Original Item: Only One Available. Always considered one of the most romantic styles of British Cavalry Helmets the 12th Lancer’s principal color was bright red.
Raised by BRIGADIER GENERAL PHINEAS BOWLES in July 1715 to face the threat of the Jacobite Rebellion the Lancers has become some of the most famous Cavalry Regiments in the British Army. Even the Duke of Wellington served as a Subaltern (Lieutenant) in the 12th
Lancers between 1789 and 1791.
The Regiment saw service in Egypt in 1801, the Peninsula War 180911813 followed by Waterloo in 1815. It served in the Crimean War in the 1850s, the Boer War of 1899-1901, WW1 and WW2 where they served in France in 1940, evacuated at Dunkirk, went to Egypt, fought at El Alamein against Field Marshall Rommel and chased the Germans all the way up Italy by the end of the conflict. They actually retired the horses and moved to Armored Cars in 1928.
This helmet, built of hard leather, features a huge brass helmet plate showing multiple Battle honors which date it’s issue to just post 1902. It features a Red Horse Hair plume and comes with brass interlocking ring chin scales the leather from which is now absent. One small suspension ring for the chin scales is missing from the Lion Head mount over the left ear so the chin scales are shown in the rest position for when the helmet is not being worn. This is a very nice example of perhaps the most colorful of Britain’s Lancer Chapka Helmets.