Friday, 16 March 2007
Royal New Zealand Receives Prince Andrew
What monarchy does best. Prince Andrew, the Duke of York, was received by a 100-strong Royal Guard of Honour and 21-gun salute at the Trentham Military Camp today, as he performed an inspection of the Royal New Zealand Army Logistic Regiment, of which he is Colonel-in-Chief.
I've always liked the Kiwis' and Aussies' dress uniforms...British yet unique to their respective Dominions. Meanwhile, we in Canada adopted the dreadful "green hornet" uniform that looks more American than British.
ReplyDeleteRandy Andy looks good in a boy scout hat. Does NZ want him? I wouldn't mind if he would stay. Now if we could just get rid of that loony tunes Charlie and that nonsense he keeps scribbling the world would be a better place. BTW does Charlie get his ideas from a fern or an oak? Enquiring minds want to know.
ReplyDeleteDamn smart uniforms alright, little changed since the Great War. We've kept all our ceremonial dress unchanged as well, but some of our God-awful parade attire, which was Canadianized in the 70s and Americanized in the 80s should be relegated to the dust-bin of other failed and misguided nationalization projects.
ReplyDeleteHave they changed the protocol? Used to be that the guard would PRESENT ARMS for the reception of a royal instead of the SHOULDER ARMS this guard is maintaining. My Navy buddy lost all respect for the royals while serving in the Atlantic theatre. The royal yacht was in the area and it was deemed wise that the royal on the yacht would inspect the ship in a few days. The salts on board the Canadian ship polished ever part of that ship. The day of the inspection arrived with all hands on deck, turned out in dress whites. The royal yacht approached and it was announced to the ship's company that the royal was having her period and the visit was cancelled. The royal simply stood on the aft deck of the yacht and waved to assembled sailors as the yacht went by.
ReplyDeleteCould have probably done without parts of your story, but when has it ever been protocol to be inspected at the Present Arms?? You present arms for the royal salute, not for the inspection.
ReplyDeleteCould you please explain the heading "Royal New Zealand" for the slow ones among us please?
ReplyDeleteThe Aussies have the "digger hat", the Kiwis have the "lemon squeezer hat"...what would be appropriate dress headress for the Canadian Army? The Stetson was only used by cavalry units, and it is more related to the RCMP nowadays than the Army...a muskrat hat would be too hot for summer parade...I don't know what a distint Canadian military headress would be!
ReplyDeleteAs a retired US Army officer, I have to agree totally about hopw dreadful our service dress (Class A) uniform looks. You look like a bus driver with a medal fetish in that thing!
ReplyDeleteAnd that silly beret!!!
The full dress (dress blues), however, was always a sharp uniform when worn with a four in hand tie and garrison cap with branch color around the brim.
Amen to that, Splendor. I was thinking the exact same thing not that long ago. I was looking at the website for the Aussie Military Academy and marvelling at how sharp the commandant looked in his uniform. Then, for poops and giggles, I surfed over to RMC and looked at the commandant there. It is amazing how indescribably ugly his uniform is.
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