Officers Full Dress Stable jacket of junior rank of the S.N.Y.C. Circa 1880

 Throughout the 1840's and 50's, the regular Army Hussar regiments, and the Yeomanry Cavalry regiments adopted the Hussars tunic. Closely based on the German and Austrian designs, the Attilla. A tight fitting jacket with gold gimp decoration for officers and gold decoration to the collar.  The German Hussars tunic usually had five horizontal lines of gimp decoration, although the regular British Hussars regiments chose to have six lines, probably so they did not show a direct copy. The South Notts Yeomanry Cavalry however chose to stick with the traditional five lines. Some regiments such as The South Notts Yeomanry Cavalry  chose to have the shorter "Stable" jacket. The dress code for Yeomanry regiments was not as strict as the regular regiments, and the yeomanry uniforms tended to be a mix of hussar and cavalry regiments of the time. 

The South Notts Yeomanry Cavalry first adopted the five lined dark blue stable jacket in 1846. A Prussian style dark blue short Stable jacket with five lines of yellow cord for troopers, and gold gimp frogging for officers. Pairs of oval droops to both ends, and a figure of eight to the middle of both sides. With a few changes throughout the following decades, the tunic would basically remain the same with The South Notts Yeomanry Cavalry until the late 1890's. 

In line with the regular Hussar regiments,in 1861, the Regiment  adopted the Austrian style knot to the cuff, such as we have here,  The Troopers having the knot along with the five lines in yellow cord. The Lieutenant rank as we see here had the same  design but in gold gimp. The Captain rank was the knot, but with more decoration added around the design, and yet further gold decoration the higher than rank was. Rank insignia for officers was also worn on the collar. Also in the 1860's, the five large centre gilt buttons to the middle were replaced with the cloth,or gold gimp covered long oval buttons as we see here. In 1881, for officers the rank badges were moved from the collar to the shoulder straps. Sadly, the shoulder straps are missing from this jacket, but there is evidence of where they were. At some point, probably from around the 1880's, the colour of the jacket changed from blue to what is either very dark blue, or black. This example and three other observed examples of S.N.Y.C. officers' jackets of the same period appear to be black. 

These jackets were a very expensive purchase which the officer had to pay for out of his own pocket. With the dress regulations for yeomanry not being very strict, images of groups of  South Notts Yeomanry Cavalry Officers can be seen with the Officers wearing different types of insignia and decoration, an officer wearing the early type in a later period wanting to get full usage out of his costly jacket. The exact layout of the gimp decoration appears to have not been rigidly enforced, several officers preferring to have two "eights" to the centre of each side of the five horizontal lines, Sir Lancelot Rollestion still wearing a dress jacket with double eights after the Boer War.  

The jacket has its gold gimp covered cap lines which were adopted in 1866 for use with the new Busby headwear. It is also shown with an S.N.Y.C. officers' peakless forage cap known as the pillbox cap for the undress uniform. Dating from around the same time as the tunic, possibly later. The S.N.Y.C. officers pillbox had a wide gold band to the side in Russian braid, a zig-zag pattern the same as the collar facings on the jacket. To the top, a six pointed star in gold gimp. Fitted with a very slim leather chinstrap. 

In the three black and white images, first a group of S.N.Y.C. officers at Wollaton camp in 1888. Sadly, the tunic does not have a name inside to pin it down to an exact officer. Could this tunic be in this photograph? - quite possibly. The second group image shows the new style of uniform adopted in the late 1890's. Taken in 1903, it shows the pillbox cap for undress was still in use after the Boer War for the undress uniform. The image illustrates the freedom of Yeomanry officers to not follow the exact pattern, the only top of a pillbox cap visible, that being worn by Major Trotter shows an extra gold band to the top. Is this pillbox cap one of the others shown in the mage? - quite possibly.