Page 4 CLOTHING

RCMP INSIGNIA RCMP Clothing

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RCMP INSIGNIA

RCMP UNIFORMS

RCMP clothing

page 4

Here is a red serge, corporal rank. Based on a tag inside, this dates from 1981.

It has the GRC RCMP shoulder titles, the collar dogs, 2 stars on the left shoulder each indicating 5 years of service, the corporal chevrons on the upper right sleeve and the rifle marksmanship badge on the lower left sleeve.

While this is a bit old, it has no rips, tears etc.

Since there are clothing items from several ranks pictured here, note the number of people holding each rank as of October 2013, per the RCMP web site:

Commissioner 1

Deputy Commissioner 6

Assistant Commissioner 27

Chief Superintendent 58

Superintendent 170

Inspector 380

Corps Sergeant Major 1

Sergeants Major 3

Staff Sergeants Major 15

Staff Sergeants 862

Sergeants 2,015

Corporals 3,586

Constables 11,566

Special Constables 68

ON THE RIGHT --------

Here is an RCMP officer's tunic with Superintendent rank shoulder insignia.

Note the blue around the cuffs and the all-blue collar, to distinguish an officer from a distance.

It has no tag inside.

STILL LOOKING FOR any size red serge for the NCO ranks I am missing.

BELOW -- Constable's serge; tag inside is dated 2004;

note it has buttons on the lower pockets and the lower pocket flaps go straight across with no fancy curves.

.

ABOVE -- Constable's serge; no metal insignia and no buttons on the lower pockets; dated 1997.

ABOVE - Constable's serge; no metal insignia; dated 1979

ABOVE - older (but undated) sergeant's serge.

ABOVE -- closeup of the gold mylar chevrons and crown.

ABOVE -- closeup of the sergeant's

marksmanship badges.

ABOVE -- closeup of the

sergeant's 5 year stars.

Each star indicates 5 years of service. In police departments that use some type of badges or patches on the sleeves to indicate years of service, it is not unusual for the rookies to be referred to as slick sleeved due to having no indication of years of service.

ABOVE - serge from 1943; King's Crown above the sergeant chevrons and on all the buttons; King's Crown collar badges

ABOVE - a closeup of the gold wire chevrons and King's Crown

ABOVE -- RCMP button from the top pictured red serge, from 1981

ABOVE - Here is a pic of the female red serge/tunic, first issued when women graduated from Depot in 1975. Besides being a different design from the male version of the serge, the buttons are sewn on the left side of the tunic as they typically are on womens’ clothing.

It was worn with a white turtleneck and a skirt. I have only the tunic. The ladies also wore pumps instead of the high boots for many years.

This ladies' version of the red serge was used until 1990 or 1991. I am unable to pin down precisely when this uniform became obsolete – if you know, pls tell me so I can update my information.

When this serge and the female version of the forage cap became obsolete, the ladies started to wear the male version of the red serge and the standard issue forage cap, and this continues to this day.

In another pic on my web site, I have a decent pic of the obsolete duty cap worn by the ladies in times past. It would make sense that the dates when both the tunic and the hat became obsolete, would be the same, but I don’t know if that is the case. Any information is appreciated.

ABOVE - Staff Sergeant serge; dated 1974.

ABOVE -- officer's mess dress. All the buttons have the RCMP crest. The lapels have the standard collar dogs.

ABOVE -- shoulder metal for the mess dress --

Note the lack of color on the small mess dress sized crown and pip.

Other than the gold/brass color -- there is no red in the crown and no red plus green leaves on the pip.

The mess dress crown and pips, and the crossed sword and baton items, are smaller than those

items used on the shoulders of the serges and the pips generally have no words on them; the larger size pips on

serges have the words, Tria Juncta in Uno.

ABOVE -- the vest for the mess dress; again, all the

buttons have the RCMP crest; the back color is the

red serge color.

ABOVE -- officer's white gloves

ABOVE -- Red serge blazer, worn by vets

ABOVE - life size cardboard cut-out standing poster of a mountie wearing the red serge. This measures approximately 5 feet 9 inches high (27 cm) and is approx. 30 inches across (12 cm) at the widest part.

