What is the Black Watch and What is a Royal Stewart

[figheadair]

Neither bagpipes nor music were banned either!

Or Gaelic.

[XenaTuba]

I am enjoying this thread. I have been in the process of choosing a tartan as my ancestry is of sufficiently muddled background that tracing the English, Irish, Welsh, Scottish and German heritage is very difficult. I am a retired LEO who worked 23 or so of my 28 years night time patrol, and have more or less settled on Black Watch (although my friend moosedog does have some RCMP tartan, and I have worked some with the RCMP...) I don't much care for the colors in the American Law Enforcement tartan.

[figheadair]

I am enjoying this thread. I have been in the process of choosing a tartan as my ancestry is of sufficiently muddled background that tracing the English, Irish, Welsh, Scottish and German heritage is very difficult. I am a retired LEO who worked 23 or so of my 28 years night time patrol, and have more or less settled on Black Watch (although my friend moosedog does have some RCMP tartan, and I have worked some with the RCMP...) I don't much care for the colors in the American Law Enforcement tartan.

If you opt for the Black Watch tartan be sure to search around for the various shade options available. To my mind it looks best in Wilsons of Bannockburn's shades.

[Kamilavalamp]

Neither bagpipes nor music were banned either!

You Mean BRAVEHEART was historically inaccurate!!?? lol

[OC Richard]

The Black Watch tartan is named after the regiment of the same name but that terminology dates from the mid-late 19th century. In the 18th century it was simply known as the Government Tartan and in the early 19th century the pattern was adopted by several clans that had early connections with the Independent Companies, the forerunner of the 43rd or Black Watch regiment. This was a popular tartan is the order books of the weaving firm Wilsons of Bannockburn which they sold as 42nd (the subsequent regimental number of the Black Watch) which is why it too is often regarded as a universal tartan.

What many people don't realize is that a large number of Highland regiments were raised in the 18th century and subsequently disbanded. Most of these wore the Government Tartan.

Government tartan worn by the 77th Foot (Montgomery's Highlanders) 1757-1763



Barnes gives a list of twenty Highland regiments raised and disbanded between 1745 and 1800.

The de-kilting of a number of Highland regiments in 1809 left only five kilted regiments: the 42nd, 78th, 79th, 92nd, and 93rd, two of which wore the Government tartan, two others that tartan with additional overstripes. Only the 79th wore an unrelated tartan.

The point is that many people's modern one-to-one linking of the Government tartan to the Royal Highland Regiment is not historically correct.

The Scots Guards pipers, by the way, wear Government tartan bag-covers.

The Prince Charles Edward Stuart tartan of the old 72nd Highlanders survived in the army until 1994, when the creation of The Highlanders finally saw the elimination of the PCES rear drone ribbons of the pipers. These had been worn by the pipers of the 1st Battalion Seaforth Highlanders post-1881 and the pipers of The Queens Own Highlanders until 1994.

The PCES tartan as worn by the 72nd Highlanders, who wore tartan trousers rather than the kilt.



A Seaforth Highlanders piper in the 1950s wearing the PCES rear drone ribbon

[blackwatch70]

yes, It is sad that the Highlanders lose reminiscences of 72nd regiment in the unform of their pipers...
Usually it is regimental pipers who were a tradition keepers after multiple amalgamations...

[tundramanq]

Rereading the Act with a lawyers (barristers) eye really clears this up for me. It appears these purveyors of law have been confusing (and misleading) the public and many enforcers of law for a very long time. To the point that it has become tradition.