The 53rd Infantry Brigade Combat Team CSIB (Combat Service Identification Badge) reflects the unit’s service in the Infantry, Artillery, and Armored branches of the United States Army and Army National Guard. Yellow is the color traditionally associated with the Armored branch; from 1964 to 1968, the unit was designated the 53rd Armored Brigade with five maneuver elements (two Mechanized Battalions and three Armored Battalions). The Artillery branch color is scarlet, and the 53rd spent the first forty-two years after its establishment in the Florida Army National Guard as an Artillery unit of one type or another. Blue, of course, is the color of Infantry; the Brigade was originally formed as art of the 27th Division of the New York Army National Guard in October 1917 with two regiments, the 105th and 106th. Since 1968, the Brigade has been designated either an Infantry Brigade or and Infantry Brigade Combat Team.
In the middle of the 53rd Infantry Brigade Combat Team CSIB is a
morion, a helmet that is popularly associated with the Spanish explorers who discovered Florida (although it and similar helmets were also worn Infantry troops in a number of other European nations). Nicknamed the “Gator Brigade,” the 53rd has been headquartered at Tampa since its establishment as an ARNG unit in 1921.
Related Items
53rd Infantry Brigade Combat Team Patch (SSI)
53rd Infantry Brigade Combat Team Unit Crest (DUI)
53rd Infantry Brigade Combat Team Combat Service ID Badge (CSIB)