Fourragere: Authorized Units, Permanent Entitlement, and Wear Rules

The fourragere is a braided shoulder cord awarded by the French government to military units cited two or more times in the French Orders of the Army for exceptional battlefield performance. A handful of United States Marine Corps and Army units earned it during the World Wars, and members currently assigned to those units wear the cord on the left shoulder of certain service and dress uniforms. Whether you can keep wearing it after you transfer out depends on whether you were personally present during the cited actions.

Which U.S. Units Are Authorized

On the Marine Corps side, the list is short. The 5th Marine Regiment, the 6th Marine Regiment, and the 6th Machine Gun Battalion earned the fourragere for World War I service. The 5th and 6th Marines received three French citations for actions including Belleau Wood, making them the only two American regiments to receive the Croix de Guerre with two palms and one gilt star.¹ The cord itself is predominantly red and green with a metal pencil-shaped tip that hangs at the front of the shoulder.²

The Army list runs longer. Whole divisions carry the authorization, including the 1st Infantry Division, 3rd Infantry Division, and 82nd Airborne Division. Individual regiments and battalions hold it independently as well: the 16th, 18th, 23rd, and 26th Infantry Regiments, the 5th, 7th, and 12th Field Artillery Regiments, and the 1st Engineer Battalion.³ These authorizations follow the unit’s lineage, so a regiment can carry the decoration through decades of reorganization as long as its official lineage traces back to the cited formation.

Belgian and Netherlands Cords

Two similar foreign cords are sometimes confused with the French fourragere. The Belgian Fourragere of the Croix de Guerre 1940 was granted to Army units for World War II service, and the Netherlands government awards an Orange Lanyard to units cited for the Military Order of William, held by both the 82nd Airborne Division and the 101st Airborne Division. All three cords sit in the same spot on the left shoulder, which matters for placement rules covered further down.

Permanent Wear vs. Temporary Wear

This is the distinction that trips most people up. In the Army, you qualify for permanent individual wear if you were assigned to and present for duty with the unit during the period cited in the award, or if you were attached by competent orders and present for at least 30 consecutive days of that period.⁴ Because the French fourragere for U.S. Army units traces back to World War I or World War II, permanent personal entitlement is now a historical category rather than a live one.

If you are currently assigned to an authorized unit but were not present during the original cited actions, you wear the cord as a temporary part of your uniform. When you transfer out, you take it off. That covers virtually every soldier and Marine wearing a fourragere today: the decoration belongs to the unit, and you display it as a member of the current formation.

The Marine Corps regulation reads the same way. All Marines serving in the 5th and 6th Regiments are authorized to wear the fourragere for as long as they remain assigned.² Under the original French criteria, Marines who were present with the regiment during at least two of the cited actions kept the cord permanently, but that applies only to World War I veterans.

Getting Permanent Entitlement Into Your Records

For soldiers with a permanent claim, the entitlement should appear in your Official Military Personnel File, Enlisted Record Brief, Officer Record Brief, or IPPS-A. Your unit’s Human Resources office handles the update and can rely on listings from the Awards and Decorations Branch or copies of Department of the Army General Orders. You do not need a personal copy of the unit award order to get your records corrected.⁴

You can also have the general orders and unit award citations added directly to your OMPF. If you want the fourragere reflected on your DD-214, getting the paperwork in your file before separation is far easier than correcting the record later.

How the Cord Is Worn

Both branches wear the fourragere on the left shoulder, but the attachment differs.

Enlisted soldiers pass the cord under the left sleeve and attach it to the shoulder loop on the coat. Officers have to sew a 20-ligne button onto the left shoulder seam, positioned half an inch outside the collar edge, and attach the cord to that button.⁵ Officers moving between authorized and non-authorized units end up adding and removing that button repeatedly.

Marines pass the left arm through the large loop, engage the small loop on the button under the shoulder strap, and let the metal pencil tip hang naturally to the front. On the enlisted blue dress coat, the small loop engages the button above the strap rather than below.²

Only One Cord Per Shoulder

Only one fourragere, lanyard, aiguillette, or cord is authorized on each shoulder.⁵ An 82nd Airborne trooper is authorized both the French Fourragere and the Netherlands Orange Lanyard, for example, but only one can go on the left shoulder at a time; the unit designates which cord is worn for a given occasion. The same rule means that if you draw a staff assignment requiring an aiguillette, the aiguillette takes the shoulder and the fourragere comes off for the duration of that duty.

Which Uniforms It Goes On

In the Army, the fourragere is authorized on the Army Service Uniform coat, the Army Green Service Uniform coat, and the ASU shirt when worn in the Class A configuration. It is not authorized on the Class B versions, and it is never worn on combat or physical fitness uniforms.⁵

For Marines, the fourragere goes on all service and dress coats and jackets when medals or ribbons are prescribed. It is specifically prohibited on the tanker jacket and the All-Weather Coat.²

Wearing the Cord After You Leave

Retired soldiers authorized to wear the uniform for ceremonial occasions must display awards and decorations exactly as active duty personnel do.⁶ If your entitlement was permanent at retirement, you wear the fourragere when you wear the uniform. If your authorization was temporary, it ended when you left the unit and should not appear on any uniform afterward.

Ceremonial occasions authorized for retired personnel include military funerals, memorial services, weddings, inaugurations, and parades on national or state holidays where a military unit participates. Only service and dress uniforms are authorized for those events.⁶

1
6th Marine Regiment. Fourragere Eligibility and Fourragere Uniform Regulations
2
Marines.mil. Marine Corps Uniform Regulations MCO 1020.34H
3
U.S. Army Center of Military History. 23d Infantry Regiment Lineage and Honors
4
U.S. Army Human Resources Command. Unit Award Info
5
U.S. Army. DA PAM 670-1 Guide to the Wear and Appearance of Army Uniforms and Insignia
6
U.S. Army Central. AR 670-1 Wear and Appearance of Army Uniforms and Insignia