The 1st American Regiment is the direct ancestor of the modern U.S. Army. Congress raised it in 1784 from veterans of the disbanding Continental Army, primarily for frontier service in the Ohio Country, and it has run in unbroken line of descent ever since — through the Legion of the United States, the Indian campaigns of the 1790s, and the early peacetime army — to today's 3rd U.S. Infantry Regiment, the Old Guard, at Fort Myer. The 1782-90 period covered by this figure is the bridge between the war's last campaigns and the new republic's first standing army, when veterans of Yorktown were still in uniform but the Continental Army itself was being wound down.

This figure shows the regimental ensign — the junior commissioned officer responsible for carrying the National Color, the Stars and Stripes flag with the original thirteen stars in a circle. In the eighteenth-century army the ensign's job was honorable, ceremonial, and exceptionally dangerous: the colors marked where the unit was, which made the bearer a target. The W. Britain sculpt has him standing at attention, flag aloft, in the dark blue coat with red facings of the late Continental and early Federal army. He pairs naturally with the other Revolutionary-era figures Breagans carries — General Washington Mounted, Alexander Hamilton 1783, and the broader American Revolution range — for a Continental Army display.

1/30 scale (60mm), matte-painted, single figure boxed. Catalog number 16038. As with the rest of the W. Britain modern range, the painting is photographic-quality detail intended to read well in dioramas and display cases.