Quote Originally Posted by Barb T.
Childhood nutrition is a significant factor in adult size - and I'm not talking about people being overweight. In the early part of the last century, childhood nutrition was comparatively poor for many people, and the average body size of British soldiers, for example, was smaller than it is today.

The bulkiness of modern American and British soldiers is unusal, historically-speaking. I don't mean fat - just muscle-bulky. If you watch movies of WWI or WWII, soldiers look almost universally scrawny by comparison. And, actually, it's quite striking how much bulkier American and British soliders are in comparison to Iraqi soliders, policemen, and citizens.

B
Excellent point, Barb! And to add to it, if one has ever been around uniforms from the 19th century, one will see positive proof of what Barb says -- the uniforms I worked with in the NPS would probably fit large children, but not the adults of today.

John Baynes devotes several pages of his book about the 2nd Scottish Rifles (Cameronians), "Morale: A Study of Men and Courage" to the nutitrition (or lack thereof) of Glaswegians, who made up the bulk of the Battalion. Whilst jokes about army food are very universal, Baynes maintains that to the average ranker, army food was ample, even though sometimes not the most apatizing!

It's also noteworthy that the Civil War was responsible for "off the rack" clothing, as the US Army introduced "generic" sizes (I, II, III and IV) to issue to troops.

Cheers,

Todd