F/E's purple stripe - how?

[18-Wheeler]

I've been told - and have seen a supposed copy of the official decree saying that F/E's have to wear the thin purple stripes - F/E's wear the three stripes & two purple stripes to honour the memory of the Engineers that stayed at their stations on the Titanic as it went down.
But a guy that really knows his naval history says otherwise -
" the reason that aircraft engineers wear purple stripes is that in the Royal Navy engineering branch officers wore a purple strip to show they were engineers. The when the RAF was formed the majority of its pilots and engineers came from a Navy background, the Purple strip is a carry over from those days."

So which is right?
Was the decree thingy that I saw a fake? I tried to get a copy off the English F/E, but for some reason I didn't get one.

[Speedbird48]

The Titanic story is the correct one, but where do you think the navy engineers got theirs from??

The Titanic had engineers and they were in the merchant navy and wet down with the ship!!

Navy doctors have red stripes between the gold to show their trade but where did that come from??

[JW411]

I've also seen navigators with green between the stripes and a flying doctor with orange.

[mainwheel]

This is an interesting one. The barber's pole red and white because of some old tale. Green for go and Red for stop.
Why purple for engineers??

[Shuperstar Loadie]

The loadies at Channex have a red stripe between the gold but no one seems to know why...........................?????

[ORAC]

Urban Legend (http://www.nmm.ac.uk/site/navId/005002006001008/request/setTemplate:faq/contentTypeA/conFaq/contentId/40/mode/archive)

[Techman]

Now why did you have to go and spoil a perfectly good explanation?. :rolleyes:

[18-Wheeler]

Thanks, ORAC.
Thus nature balances itself.

[javelin]

I thought it was to match the helmet :cool:

[brianmay]

As a long-time FE, I'm more than happy to go down . . . .

It was always my understanding - having been trained by ex WW2 FE instructors that the purple came from the colour they went when the skipper acted like a prat and tried to kill them and the rest of the crew.

Sounds favourite to me.