Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2012 March 20

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March 20

Australian hats

The article Hat says a brim is "an optional projection of stiff material from the bottom of the hat's crown horizontally all around the circumference of the hat." This has the benefit, in many types of hats with brims (boonies, bowlers, fedoras, homburgs, panamas, stetsons, pith helmets. porkpies, sombreros, and stetsons) of shielding not only the top of the head, but also the ears and neck from sun and rain. The Australian soldier's hat pins the brim on the left side to the crown, exposing the left ear and neck to sun and rain, such that the man might as well wear a beret. forage cap, baseball cap or fez for all the good his left side receives. What is the origin and purpose of this hat style? Is it just an affectation of style, or does it serve an important purpose? Does it result in a funny looking one sided "hat tan?" The article Slouch hat says the Aussies and some others pinned the brim on one side "so that rifles could be held at the slope without damaging the brim." What does this mean? Is there a picture of such a soldier holding his weapon "at the slope" where it would have hit the hat, a problem I haven't heard of as experienced by WW1 Doughboys wearing campaign hats without one side pinned up, or by US cavalry troops post-Civil War who also wore broad brimmed hats. Was it common for US soldiers wearing broad brimmed hats to pin them up to avoid hitting them with the rifle barrel or bayonet? Edison (talk) 02:28, 20 March 2012 (UTC)

I found Hardee hat as an example of a US Civil war hat with a brim pinned up on one side (left side for infantry, right for cavalry and artillerymen. Why the difference?). It seems odd the practice was abandoned, if it was thought useful then. Shorter rifles? Different drill practice? Edison (talk) 02:49, 20 March 2012 (UTC)

According to this newspaper article, "according to Mr. A. K. Peacock, librarian of the Defense Department", it was indeed to avoid getting in the way of the rifle when shouldering arms on the right shoulder and to be able to "look the inspecting officer in the eye". It was originally pinned up on the right side. When the "slope arms" maneuver was introduced, with the rifle ending up on the left shoulder, the pinning was shifted to the left as well, or so the article claims. Clarityfiend (talk) 04:17, 20 March 2012 (UTC)

Yep, the sloped rifle was the reason. The hat is still used by the Australian Light Horse Regiment, who use more mechanical than hoofed means of transport these days. HiLo48 (talk) 04:39, 20 March 2012 (UTC)

Did they keep it pinned up during actual combat, or only for drills? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 11:13, 20 March 2012 (UTC)

I've seen old pics with the hat worn either way. Possibly a personal choice once one is in range of the enemy. I think it's pretty much reserved for ceremonial and formal usage these days. An additional popular feature is to adorn the hat with an emu feather. Don't think that would be a good idea in combat. (There's a lot of emus on the base where these guys do their early stage training, near where I work. I don't want to think too hard about how they collect the feathers!) HiLo48 (talk) 11:21, 20 March 2012 (UTC)

I've just looked through Hardee's Drill, in particular the manual of arms section starting page 29. This is the 1855 manual used by both sides in the US Civil War, and it shows a musket held on the left and right side in various parts of the drill. Books discussing the Hardee hat say it was generally abandoned early in the US Civil War. Hats were worn thereafter by US forces they were generally symmetrically brimmed. I am still curious how Aussie weapons or "slope arms" position were different from those of US soldiers, who accomplished them in many cases without pinning up a hat brim.US soldiers in WW1 drilled with a symmetrically brimmed campaign hat. Is there an online source showing the Aussie "slope arms" drill position? The Tricorn, with the brim pinned up left right and back seems like a possible antecedent for one sided pinning. The tricorner hat article says it shed rain to the front out of the face (but so would a symmetrically brimmed hat). It may have avoided knocking the hat off when the weapon was moved incautiously during drill, but it still seems like it was and is done mostly because it's cool looking and distinctive. Edison (talk) 13:57, 20 March 2012 (UTC)

I found this Member of the Irish Fórsa Cosanta Aitiúil at "shoulder arms" with a Lee Enfield rifle. Note that both the Irish and Australian armies followed the British drill tradition, and all used the Lee Enfield rifle through the first half of the 20th century. In the British system, the butt of the rifle is held horizontally, with the bolt assembly facing inwards (towards the left). I believe that the US follows the French system in holding the butt vertically, with the bolt upermost. Alansplodge (talk) 16:17, 20 March 2012 (UTC) Alansplodge (talk) 16:12, 20 March 2012 (UTC)

You are correct about the US way of holding a rifle. Dismas|^(talk) 07:46, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

