..... AND another thing.... my God, will we ever get him to shut up?...

A cockade could also be a simple way of indicating a difference in loyalties when both sides were wearing the same - or at any rate similar - uniforms. As artbrooks has pointed out, during the French revolution, royalist and revolutionary troops could be from the same regiment, and all be wearing the same dress.

Mind you, when the muskets started firing, after a couple of volleys, nobody nearby was going to see anything anyway for the smoke.