THE YPRES TIMES 197
In bygone days the Colours were the rallying point in battle of each British regi
ment, and round them the last stand was always made. Indeed, a regiment's colours are
very largely that regiment's history and further, when one considers the countries
and the causes in which these colours have been unfurled, they become nothing less
than an epitome of the history of the British Empire during the last three centuries.
The Suffolks, Cheshires and Marines.
In some fashion the Sovereign's birthday has always been observed for many
centuries wherever a British regiment is to be found, and it has usually been associated
with the Colour. Some variations there are, according to tie regiment's own customs.
Among the most interesting of these exceptional celebrations is that of the 1st
Battalion, the Suffolk Regiment, the old 12th of the Line. On the King's Birthday
red and yellow roses are worn on the headgear of all ranks, and the drums and colours
are decorated in the same way. By a train of reasoning which strikes one as somewhat
Irish for so essentially an English regiment, the roses are not worn in honour of the
King, but in commemoration of Dettingen Day. The Suffolks do not celebrate the actual
date of the battle by any ceremonial, but at Dettington in 1743, King George II, the
last King of England who personalty led his troops into battle, placed himself at the
head of the 12th Foot. Hence the time-honoured birthday roses.
The oak sprigs, which the Cheshire Regiment wear in their headgear on the King's
Birthday, together with an oak wreath on their colours, are also in memory of Dettingen,
where the 22nd Foot saved the King's life under an oak tree in the thick of the battle.
In many places, both at home and abroad, infantry regiments Troop the Colour
on the King's Birthday, and a distinctive ceremony is that of the Royal Marines, who
troop one of their divisional Regimental Colours.
The Navy's Parade."
At the principal naval commands also the Royal Navy parade their King's
Colour with ceremonial which is in all essentials the same as that of the Foot Guards
on the Horse Guards' Parade. It was only in 1923 that the King approved the use
of the White Ensign with the Royal cipher as the King's Colour for the Navy but,
new as the actual colours may be, they seem already to embody all the ancient traditions
of the sea service.
George IV. took part in no parade. In 1822, although his birthday fell on 12th
August, he kept it more or less appropriately on St. George's Day, when the morning
was ushered in with the customary demonstrations of rejoicing." It was a general
holiday, and the King himself, in field marshal's uniform, held a Drawing Room from
twelve to five, when a most splendid and costly gathering assembled, headed by an
extraordinary large number of bishops, with the Archbishop of Canterbury, who delivered
a lengthy address."
King George's Addition.
In the early years of Queen Victoria's reign there was a special Birthday Drawing
Room, and the Guards and the Postmen received new uniforms. There were also illu
minations at night, the last being a great feature, since the clubs, public buildings and
West-End shops vied with each other in splendour and brilliance, especially when
the new inflammatory agent, gas, was available."
In the forties there were military inspections on the Horse Guards' Parade by
the Prince Consort on the birthday," though there is no mention of the Queen's Colour
being trooped. After the Crimean War the ceremony seems to have begun to take the
present form, although the Queen herself was rarely, if ever, present. The Duke of
Cambridge, or one of the Princes, usually took the salute on her behalf.
King George, in 1914, initiated a very popular addition to the ceremony. For the
first time he rode off the parade at the head of his own guard, attended only by those of
his escort who were themselves Guards officers. It has now become a marked and appro
priate feature of the fine ceremony, and one which acquires added beauty and grandeur
with the passing of years. H. B.