"French Sapper/Pioneers" Topic

I've got a couple to paint. I can only find reference pics where the bearskin has a side plume and cords. The figs I have don't have a side plume or cords. They have a small pompom at the front middle, and a flap pulled down over the left side of the bearskin.

Does anyone know what this signifies please, or have any links to appropriate pics?

Thanks

Without a picture, what you are describing seems to be a colpack, which was worn by the carabinier (grenadier) company of the leger battalions. Maybe the leger battalion sappers also wore the colpack.

Jim

I have leger sappers from ABFigures and they are wearing colpacks, so maybe…

thanks guys, I think they are leger then. Do you know of any links to appropriate pics?

French sapeurs wore the usual bearskin, colpacks, and shakos. You can probably find some on the New York Public Library site which has many picturescut from quite a few different books and you might find something there.

Guy Dempsey's book on the Otto collection has some in all three types of headgear. The colpack doesn't necessarily mean a light unit. If I recall correctly, the sapeurs for the Guard Foot Artillery Regiment wore colpacks. More than designation or function, the headgear was usually dependent on the regimental commanders 'druthers.

Sincerely,
Kevin

As a footnote, in the French service, sappers and pioneers were two different types of engineer troops. Sapeurs, more properly sapeurs du genie were combat engineers and that included the elite sapeurs in infantry, hussar, chasseur a cheval and dragoon regiments.

Pioneers were engineer labor/construction troops and were not elite troops.

Sincerely,
Kevin

In French light infantry regiments, the more common headgear was the grenadier bearskin without the brass plaque on the front. The colpack could be worn, but that was more common with voltigeur companies in both line and light infantry regiments. Later, the shako became regulation and more common, but both the bearskin and colpack were worn through 1814.

Sincerely,
Kevin

Thanks Kevin, great info there!

You're very much welcome.

This is a tough one. One would not expect to find a colpak outside of a line voltigeur co. or a legere unit. But I would expect legere sappers to be carabiniers, wearing the full height bearskin.

Very curious.

Kevin, why would the Guard Foot artillery sappeurs wear colpaks when the rest of the unit was wearing bearskins, a superior headress? Can you double check that one? It doesn't sound right.

In 1812 the sapeurs of the Guard Foot Artillery were equipped with colpacks. There's a Herbert Knotel plate in Napoleonic Uniforms by Col Elting on page 369 (the newer Greenhill edition) that shows it. He undoubtedly had a colpack because the regimental commander wanted him to have one. I don't know when Drouot added them, but the plate is an 1812 uniform. They may have had them earlier. Drouot also gave the regiment a band and procured bearskins for them.

According to the Otto Manuscript, the following units' sapeurs had the noted headdress:

3d Ligne-shako
8th Ligne-bearskin
21st Ligne-bearskin
22d Ligne-bearskin
24th Ligne-bearskin
25th Ligne-bearskin
45th Ligne-bearskin
46th Ligne-bearskin (this unit managed to keep its bearskins into 1814)
54th Ligne-bearskin
63d Ligne-colpack
85th Ligne-shako
94th Ligne-bearskin
95th Ligne-bearskin
96th Ligne-colpack
10th Legere-colpack
16th Legere-shako

In Napoleonic Uniforms Volume I the following units have sappers headdress' as follows:

Infantry:
8th Legere, 1809-colpack
16th Legere, 1808-shako
16th Legere, 1809-bearskin
18th Ligne, 1812-bearskin
63d Ligne, 1808-bearskin

Cavalry:
4th Chasseurs a Cheval-colpack
15th Chasseurs a Cheval-colpack
1st Hussars-colpack
9th Hussars-colpack
18th Dragoons-bearskin

I hope this helps.

Sincerely,
Kevin

thanks again Kevin, that helps alot. Would be good to know colour schemes of the units that used colpack listed above. I have seen a pic where the sappers had red jackets

I note Osprey NAPOLEON'S LIGHT INFANTRY 146 plate F Sapeur 8e Leger 1809 – colpack , red plume over red ball, red cloth bag draped down the colpack with white tassle, red tunic, blue facings blue breeches, black gaiters edged red, white apron and gloves.

I would stay away from the Ospreys on Napoleon's infantry, line, light, and Guard. There are too many errors in them to my mind for them to be a reliable resource. For what it's worth, I don't use them anymore and got rid of them years ago. The most glaring error in them is that the bearskins are too small. The French bearskin was quite large, and you can see that in the Musee de l'Armee if nowhere else.

I would highly recommend getting the work of the Knotels, Rousselot, Michel Petard, Keith Rocco, Detaille, Preben Kannik and others that are much better than the older Osprey material and much more accurate. You'll find errors in anyone's work, but the early Ospreys aren't that good for reliability and accuracy. I know getting the other material is expensive and takes up space, but it is worth it in the end. It has taken me nearly twenty years to build up my library to the state that it is in now, and much of the uniformology is primary and the rest is reliable secondary material. I'm now starting to write books on uniforms and it is very difficult and the occasional error does creep in, unfortunately.

