Welsh Regiment cap insignia

[Simon J Emmerson]

Hi. I'm intrigued as to why this Welsh Regiment Pte would have the union flag wrapped around his Service Cap. 

Could he be part of a Recruitment Party? 

Has it been added for end of war celebrating? 

I've enclosed a full photograph & close up of Head & Shoulders. 

[mark holden]

I would favour end of the war noting his five overseas service chevrons, slip on titles combined with the Union Flag around his cap band.

Edited 25 March , 2020 by mark holden

[FROGSMILE]

I've not seen a union flag used in that way before, but for over 2-hundred years it had been convention for recruiters and recruiting parties to wear red, white and blue cockades and streamers affixed to hats and caps and wrapped around the drums of those 'beating up' recruits (as it was called).  I can't see that he was doing it for no reason at all, so it does seem a possibility that he was part of a recruiting party and wearing the flag in lieu of streamers.  I agree with Mark that it might also simply be a celebratory photograph marking the end of the war and his 'miraculous' (given 5 OS stripes) survival.

Edited 25 March , 2020 by FROGSMILE

[Dave1418]

He didn’t get off that easily judging by his wound stripe but very luck non the less

[FROGSMILE]

1 hour ago, Dave1418 said:

He didn’t get off that easily judging by his wound stripe but very luck non the less

We don’t know if he was an infantryman for the whole war, as over its course a great many men were combed out from the support corps to feed the infantry machine denuded by attrition, but if he was in an infantry unit from 1914-1918 his survival, regardless of wounding, must be relatively extraordinary.  The statistical likelihood of survival in the infantry over a substantial period of time was, and still is, proportionality very low.

Edited 25 March , 2020 by FROGSMILE