The Guard, Royal Horse Artillery, 1895 (c)

Glass negative, W Gregory and Company, 51 Strand, London, 1895 (c).

This image comes from a collection of glass plate negatives associated with William Gregory and Company. The negatives depict the British Army, including some members of the colonial forces, 'at home' in Britain during the 1890s.

As well as being intimate portraits of soldiers from this era, the images provide detailed illustrations of uniforms worn during the high point of military tailoring.

All four soldiers are wearing the same full dress uniform. The bombardier stands on the left of the image, distinguished by the chevron on his upper right sleeve. Their full dress caps (busby) are made of black fur with a red cloth bag covering the top of the cap and extending down the right side, with white plumes made of horsehair. These caps are held on with a chin chain of black leather, and yellow cord caplines loop round onto the breast. Their highly decorative Hussar-style full dress tunics are dark blue with red facings on their collars. They have several buttons with double cord braids of yellow worsted across the front with a loop at each end.

Their dark blue pantaloons have a broad red stripe down the outside seam, and are worn tucked into black riding boots with spurs attached. They wear white gloves and hold their swords aloft with the scabbards hanging from the slings of their white leather sword belts. Another soldier in undress can be seen in the background.

One of a collection of 280 glass negatives, associated with W Gregory and Company, London, and F G O Stuart, 1892 (c)-1900.