"Officer sashes - colors?" Topic

IS there any evidence out there that officer sashes on either side were colours other than Red and Orange?

Yes-ish

Most portraits do conform to the standard red or pink for Royalists, orange for Parliament, but certainly there's a contemporary portrait of Cromwell wearing a silvery-white sash, during his Irish Campaign iirc. I vaguely remember seeing other contemporary portraits with the occasional blue or green sash.

King Charles is sometimes painted with a light blue sash- but this is the Order of the Garter.

I remember reading of an officer who wore a black sash in mourning after his friend was killed in battle.

It's been proposed that the 'other' regional Parliamentarian armies might have worn different colour sashes (eg blue for the Fairfaxes, green for Manchester, yellow for Waller) but I fear there's no evidence for or against.

Orange was the colour of the Earl of Essex and widely worn by his officers. Sir William Waller detested him and wore a blue sash and encouraged his troops to wear the same.
I suspect other regional armies wore different colours but it was often down to personal preference.

Hi RJBAJB,

interesting, I've not heard of Waller choosing blue before. Any idea where this is from?

Cheers,
Tim

There is a wargamers site called "The Gentlemans Wargames Parlour" (search on Google for "GWP3").
If you follow the period room page down to The Sir Philip Skippon Snooker Room, open that up, and look for a topic entitled "Thomas Fairfax Regiment at Worcester" there is an entire debate in regard to sash colours pre and post the first civil war.

Cheers Drillmaster,

I remember posting on that thread. Just checked back and we didn't really come to much in the way of hard and fast conclusions. Plenty of good ideas though!