When to Tip or Remove Ones' Hat

[Chas]

In the UK, you remove your hat -

When passing or being passed by a funeral cortège (one also stops walking and stands still).

When walking through a lychgate at the entrance to a churchyard. Not necessarily in the churchyard itself.

When one is part of a funeral procession. Mourners, following the coffin are bare headed, but the gravediggers, (standing to one side, waiting for the internment to finish) are not.

Regards

Chas

[Chas]

Memories come flooding back -

When passing or being passed by marching troops, one removes one's hat. If they are carrying colours, one also stops walking and faces the colours.

For some reason that I cannot remember, one removes one's hat when passing a woman pushing a baby carriage - regardless, of whether the woman is a maid, nanny or the mother.

When church-bells sound in the middle of the day, it usually means there is a funeral. At some point in the ringing the tenor bell will toll out the years of the persons life (the angelus if the deceased is a child). Hats are removed during the tolling of the years.

Regards

Chas