WW2 British Officers Battle Dress Blouse, 47th (Wythenshawe) Battalion Manchester Home Guard, Lovely original wartime battle dress blouse, to a Manchester Home Guard Lieutenant of the 47th Wythenshawe Bn. The insignia is applied to each arm by means of hand stitching and two Khaki pips sit upon each epaulette. The Home Guard titles are blue on khaki which denote areas or zones covered by the Manchester’s Home Guard units. Below the printed ‘MAN’ and ’47’ patches sit in the usual HG way. The blouse itself is of the early ‘Battle Dress, Blouses Serge’ pattern with its unlined collar and twin interior pockets. The label that still remains, shows the blouse to be a size 17, and 1940 dated, made by Rego Clothiers Ltd. Some wear to one cuff edge and little to no mothing. Good example of an early originally patched up blouse.

WW2 British 3rd Infantry Division Battle Dress Blouse, Pioneer Corps, Austerity battle dress blouse as badged to a Sergeant of the Pioneer Corps in the 3rd infantry division. Printed titles to each shoulder and a ‘combination’ patch of the 3rd Inf Division patch with the arm of service stripe below, sown onto a separate piece of serge before being applied to the blouse, a common wartime practice. The insignia is quite worn and discoloured by the sun. One of the AoS stripes is applied the wrong way around, not an uncommon error seen on BD. Printed Sgt stripes have been applied to each arm. The blouse itself has unfortunately seen better days, suffering from heavy mothing and creating large holes in the serge. The label in situ shows it to be a size 13, 1943 dated and made by ‘Town Tailors Ltd’. A mixture of different button across the blouse and heavy sun bleaching, in particular to the left arm. Despite the condition the blouse strikes as an almost ‘in theatre’ worn piece, to a well-known infantry division which served with great distinction in the North West Europe campaign.