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Superb piece of work Jim! The "Bejabers, Boys I have the Cuckoo!" is a source of bitter debate among many former Faughs. A dear old friend, who is a Trustee of the Royal Irish Fusiliers Museum, is driven to the verge of apoplectic rage whenever it is suggested that Pat Masterson might have...

Sorry folks, PEDANTRY ALERT! Neal it is the 27th (Inniskilling) Regiment. The regiment was raised in Enniskillen, but always used the Anglicised phonetic spelling of the of the old Gaelic Inis Ceithleann. Same goes for the Dragoons; always Inniskilling.

The sprigs are a little miserly for the Micks, Bob.

Back in the late 1980s I was posted to be Adjutant of one of our TA battalions, which had a rifle company at Movilla Camp in Newtownards. I knew that Paddy Mayne was buried in the nearby cemetery and combined my first visit to the company with a visit to see his grave. Sadly the plot, a family...

It is said that as the Army left the battlefield a senior officer of Wellington's staff had asked his ADC why the Innsikillings had not yet followed the order to march off and were still in square. His ADC replied, "The Inniskillings are killed, m'Lord."

None died of wounds, Alan. A remarkable statistic given the mortality numbers of the day. Wellington wrote of the Inniskillings that they saved the centre of his line at Waterloo and it is certainly the case that they had to 'stand and take it'. The commanding officer of a neighbouring...

Important point, Neil. Far from impossible, I think it likely that senior officers would have their tailors run up their own, more comfortable, BD and these would tend to further compromise the standards of pattern that production scales would already have smashed. It is interesting that the...

The following shows Shan Hackett with staff officers' cap-badge, Roy Urquhart with general officers' cap-badge and Monty, ever the drama queen, wearing a PARA cap-badge. All wear gorgets by virtue of their rank.

Sadly, no matter which way you look at this, the bust is wrong. The British Army stopped its staff officers (GSOs) wearing staff gorgets after the Great War (Where the distinction became to be viewed as toxic and counter to the cohesion of the Army). Thereafter and since, the staff gorget has...

Thanks Mick. I'll get in touch. I think your sculptor has fallen a little foul of the distinctions between the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers and its associated militia/territorial battalions. The figure looks like a pretty good representation of an Inniskillings piper c1900 with the exception...

If I might chip in, as one who wore the caubeen for more than 30 years, the texture of this one is far too pronounced. The caubeens reintroduced in 38 (Irish) Brigade during the Italian campaign were cut from the greatcoats of Italian prisoners, but later were made either from rough serge...

I'm guessing that its a Benghazi Burner; a tin of sand which is doused in petrol and used to brew up his mug of tea. I used one in BATUS in the late 80s - brilliant for keeping the bottom of your trench warm too.

The pedant in me couldn't let it go, but Victoria didn't come to the throne for another 30-odd years. This would be a Georgian subject.

Constantine, The Colours of the 1st Battalion of the 24th Foot, which you have shown, were carried from the field by Lts Melville and Coghill and did not become the centre-piece of any last stand. The details of how the 2 officers came to leave such a desperate battle are the subject of...

Agree on the excellent work - superb stuff from both Jose and Pepe. I was a young TA officer cadet in the early 80s with the Mercian Volunteers and was attending my first dinner night when I was challenged to go and ask the RSM why the 2nd Battalion of his Regiment (The Staffords) were known...

Surprised Mick didn't add that the 89th of Foot wore black facings, too. Later to become 2nd Battalion, the Royal Irish Fusiliers.

Andy, the wounded bloke's left arm is wrong. It needs to be the other side of the carrier's head and neck to form a stable carrying position. This would allow the carrier to bring his own left hand between the wounded bloke's legs and across his own chest to grasp the wounded bloke's left hand...

Great stuff Andy - but 1 small thing. There's no way they would fetch him out and leave his weapon behind.

The War in Bosnia? Like Martin64, I was there. Unlike him, I won't bite my tongue. It wasn't a war, it was murder writ large. Mladic's Bosnian Serbs weren't the only murderers, but murderers they undoubtedly were. If you've ever stood in a hamlet with the stench of burnt-out homes and their...

Don McCullin's 'Shell-shocked US Marine' in 150mm.