03 Pattern Bandolier

During the Boer War British soldiers had used cotton bandoliers to hold rounds of ammunition. As these were made o flight fabric and were not intended for repeated use they soon became damaged and rounds were easily lost. Based on their experience with these bandoliers, in the aftermath of the conflict the War Department decided to ignore cotton webbing (despite it being much more heavy duty than the bandoliers used in the Boer War) and continue with leather for the manufacture of its equipment. The result was the introduction of the 1903 equipment, centred around the leather five pocket bandolier.

 The Bandolier is made of leather, designed to fit over the left shoulder, and has five pockets, each with space for two charger clips, giving an overall capacity of 50 rounds:

The pouches are riveted to the curved cross straps by four metal rivets resulting in a very secure construction:

Where the front and back of the bandolier meet is a brass triangle and a leather strap to affix the bandolier to the belt and the rest of the equipment:

The bandolier is covered in a lot of stamps with numbers and letters, most of which now mean nothing, but there is the /|\ with a ‘U’ stamp indicating South African ownership:

As has been explained before South Africa continued making these leather 03 items into the middle of the Second World War, and indeed the equipment itself continued being used across the Empire long after it had technically been made obsolete. Whilst it was not a particularly effective set of equipment for infantry, it was far more useful for second line troops and those mounted on horseback such as The Royal Artillery and Cavalry. They also continued in use with colonial troops long after the mother country had replaced them. The image below of Indian troops in the Bahrain Levy Corps, a local police and security force trained by the British, in the 1930s clearly shows one of them using the 03 bandolier:

Anecdotally from photographs it seems that most often the bandolier was worn on its own, without belt, pouches or water bottle, indeed my own Great Grandfather, a member of the Royal Field Artillery, is seen wearing one in his wedding photo: