The Royal Scots Dragoon Guards

The Royal Scots Dragoon Guards (Carabiniers and Greys), to give its full name, is a rather interesting outfit, being Scotland’s only cavalry regiment and indeed the senior Scottish regiment in the entire British Army. The oldest antecedents of the regiment date back to the late 1600s, though it only took its current form as SCOTS DG (the official abbreviation) in 1971. The unit’s cap badge displays the French Imperial Eagle captured by the Scots Greys (the main antecedent of the current regiment) at Waterloo. More interestingly, however, is that the cap badge is always, even to this day, worn on a black facing, in mourning for Czar Nicholas II.

The Czar was Colonel-in-Chief of the Scots Greys from 1894 until his grizly murder at the hands of the Bolsheviks. Indeed, at regimental dinners at which the band is present, ‘God Save the Czar’, the old Russian Imperial Anthem, is still played in memory of His Imperial Majesty and his family. In 1998, the Commanding Officer and a regimental party were present at the interrment of the Czar’s remains in St. Petersburg. The Czar is pictured above in his uniform as Colonel-in-Chief of the regiment. Unique amongst the British cavalry regiments, the full dress uniform of the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards includes the bearskin cap, a privilege inherited from the Scots Greys.

The Scots Greys were also the subject of one of Lady Elizabeth Butler’s great paintings, ‘Scotland Forever!’ (below, and in larger form here), depicting their charge at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815 and further described here by our own Man About Mayfair. Of course, the fact which we have no doubt will bring even greater reknown to the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards is its privilege of counting the great William Calderhead, M.A. (Hons), St Andrews 2004, among its officers.