(The, or The Buffs), subs. phr. (military).—The Third Regiment of Foot, now the East Kent Regiment; from its facings and Colonel’s name from 1737 to 1749; also THE NUT-CRACKERS (q.v.); and THE RESURRECTIONISTS (q.v.), from its reappearing at the Battle of Albuera after being dispersed by the Polish Lancers; also THE OLD BUFFS, from its facings, and to distinguish it from the 31st, THE YOUNG BUFFS; but the most ancient OLD BUFFS were the Duke of York and Albany’s Maritime Regiment, raised in 1664, and incorporated into the 2nd or Coldstream Guards in 1689.
1849. MACAULAY, The History of England, I., 295. The third regiment, distinguished by flesh-coloured facings, from which it derived the well-known name of THE BUFFS.
1851. H. MAYHEW, London Labour and the London Poor, I. 232. His father was a captain in THE BUFFS, and himself a commissioned officer at seventeen.
1874. The Saturday Review, 95. This regiment [the First or Grenadier Guards] has almost the longest record of any in the service, only yielding, we believe, to the 1st Royals, and to the 3rd BUFFS, which were originally raised for the service of the States-General of Holland.
1886. Tinsley’s Magazine, ‘Our Regimental Mottoes and Nicknames,’ April, 319. THE BUFFS—a corps which enjoys the almost unique privilege of marching through the city of London with bayonets fixed. The 3rd Foot owes ils immortal cognomen to the fact of its having originally been clad in scarlet, lined and faced with BUFF; its members also had BUFF waistcoats, BUFF breeches, and BUFF stockings. Being the senior regiment thus clothed, they were occasionally styled the OLD BUFFS; and the 31st, raised in 1702, and dressed in a precisely similar fashion, were known as the YOUNG BUFFS. The following tradition, however, offers a more circumstantial account of the latter appellation. Having earned in some hotly-contested action, the good opinion of a general under whom they were serving, and who expressed his approbation by calling out to the 31st, ‘Well done, OLD BUFFS!’ a few of the men, somewhat excited by close combat, replied, ‘We are not the OLD BUFFS, Sir.’ Whereupon the general cried, ‘Then well done, YOUNG BUFFS!’ And so the ‘YOUNG BUFFS’ they became, and have since remained, although the days of ‘buff’ waistcoats and stockings have long passed away.
