The color of a man's shirt wasn't always a personal choice. Since the time of the Christian Martyrs men who followed a certain faction displayed their beliefs by a wearing a specific color of shirt. The Bloody or red shirt of ancient Rome was identified as a badge of freedom, while the black shirts worn by supporters of Mussolini indicated power.
Red Shirts for Garibaldi
Wearing colored shirts to show a united front is thought to have started with the Italian liberator Garibaldi. As most traditions, now taken for granted, it was born of need. Garibaldi was in Uruguay, South America in 1843 and was asked to organize an army to march with Rozas, the Argentine leader who was waging a battle for human liberty. When he amassed his army he discovered that they were poorly clothed. He sought help from the patriots who, in their search, found about 500 red shirts ready to be worn by butchers at the Faladeros stockyards in Buenos Aires. The shirts were commandeered and quickly became known as a symbol of republicanism.
Black Shirts for Mussolini
When Benito Mussolini came into power in Italy one of his first acts was to ban the wearing of red shirts. He wanted all memory of the Italian people's fight for liberty and unification erased. Mussolini, with his Fascist viewpoint and fanatic anarchist policy chose the color associated with those factions; black. Black stood for power by force. It was worn by his famous mopping up squads and anyone associated with is regime.
Blue Shirts for France
In the 1930s a group of students known as, Camelots du Roi, a fanatical faction of young political activists adopted the color of royal blue for their identity shirts. The group is still in existence today supported by men of the Royalist Party and given publicity by a French Loyalist newspaper called L'Action Francaise. They still wear the royal blue color for their message.
Green for Ireland-Brown for Germany-Gray for Russia
The Irish Republic Movement wears the traditional Irish green to signify their revolt against ties with the United Kingdom of England. In Germany, during the regime of Adolf Hitler, the Nazis adopted the practice of wearing brown shirts as a sign of solidarity of purpose. In the last century in Russia the Communists chose gray as a sign of loyalty of devotion to the doctrines of Karl Marx.
The Shirt in History
One of the most famous shirt stories is associated with Hercules. His second wife, Deianeira, sent him a shirt smeared with what she thought to be a love potion but was actually poison. In great agony he built a pyre and burnt himself to death. When his spirit ascended to heaven he became immortal and married Hebe. The shirt has played an important role in literature and has been used as a descriptive symbol for centuries. For instance the phrase; 'keep your shirt on' that is meant to calm the angry, and 'bet their shirts' a colloquialism for gamblers. The Germans had a saying, 'near is my shirt but nearer my skin' which indicates that at times one has to give something up in order to preserve life.
Source:
North American Newspaper Alliance, The Kansas City Star, 1932
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