Here are the uniform details for the sappers with colpacks that I have:

63d Ligne: Dark bbue habit and breeches, dark tan collar and lapels, gaultlets with the cuff white and the lower part dark tan. Apron is dark tan and the colpack has a tall red plume and white cords and tassels. The gaiters are half gaiters, light infantry style, piped on the top in red with red tassels. Beard and mustache.

96th Ligne: dark blue habit and breeches with light infantry half gaiters piped red with a red tassel. Collar, lapels, and Polish cuffs are red as are the epaulets. The coat is the newer, shorter habit with the lapels to match. The colpack is black with no adornments. Mustache, but no beard. White apron.

10th Legere: Normal light infantry uniform, plain colpack with a red bag and nothing else for adornments. White gauntlets, red collar piped white along the bottom white. Lapels piped white. Red crossed axes on the sleeves and the red epaulets out outlined in white on the top with two half moons outward (or two semi-circles). White apron.

Italian 1st Legere: Dark green uniform, old style (pre-Bardin) piped red, red epaulets, colpack with red drooping plume and cords and tassels hung horizontally from left to right, dark tan apron and gauntlets, red crossed axes on upper sleeves, belly ammunition box (black).

8th Legere: red habit, blue collar, lapels and turnbacks piped white. White epaulets and crossed axes on the upper sleeves, with a bursting grenade on top between the axe heads. Colpack has a red bag piped white with a white tassel, with a tall red plume on the front. Blue breeches with plain light infantry gaiters which were black. White apron and the uniform may have been changed the next year to dark blue faced bright green.

Guard Foot Artillery: The only apparent differences with the usual artillery uniform were the colpack with red bag piped yellow and red plume in the front; black gauntlets, white apron, beard and the usual sapper accoutrements. The crossed axes with grenade device were in red also.

The cavalry units are in the normal uniform with the addition of white aprons rolled up while mounted along their belt line, beards, and lances, with a red pennon.

I do hope this helps.

Sincerely,
Kevin

Wonderful detail, thank you Kevin, I don't have the documents that you mention. I note the 8e Leger uniform details in the Osprey do in fact seem to be accurate against the other source that you quote.

The thing about bearskins in Ospreys has been said of many secondary sources, I know. The other thing might be that the blue in the uniforms is too light. The writer Phillip Haythornthwaite of the Osprey 146 ,I understand, has been an authority for some years and no doubt has had access to the materials suggested above for some time; in fact the sources listed at the end of the offending Osprey are Rousselot, Rigo, JOB, Brunon and others. The reason for quoting the Osprey is that the author is, I would argue, reliable and secondly the book is easy to come by. And what a stunning uniform for the 8e.

I would agree errors must easily creep in with all military depictions of this era. There are generally gaps in what is known, sources show apparent inconsistencies and in pre industrial era armies, to paraphrase the late great Colonel Elting, what was prescribed for wear in the manual, for parade and what was worn on campaign are very different matters. However, I'm not sure some apparent inconsistencies with other sources render the Osprey useless. It doesn't go to the root of their worth.

Incidentally, I note a croat sapeur, 3eme provisoire Croate (mid blue habit veste piped yellow, red epauletttes, white apron, gloves, yellow collar and bag to colpack, red plume over red ball) of 1812 in Hourtoulle's "Soldats et uniformes du Premier Empire" and 7e Leger sapeurs at work in a P Courcelle picture in the same book. The 7e blue habit veste, white aprons, colpack, red plume over red ball red bag piped white with a tassle, red epauliettes with the usual insignia in red.

Now all we have to do is fill in the gaps for the rest of the light regiments; were there 30 odd at one stage?

"In Napoleonic Uniforms Volume I the following units have sappers ….
Cavalry:
4th Chasseurs a Cheval-colpack
15th Chasseurs a Cheval-colpack
1st Hussars-colpack
9th Hussars-colpack
18th Dragoons-bearskin"

"The cavalry units are in the normal uniform with the addition of white aprons rolled up while mounted along their belt line, beards, and lances, with a red pennon."

May I ask, please, on what source basis were these units deemed to have sapeurs, and with the indicated uniforme details ?

Here, from the Bros. Suhr, we have the 13e chasseur ŕ cheval sapeurs :
picture
Note that only a few have lances, and none have aprons.

Similarly, the colonel Barbier painted from life two of his own sapeurs in the 2e hussards of 1805-1806 : no beards, no aprons, no colpaks but instead shakos (covered in sky blue as per trompettes), lances with sky blue pennons.

