One question for you. When you joined in 64 did you wear the new combats or the old battledress first?
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In 1964 the Army still pretty much looked like it did in the Korean war era.
Combat clothing was just coming on line. It was very scarce and was reserved for people in field units, and was only authorized for wear in the field, and not in garrison.
Field dress for us trainees and other ash and trash at the time was either black coveralls and/or bush clothing with the 1951 pattern webbing, which was exactly the same as the wartime pattern 1937 webbing except that it was OD in colour and had eyelets on the belt to attach the basic pouches and canteen and mess tin carriers. Footwear was the ankle boot with puttees-always a great delight.
I think the puttees, along with other Brit-like things like the Canadian Guards, was a Guy Simonds thing. Simonds was the Chief of General Staff, had been born in England, and rose to his wartime heights under British command and generally continued to ape the Brits-not necessarily a bad thing in some ways. From fall to spring we wore the standard wool battledress in garrison and in the field. This continued until the CF green uniform was issued to the Regular Force in 1969/70. The Militia got theirs later.
Bush dress included OD cotton trousers with 2 metal buckles and button fly with 3 loops for the P37 web belt with regimental buckle. You wore an open neck shirt with rolled sleeves and an armlet with rank badge and regimental flash. The bush jacket was the standard Korean War era style with 4 pockets and had regimental flashes and was even worn with medal ribbons. Both the Bush Dress and Battledress were made into things of beauty for wear in garrison. You would do things like starch the sh&t out of the bush pants and shirt and then chin yourself on the door so your buddy could slip on the trousers w/o breaking the crease before morning parade.
You kept different sets of uniforms for parade and the field. Ditto for the ankle boots. One pair of boots was made over into parade boots with pebbled leather surface buffed or spooned off, toecap inserted and a triple sole added with steel horseshoe heel cleats and a metal toecap for snappiness on the parade square. The damn things must have weighed 5 lbs each. Some guys would cut and have zippers put into the puttees to cut the time spent wrapping them every morning. To top things off, you would wear a set of lead weights in your trousers above the boots to give them a spiffy bloused look. Forage caps with corps colors were worn in garrison with both Battledress and Bush Dress. The other funny one was the Bush cap which had a folded up neckshade in the back, like the Foreign Legion or something. You had to buy a "birdcage" to insert in them to give them a squared away look.
Battledress was identical to what my dad wore in WW2, except that the collar was open and pressed down for wear with shirt and necktie. It was a pretty good looking uniform. I recall seeing one of our old WW2 Privates dressing up in his BD to get his release back around 1967 ( soldiers could continue to serve as a Private forever until the "Hellyer Cpl" thing came in and made them all into Cpls). He had been shot up during the war and spent many years on garrison duties, such as mess steward, cook's helper, hut slut, etc. I recall seeing him wearing a white shirt and black trousers or TW summer dress, but I had never seen him in Battledress. Anyway, he did show up to go for his release in his wartime battledress blouse, which fastened at the collar, and got a final tongue-in-cheek arse reaming from the Sgt-Maj for his idleness.
Our winter field gear was essentially Korean era, but it was good, especially the 1950 model parka with nylon shell and removable pile liner for drying. The parka which replaced this one was a disaster. It was intended to be worn over the combat coat-a very bad idea as the accumulated moisture would freeze in the non-removable liner. They went back to what was essentially the 1950 parka after this.
I refuse to comment on the CF Workdress/ Coca-Cola man abortion which came after this.
