Red coats and black faces

The red coated uniform worn by many regiments of the British Army in the 18th and 19th centuries may have made the ladies swoon, but it wasn’t exactly practical. The 50th regiment to which Susan’s husband, David Whybrew, belonged, became known as the “dirty half hundred” because at one stage the dye on the black cuffs of their jackets wasn’t colour fast and rubbed off onto their hands and from there to their faces.
Here’s a video demonstrating why modern armies usually wear loose fitting khaki uniforms.