Gorget Patches and Red Tabs: What Those Collar Flashes Actually Mean

October 3, 2026

If you have seen a photograph of a senior British officer and noticed bright patches on either side of the collar, you have seen gorget patches. They are one of the clearest visual markers in the British Army and one of the least explained.

What they signify

Gorget patches mark senior rank and staff appointment. They are not worn by junior officers, which is exactly why they read so strongly: in a group photograph they identify the most senior people present before you have looked at a single rank badge.

The colour is not decorative either. Different branches use different colours, so the patches say something about which part of the Army the wearer belongs to as well as how senior they are.

Where the name comes from

A gorget was a piece of armour protecting the throat. Long after plate armour stopped being worn, a small crescent-shaped metal gorget survived as a badge of commissioned rank, hung at the throat on ribbons.

The gorget eventually disappeared. The patches of coloured cloth that had sat underneath it did not — and that is what is still on the collar today. It is one of those details where a piece of modern uniform is the fossilised remains of a piece of armour.

Why they are called red tabs

The scarlet version is the most visible and the most commonly seen, so "red tabs" became shorthand for staff officers generally. The term is not always affectionate — it carries a fair amount of history about how front-line soldiers regarded headquarters staff, particularly from the First World War onward. It is worth knowing that background if you are going to use the phrase.

Collecting them

They come in pairs, one per collar side. Singles turn up constantly and are worth much less.
Check the shape. Patterns differ between branches and periods, and the shape of the patch is often more diagnostic than the colour.
Colour fade is a real problem. Scarlet fades toward orange and pink, and once it has gone there is no bringing it back.
On a garment, check the stitching. Patches added later to increase a tunic's interest are not unheard of, and modern machine stitching on an old garment is usually visible from the inside.

Not every collar flash is a gorget patch

Plenty of things sit on a military collar, and they get confused constantly in listings:

Collar badges — sometimes called "collar dogs". A matched pair of small metal badges, usually a version of the cap badge, worn on the lapels. These are by far the most common thing on a collar and are not gorget patches.
Gorget patches — rectangular or shaped panels of coloured cloth, marking senior rank and appointment.
Rank on the collar — used by some services and in some orders of dress.
Trade and qualification badges — occasionally worn on the collar rather than the sleeve.

If you are searching for one and finding the other, this is why. Collar badges outnumber gorget patches enormously.

What a tunic with them is worth

A service dress tunic with intact gorget patches is a considerably more interesting item than the same tunic without, because the patches identify it as a senior officer's garment rather than general issue. Officers bought their own uniforms, so such a tunic is likely to be better tailored and may carry a named label.

Two cautions. Patches are occasionally added to an ordinary tunic to make it more saleable, so check the stitching from the inside. And an officer's tunic without its buttons and badges is worth far less than one that is complete — so if you find a complete example, that completeness is most of what you are paying for.

Spotting them in photographs

Once you know to look, gorget patches turn a group photograph into a chart of who was senior. Two things make them easy to read even in poor images:

They are high contrast by design. A bright panel either side of the collar reads at a distance where rank badges on the shoulder are invisible.
They sit symmetrically. A pair of matching flashes at the throat is a shape the eye picks out immediately, even in a black and white photograph where the colour is lost.

In wartime photographs this is genuinely useful for dating and placing an image, because it tells you a senior headquarters figure is present.

Reproductions and how to spot them

Gorget patches are simple shapes in plain coloured cloth, which makes them among the easiest insignia to reproduce and among the hardest to authenticate from a photograph. The reliable tells are in the materials rather than the design: the weave and weight of the cloth, whether any braid or gimp is real metal thread or synthetic, and how the edges are finished. If a seller cannot tell you where a pair came from, price them as reproductions.