Side drum, Royal Green Jackets, Army Cadets, 1975 (c)

Military side drum with wooden counterhoops, 14 inch skin heads, rope-tensioned with rectangular leather braces. The counterhoops have 8 drilled holes through which the tensioning rope passes. Adjustable snare with 16 twisted wire snares.

Side drums, also known as snare drums, were historically used on the battlefield because the piercing sounds they produced could cut through all the noise.

This 1975 drum, used by the Army Cadets, has a printed label bearing the regimental cap badge of the Royal Green Jackets: a bugle horn, the traditional emblem of rifle and light infantry regiments, mounted on a Maltese Cross derived from the badges of its predecessors the King's Royal Rifle Corps and the Rifle Brigade. Battle honours are listed on the arms of the cross. The naval crown at the base of the cross commemorates the Rifle Brigade's service at Copenhagen in 1801.