Why did the great artist Charlie Russell wear a red sash?

Why did the great artist Charlie Russell wear a red sash? Brian LaMoure Helena, Montana Cowboy artist Charlie Russell never wore a belt, but he folded his sash like one. He began wearing a red sash when he arrived in Montana in 1880 after seeing old-timers wearing them in Helena. These sashes were known as a metis (French for “half breed”) because mixed race trappers, traders and bullwhackers commonly wore them in place of a belt. Elizabeth A. Dear, former curator of the C.M. Russ