"91st Foot Lace Colour" Topic

Back to the 91st Foot!

Different sources show silver or gold lace for the officers. The older ones tend to say silver and the newer ones gold.

Franklin says silver until 1805 then gold.
The regimental history says gold was adopted in the reign of William IV (1830s).

Does anyone have anything definitive for the Peninsular war period?

Here are following references that I found that support silver officers' lace:
Haythornthwaite, Uniforms of the Peninsular Wars 1807-1814, silver officer's lace;
Windrow & Embleton, Military Dress of the Peninsular War, 1808-1814, silver as well;
Lawson, A History of The Uniforms of The British Army Vol V, silver;
Hamilton-Smith, Wellington's Army: The Uniforms of the British Soldier, 1812-1815, silver.
The preponderance of reliable evidence supports silver lace for the 91st Foot during the Peninsular War.

Mont St Jean site shows silver as well

Franklin is not the most reliable source.

IronDuke, Thanks for looking. I had seen those but wondered if they were based on Hamilton-Smith which isn't always correct.

My guess is that they were silver (based on the regimental history) but would be very interested in Dibble's thoughts as he has gold on his schematic. I haven't found any portraits from the period- only one for 1828-32 which has gold lace.

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Another update. I had a look at the regimental history again and two pages earlier, it states that in 1803, the officers' epaulettes were changed from silver to gold! Could they have had gold epaulettes and silver lace? Seems unlikely.

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Iron Duke:

Here are following references that I found that support silver officers' lace:
Haythornthwaite, Uniforms of the Peninsular Wars 1807-1814, silver officer's lace;
Windrow & Embleton, Military Dress of the Peninsular War, 1808-1814, silver as well;
Lawson, A History of The Uniforms of The British Army Vol V, silver;
Hamilton-Smith, Wellington's Army: The Uniforms of the British Soldier, 1812-1815, silver.
The preponderance of reliable evidence supports silver lace for the 91st Foot during the Peninsular War.

So! going by those listed above. the 30th had Bastion single lace? And in Lawton's book, (though not in the Peninsula) the 98th were single and silver button/lace?

What about the 31st, 58th, 70th, 78th button/lace? And there's the 100th (County of Dublin) Regiment (1802-1812) and 103rd who are shown as having silver button/lace rather than gold with the button/lace spacing for the 103rd being singles rather than in pairs.

So, "The preponderance of reliable evidence" isn't that at all!

One should be very careful when relying on multiple references who all take their evidence from the same source.

PS. I say 'go for gold'

42Flanker

Franklin is not the most reliable source.

Unfortunately, he uses the same old source of De Bosset/Hamilton-Smith. Even the Pearse list is incomplete and suspect.

I'm with Dibble & the partial reference to gold epaulettes in the regimental history on this one.

Just had a look at Dibble's post with all the uniform pictures and it looks to me like the Marcuard schematics from 1819 show gold so it looks like gold is the answer.

I checked my photos of the tremendous collection of notes/images done by Rev. Sumner – today in possession of the ASKB.

Here you find the 1st page of his notes regarding the 91st Regiment:

There you also find the change of silver to gold in 1803.

Greetings from Berlin
Markus Stein

@Dibble: as I just finalize my speech about "field uniforms of the British in 1815" I would appreciate to get in contact with you – I would be glad if you may contact me via stein AT napoleon-online.de

Markus: It would be better if you contact me at dibble201@hotmail.com

Thanks very much. Coincidentally I've spent a lot of today reading the Reverend Sumner's articles in the JSAHR and they seem very well researched. Are the papers available online?

Lots and lots of excellent JSAHR articles by The Rev. Percy Sumner available via JSTOR online. (95 pages showing each theoretically with 25 articles – I didn't get to the last page, only as far as page 10).

You can register for an independent account if you don't have access via an institution (Read up to six articles every 30 days online for free. Note that they have temporarily increased the number of articles you can read online for free from 6 to 100.):
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The papers I had at ASKB were his notes and sketches and as you said, he was one of the contributors to the JSAHR with profound knowledge about the British Army.

At the ASKB they have several volumes with his notes/sketches about the infantry and cavalry plus a volume with plates (a friend of mine made photos of during another visit at ASKB). None of them is available online.

And thanks for the JSTOR hint – I got some volumes of JSAHR, but a lot is missing. Not only the articles but particularly the smaller notes are very interesting.

Greetings
Markus Stein

If you live in Scotland, you can get full access to JSTOR through registering as a reader with the National Library of Scotland. It's free- you just have to have proof of address. There may be equivalents in other countries.

Markus: I stupidly forgot the @ in your address, thus couldn't contact you. I highlighted the address you posted above using the 'AT'…Silly bloody old me!

PS.
I'm a fully paid-up member of JSAHR. It's excellent. I get a quarterly booklet and invites to meetings and dinners, but unfortunately, I have been unable to attend either. Perhaps I should?

One for Dibble. I found this miniature of an officer of 91st. It is odd in that the facings aren't yellow and the uniform looks more like the 1793 coat but the buttons and belt plate say 91 and are gilt. Any thoughts? Could the yellow have changed colour with time?

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I've done a bit more research and am wondering if this is a picture of an officer from an earlier 91st regiment. There was a 91st (Shropshire Volunteers) raised in 1779 and disbanded in 1783. I have one reference which implies that the facings were green and the collar/ lapels in the painting look like those of the 1780s. That would also tie in with the artist's age.

Trockledockle

A very nice and interesting miniature. Thanks! I'll put it in my collection