Original Item: Only One Available. Victorian Britain was the age of Empire. The industrial revolution provided the technology and equipment while the military provided the victories. Britain expanded to dominate the world and pomp and glory became the order of the day.

Here is a magnificent brass light cavalry helmet with an impressive black horse hair plume of the 4nd Dragoon Guards.

This Helmet is the Pattern of 1871 and was in use for the remainder of Queen Victoria's reign. Complete with the original leather lining the only drawback is that leather backing to the brass ringed chin scales has become unstitched, which could easily be repaired with very little effort if one so decided.

The brass peak and bowl showing some slight dents or distortions certainly commensurate with the age making this a very rare Helmet to find and ready to display. All components are original, and on the whole, this helmet is complete original, untouched, condition.

The History of the 2nd Dragoon Guards:
The 2nd Dragoon Guards (Queen's Bays) was a cavalry regiment of the British Army. It was first raised in 1685 by the Earl of Peterborough as the Earl of Peterborough's Regiment of Horse by merging four existing troops of horse.

Renamed several times, it was designated the Queen's Regiment of Dragoon Guards in 1746 as it evolved into a dragoon unit. (Dragoons described a force of highly mobile mounted infantry equipped with lighter, faster horses and carrying firearms) and later named the 2nd Dragoon Guards (Queen's Bays) in 1767 to reflect the custom of its soldiers riding only bay horses.

The regiment served as horse cavalry until 1937, when it was mechanized with light tanks. The regiment became part of the Royal Armored Corps in 1939. After service in the First and Second World Wars, the regiment amalgamated with the 1st King's Dragoon Guards in 1959 to form the 1st The Queen's Dragoon Guards.

The regiment was raised in 1685 as the Earl of Peterborough's Regiment of Horse when James II expanded his army after the Monmouth rebellion.  Peterborough was a Catholic who remained loyal to James and was replaced by Edward Villiers on 31 December 1688.

During the Nine Years' War, it served as Villiers Regiment in Ireland between 1689 and 1691, fighting in the battles of the Boyne and Aughrim. At Aughrim, it was ordered to cross a bog under heavy fire, prompting French general the Marquis de St Ruth to shout "It is madness, but no matter, the more that cross the more we shall kill;" he was decapitated by a cannonball shortly thereafter. When the Treaty of Limerick ended the war in Ireland in October 1691, the regiment returned to England.

Brigadier-General Richard Leveson became Colonel on 19 January 1694 and as Leveson's Regiment of Horse it was based in Flanders until the Treaty of Ryswick ended the war in 1697. It escaped disbandment by being placed on the Irish establishment; Leveson died in March 1699 and Daniel Harvey took over as Colonel.

During the War of the Spanish Succession Harveys Regiment moved to Portugal in March 1704 to support the Allied campaign in the Iberian Peninsula. In July 1710 it fought at the Battle of Almenar but in December was overwhelmed by superior forces at Brihuega, the survivors being taken prisoner.

In recognition of its involvement in suppressing the 1715 Jacobite rising it changed names to The Princess of Wales's Own Regiment of Horse and after Caroline of Wales became Queen in 1727 The Queen's Own Regiment of Horse. After the 1745 Jacobite rising it changed titles again to The Queen's Regiment of Dragoon Guards in 1746 then 2nd (The Queen's) Regiment of Dragoon Guards in 1751.

During the Seven Years' War, it fought at Corbach and Warburg in July 1760 and then captured several French regiments at the Battle of Wilhelmsthal in June 1762. After starting to ride on bay horses, the regiment were renamed as the 2nd Dragoon Guards (Queen's Bays) in 1767.

In an incident at Lezennes, a single squadron of the regiment, under Major Robert Craufurd, attacked and defeated a unit of 150 French troops, in October 1793 during the War of the First Coalition.

The regiment next saw action when a squadron under Major Piercy Smith charged the rebels at the capture of Lucknow in March 1858 during the Indian Rebellion. It suffered heavy losses in an action at Leeukop in March 1902 during the Second Boer War.