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Huntly lodge, Aberdeenshire
Scotland was built by the 4th Duke of Gordon 7th Marquess of
Huntly; 1st Earl of Norwich in the 18th century.
It was here in 1787 the 75th
Regiment, the forerunner of the 1st battalion The Gordon Highlanders, was
raised for service in the Far East, but it was not until 1793 when the
French Revolutionary Government had declared war on Great Britain that the
Government asked the Duke of Gordon to raise another regiment.
The Duke having agreed, he
received the authority on the 10th February, 1794, and the command was given
to his son, the Marquess of Huntly, at that time a Lieutenant-Colonel in the
3rd, now the Scots Guards.
On the 24th June, 1794 the
newly embodied regiment was paraded for the first time at Aberdeen when they
wore the then almost new, and now famous, Gordon Regimental tartan which had
been devised by Forsythe of Huntly. Forsythe had taken the standard Gordon
plaid and woven in a yellow stripe, which, as he wrote to Lord Huntly, he
trusted would appear "very lively." |
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