Just to make the terminology clear, epaulettes (or 'shoulder straps') are straps on British military shirts and jackets which are sewn into the shoulder seam on one end, and held with a button on the other end. Sometimes I've seen, on the British tropical khaki shirts, shoulder straps sort of like German ones, where they're a separate thing (with top and bottom) which slips through a narrow cloth loop at the shoulder seam.
Rank slides are tubes of cloth which are slid over the epaulettes.
Rank slides wouldn't be called 'shoulder boards' because rank slides aren't stiff and boardlike. They're simply cloth.
The WWII slides I'm talking about, which I still can't find a decent closeup photo of, are plain khaki cloth, and for the Cameron Highlanders had a square of Cameron of Erracht tartan sewn on, and a blue HD (Highland Division) square patch sewn on. The puzzling things are the photos which appear to show an extra epaulette extending down from the shoulder seam on some of the tropical khaki shirts, the epaulette bearing one of these slides.
Last edited by OC Richard; 27th August 14 at 06:30 PM.
Proud Mountaineer from the Highlands of West Virginia; son of the Revolution and Civil War; first Europeans on the Guyandotte
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