Home


HISTORY - UNIFORM

1813 Pattern Leather Infantry Cap

Early in 1814 a new, smaller Infantry plate was improved, and it found its way onto the Type II caps. A sketch of some infantry caps made in the winter of 1814-15 is shown here, would be a good indicator of what the cap looked like at the end of the war. It is a Type II, with the new plate cut in an oval, and cords still hung in the "U". The depiction of an oval plate is backed up with archaeological evidence.

There are some variations with the new plates. Some are oval, some rectangular, some have perforations for attachment wires, and some have soldered wires on the back to fit into slits cut in the leather. But, in all these cases the eagle depicted on the enlisted manÕs version seems to have a smaller head, and is sitting on clouds, while the eagle on the officerÕs version has a head and does not sit on clouds.

Artist and spy, Charles Hamilton Smith, was in New York just after the war. He depicted some infantry he observed who where using the colors of the 25th Infantry Regiment, in what was probably May or June 1815.