I know of the sapeur for the 1er hussard only from the Collection Boersch (and hence perhaps quite speculative) as a source of origin, although Horace Vernet did also show a similar figure. In the same collection, there is an even more "unusual" bearded sapeur with axe …. for the post-1810 armored carabiniers ŕ cheval !! So one does wonder.

There is a surviving axe (not lance) of the 6e hussards (Encyclopédie des uniformes napoléoniens, Bourgeot et Pigeard, page 331) and for the sapeurs from the two Italian ligne dragon régiments (Soldats Napoléoniens No.1 and No. 2), which may have had both axe and lance. Begnini gives us also an axe for the sapeurs of the 3e hussards, but no apron (Tradition No. 214).

So …. the variations seem rather large, and the sourcing not too strong. Thus if you could provide the contemporary sources for the uniforme details that you have provided with such assuramce, it would be much appreciated.

Thank you.

I gave my sourcing for them in my posting and you can also take a look at the Bucquoy books for more material on cavalry sappers. They existed in the three types of cavalry listed and you've supported that in your posting.

In Dragons et Guides by Commandant Bucquoy, part of the Les Uniformes du Premier Empire series, there is a sapper on page 18 in full dress, dismounted by his horse with an apron. Further, on page 31, there is a sapeur a pied, a mounted one on page 34, a dismounted one on page 36, and another mounted one on page 37.

In the same series by the same author, the volume La Cavalerie Legere shows hussar sappers on pages 36 (3d Regt), 77 (1st Regt), and 85 (1st Regt).

Rousselot shows two sappers with Planche 86, Dragons Complement 1804-1815 and one has a rolled apron on his person, under his belt in front. That is taken from Markolsheim, which I believe is a primary source.

I am not sure, nor am I convinced, that the light cavalry sappers wore aprons, but only because I have not seen that displayed in an illustration.

Sincerely,
Kevin

Ned,

I am an admirer of Haythornewaite's work and he has steadily, of not exponentially, improved during his career. However, early on he made a lot of mistakes with the French (though not the British) and also made some interesting errors with the War of 1812. That is why I made the comment on those early French Ospreys, which are now over twenty years old. The art work itself is excellent, just not as accurate as it could have been.

Sincerely,
Kevin

One might note that Colonel Elting, commandant Bucquoy and the painter Rousselot are all secondary/tertiary sources of more than 100 years separation from the era. Their attribution of more original or earlier sources for their drawings is spotty at best, and often just absent.

The larger problem I find is that actual contemporary evidence of the EXISTENCE of such sapeurs (with the exception of the régiments de dragons) is ALSO very thin on the ground.

So we have pretty but essentially un-sourced 20th century images, possibly with little relation to real usage. It makes it hard to decide how to paint a French régiment !

"Rousselot shows two sappers with Planche 86, Dragons Complement 1804-1815 and one has a rolled apron on his person, under his belt in front. That is taken from Markolsheim, which I believe is a primary source."

Yes, but it may very likely have nothing to do with French dragons ! See the S.N. No.1 and No. 2 (previously cited).

It is a perfect example of the the "thinness" of the primary or contemporary source material.

The two Rousselot shows are both of French dragoon regiments. If the Italian dragoon regiments had them, it would have been through French influence, so to my mind that would reinforce the fact that French line cavalry units, with the exception of cuirassiers and carabiniers, had sappers. I don't think all of the light cavalry regiments had them, but enough did to leave an impression on those who saw them.

Whether or not the source material is thin doesn't alter the fact that they did exist.

Further, I don't think that Rousselot or Herbert Knotel made things up and based their material on solid research. One thing is for certain, though, we have a lot to learn and we are only skimming the surface of the period, and that to me is where it is quite thin.

Sincerely,
Kevin

"but enough did to leave an impression on those who saw them."
Who exactly was that ? Rousselot and Knötel were decades away from being born, so it not them. I have NEVER seen a narrative record of someone seeing a French light cavalry sapeur of the era. Have you ?

1. We have an equivocal pair of "sapeur-lanciers" in colonel Barbier's painting …. no record of them at all otherwise, especially under the name "sapeurs".

2. We the Suhr print of the 13e chasseurs (no axes, a few lances).

3. We have an axe possibly attributable to the 6e hussards, but without clear dating or provenance.

THAT'S ALL THERE IS, as far as I know about "sapeurs" in the light cavalry that can be attributed to a contemporary source – iconographic, physical or narrative. As I have been trying to ask, do you know of any others ?

A house of cards built of secondary sources, decades after the fact, is the basis for the conjectures about the use of this "office" in the French light cavalry. This is not "solid research" , it is guesswork and imagination and wishful thinking as far as I can tell.

Please, do show me I am wrong, as I hope that I am. Show me a real historical record for these sapeurs in the light cavalry, the "solid research" that you claim underlies the Rousselot and the Knötel. I fear that this basis just plain does not exist, but I would love to be proven wrong.