they deserve it. Besides being historic frontline combat units with a long history, and their current dual-hatting as royal guards on public duties while training to fight if things go sideways, they just look great doing it.

Case in point, the Swedish Livgardet late last month fell in for a state reception for King Felipe VI of Spain, complete with their 6.5mm Carl Gustav-made Mausers and bearskin grenadiers helmets.

Likewise, the Danish Livgarde, complete with horse soldiers of the Gardehusarregiment, assembled for a state reception for new ambassadors to Copenhagen. Always nice to see the traditional hussar pelisse hanging over the shoulder of braided dolmans. Of note, the foot guards are in their scarlet gala tunics and bearskins rather than the more commonly seen black tunics. The red tunics are only for special occasions such as royal birthdays.

In other, related news, the British Army’s five regiments (actually just single battalions) of foot guards will continue to use bearskin grenadiers’ hats after testing found a synthetic replacement, proposed by animal rights wackos at PETA and urged on by Pam Anderson of all people, “didn’t meet the standards required.”

1st Battalion Irish Guards for a special St Patrick’s Day Parade today at their Barracks in Hounslow, 3.16.2017. MOD photo by Sgt. Rupert Frere.

Some 110 replacement ceremonial caps were purchased by the MOD in 2020 at a cost of £145,000, with the fur coming from Canada’s black bear cull surplus– in other words, pelts that would have been harvested regardless of the Guards. 

Some 14 nations still have bearskin caps in use for military dress uniforms, a practice picked up in most respects from Napoleon’s Old Guard. 

Grenadiers of Napoleon’s Imperial Guard, by Hippolyte Bellangé, 1843

The shattered Guards at Inkerman, a special Combat Gallery Sunday

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the-roll-callelizabeth-thompson1874

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Calling the Roll After An Engagement, Crimea, by Elizabeth Thompson, Lady Butler.

Painted in 1874, currently in the Royal Collection. The painting depicts a roll call of soldiers from the Grenadier Guards during the Crimean War following the Battle of Inkerman 5 November 1854– some 163 years ago today.

In the dramatic and almost forgotten battle, some 70,000 men of Russian Gen. Prince Alexander Menshikov fell on Lord Raglan’s 9,500 British soldiers and 3,500 French allies.

The horrible battle was one of the precursors to modern war and saw advanced (and brand new) British Pattern 1853 Enfield rifles and superior marksmanship triumph from elevated positions at Home Hill over waves of Russian infantry armed with smoothbore muskets more at home at Borodino, the allies came out on top.