A Royal Navy uniform habit became King's trademark

King appears to have adopted the Royal Navy practice of wearing a breast-pocket handkerchief below his ribbons, a style associated with David Beatty. He became the last officer to continue the tradition. One tentative interpretation is that the handkerchief reminded King how he did not want to behave in command. That psychological reading is explicitly speculative, while the uniform detail shows that his complicated relationship with the Royal Navy still included personal borrowing.