But I was wrong about the French, they seem to hold theirs upside-down!. (They never do anything properly). Alansplodge (talk) 17:17, 22 March 2012 (UTC)

So did British forces using a rifle like the Enfield and drill techniques like the Aussies wear hats with brims, pinned or unpinned, during the period after the Aussies found it useful to pin the hat brim? Edison (talk) 15:06, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

Australian-style bush hats were worn by the British during the Burma campaign in the 1940s (see, eg, here), but flicking through some pictures, it seems that it was usually worn "down" with a normal all-around brim rather than one side pinned up. Shimgray | talk | 21:06, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

Yes, they replaced the Pith helmet for tropical wear in about 1942 or 43. My father arrived in India in 1943 with the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers, and was issued with a "Bagdhad Bowler"[1] (pith helmet) but almost straight away was issued with a bush hat to replace it. I have a photo of him with the brim turned up, although as you say, it seems to have been worn brim down in combat[2].

In answer to the question "is it possible to perform British-style drill in a broad-brimmed hat with the brim down?", the answer is yes, since the Royal Canadian Mounted Police still do ceremonial drill with the Lee-Enfield and with their very broad brimmed hat.[3] However, I imagine extra care is needed to avoid knocking one's own hat off. Alansplodge (talk) 12:22, 22 March 2012 (UTC)

Just out of interest, I found this photograph of Australian cavalry in England for Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee in 1897. Alansplodge (talk) 16:51, 22 March 2012 (UTC)

Thanks to all for the informative replies. I've seen old photos of farmers and construction workers with extreme "hat tans" (tanned dark up to an inch or so below the hat brim). I can imagine off-duty soldiers, or soldiers in civilian clothes, whether on leave or even trying to escape from behind enemy lines, being identified as Aussies, if they are tan on one side of the head and pale on the other, if civilians wore symmetrically brimmed hats. Edison (talk) 00:13, 23 March 2012 (UTC)

Archived document

Hello, may I request a full copy of the specified document for an article I'm writing? It was originally located here [4] though it looks like it has been removed. Is an archive of the document available? Thanks. An apple and orange (talk) 20:54, 20 March 2012 (UTC)

Hi. I'm afraid you're confusing this website (Wikipedia) with someone else. That document was on the website of the US Department of Justice. You may be able to contact them directly via their website, or use Google to search for the document, or find it on a site such as archive.org. --Colapeninsula (talk) 12:33, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

• http://www.epa.gov/compliance/resources/decrees/civil/cwa/unionpacific-cd.pdf is this the same document?--Canoe1967 (talk) 02:57, 23 March 2012 (UTC)

Hacking the Revision History.

I am confronted with the revison history under my name (Benyoch) showing three of four lines of edit that I did not do, on a certain day and time, as the revision history claims.

See here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Paterson%2C_New_South_Wales&diff=482506560&oldid=480812992 .

Notably, the edits under question had previously been made (the first by another editor and the last two by a robot) but have reappeared somehow.

The questionable lines are the first line at line 1 (i.e. adding the hatnote: distinguish... ) and also the last two at line 101 (i.e. twice adding: New South Wales).

I affirm that the edit of line 80, 'during' is the only edit I made on that day and time.

So I ask ...

How did those two edits show up in the revision history under my name?

Has the revision history been vandalised or hacked?

Is there any knowledge of revision histories of other editors being hacked or vandalised?

I appreciate your help.

Benyoch (talk) 21:14, 20 March 2012 (UTC)

I'd recommend taking this to Wikipedia:Help Desk or Wikipedia:Village Pump. You're more likely to find someone who knows the problem there. At a guess, it sounds like a database issue causing edits to be misattributed. Smurrayinchester 21:33, 20 March 2012 (UTC)

Is it possible you edited an old version of the page? All versions of a page are editable, and if you save changes to an old version, it will show up as you overwriting the new page with the old one - effectively "changing back" everything that happened between those two revisions. In this particular case, the article as you left it is identical to the one from 30/12/11 with only "during" changed; if you had somehow got to that version (perhaps by navigating through the history?) and made your change, it would fit the facts. Shimgray | talk | 21:48, 20 March 2012 (UTC)

I concur with Shimgray. It looks like a clear case of accidentally editing an old revision of the page – clicking on the edit tab immediately when viewing an old revision instead of the current one. Zzyzx11 (talk) 07:27, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for your input, fellow Wikipedians. I think the answer has been found - silly me seemingly edited an early edition. Wont do that again. Benyoch (talk) 02:55, 22 March 2012 (UTC)