ABOVE - cape chain fastener

BELOW -- old style RCMP brown serge, Sergeant rank. Has the older style shoulder flash. The lower left sleeve shows the badges for rifle and revolver marksmanship, plus Musical Ride. Tag inside says 1980.

BELOW 2 pics -- closeups of the RCMP sergeant chevrons and the left sleeve badges.

When a Member is assigned to the Musical Ride, that badge is worn

on the right shoulder. After the tour of duty is completed, the Member

wears the badge on the lower left sleeve as shown above.

BELOW -- old blue RCMP coat for a superintendent -- the pic after this shows the shoulder insignia. The collar dogs are gold plated brass (gilt). No tag inside to date this one.

BELOW -- a closeup of the blue RCMP Superintendent coat just above, showing the shoulder insignia, a collar dog and the sewn on ribbon for the Long Service Good Conduct medal with 2 silver stars for 30 years of service. You can also see the RCMP crest on the buttons. The belt for this is hanging from the hanger.

ABOVE -- a closeup of the RCMP Superintendent's ribbon with attached bar.

BELOW -- RCMP loose metal bars with 1, 2 and 3 stars, which go on the 20 years of service ribbon pictured above. Each star added to the ribbon indicates an additional 5 years of service. The bars are bronze, silver and gold, respectively. In the pic above, the ribbon has the silver bar with 2 stars.

ABOVE -- a loose unsewn thin ribbon for the RCMP Long Service Good Conduct award, to attach to the uniform; no pin on the back since it is to be sewn on.

BELOW -- a closeup of the shoulder insignia on the RCMP Superintendent's coat.

ABOVE -- closeup of one of the RCMP Superintendent's gold plated (gilt) collar dogs. Note the lack of any enamel. Their use was discontinued around 1964.

BELOW - an old pea coat for a Staff Sergeant. It has RCMP shoulder insignia though you can't see that. The inside is bright red. Almost looks like you could reverse the coat and have it double as a red serge (just kidding). Inside the coat is a tag with the date of 1964. A closeup of the chevrons is below this pic.

ABOVE -- a closeup of the chevrons on the RCMP pea coat - plus you can see the RCMP crest on a nearby button.

BELOW -- old RCMP nylon Patrol jacket with prior issue shoulder flash. No tag with a date on this one. STILL NEED a current style Patrol jacket - blue in color with the black and green POLICE tabs.

ABOVE - regimental parka from 1987. Has no shoulder badges.

ABOVE - commissioned officer's shirt

ABOVE -- some RCMP duty shirts. The current style one is at far Right.

ABOVE -- old clip-on duty tie with issued tie bar.

ABOVE - the first issued tie clip, adopted in 1951 - the gold colored bars seen at center clip to the back of the tie. This tie clip, and the second issue tie clip pictured just below, are pictured and mentioned on page 397 of Dr. Boulton's book on Force insignia (referenced on Page 1 of my site).

ABOVE -- here is the second issue tiebar - from the 1950s

ABOVE - more recent tie clip; a tie tac using this same center crest was also an issued item.

ABOVE & BELOW -- older yellow traffic jacket. The gray stripes are highly reflective.

ABOVE - front view of an older style yellow traffic jacket.

ABOVE -- Top Row -- newer style green traffic jacket. It says RCMP GRC Police on front and back.
Bottom Row - green Auxiliary traffic vest. It's hard to read the letters on the front of the vest; they say RCMP GRC Auxiliary Auxiliaire just like on the back.

ABOVE -- nylon vest -- goes over the head and closes with the velcro straps on both sides. This says the same thing on the back. Unsure when this came out, but due to the bilingual letters, likely after 1974. Still in use by plainclothes officers and is known as a raid bib. Used during raids, searches, etc.

ABOVE - a pullover jacket used by bicycle-riding Members, from the 1990s.

ABOVE - a shirt worn by bomb techs and others; a close-up pic of the shoulder emblem is below.

ABOVE - the shoulder patch used on the above shirt.

Because of the number of pictures I have of clothing items, there is another page, Page 4A, that has more pictures of clothing items.

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