"Russian Cuirassiers (1812) horse furniture colors" Topic

This is a question about the Military Order regiment in 1812.

Hourtoulle's Borodino book has a drawing plate that shows them as blue with yellow borders but there is no way to tell whether the yellow in fact represents yellow or gold (they show up similarly on the page given the constraints of the printing).

Does anyone know what it should be in reality?

Cheers, Richard

Black with yellow (gold for the officers).

The best reference is Mark Conrad's translations of Viskovatov, here: link

Thanks for that! Black (not blue)!! Repainting time…

Cheers, Richard

If you are willing to paint them up blue and white/silver, you would have the Glukhov Regiment.

Thanks – am doing the whole 2nd Cuirassier Division (36 figures per regiment) and already have the Glukov Reg. sorted out at the moment.

I also just realized that I may have painted the Glukovs' saddlery a purplish color (as per the Hourtoulle drawing) rather than royal blue or whatever it's supposed to be. Sigh and sign again….

Cheers, Richard

Simply a deep blue.

standard Army decoration – imperial monogram
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Ordenskiy kirasirskiy polk – guard-"ish" or St-Andrew star decoration
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Frayer

Most cavalry units for all nationalities as a general rule for the period if it is white/yelow for troopers it is silver/gold for officers or high level NCO's

D'Oh! yes, stars on the saddlecloth. Also trumpeter's lace was black with two orange stripes (and narrow orange edge), and the helmet plates has the 4 pointed star embossed, which will generally not show up, but the officers had the center enamelled, which might matter to some…[from Zweguintzow, Viskovatov doesn't mention it.]

Here is a good pic of them at Borodino

picture

Regards
James

Dear James,

Wow, great image – thank you so much! Do you know the artist?

I think that the unit is, more precisely, the Лейб-гвардии Конный полк / Leyb-gvardii Konnyy polk / Lifeguard Horse Regiment. The horse furniture has a blue field, with a guard stripe of red and two gold galons. The collar of the kolet worn by the troopers also has red with two gold flashes. They were mounted on blacks and dark bays, large horses mostly from north German stock.

Their "shef" was the Grand Duke Constantine Pavlovich and the post of commander was vacant at Borodino. So they were commanded by Guards-Colonel Mikhail Andreyevich Arsenev-1 (wounded and replaced by Guards-Colonel Leontiev)
The squadron commanders were:
-- His Highness' squadron: Guards-Colonel Stepan Stepanovich Andreyevskiy
-- Prince Golitsyn's squadron: Guards-Colonel Prince Alexander Borisovich Golitsyn-1
-- Colonel Soldaen's squadron: Guards-Colonel Khristofer Fëdorovch Soldaen
-- Commander's squadron: Guards-Colonel Ivan Sergeyevich Leontiev (then Guards-Captain Ilya Stepanovich Sarochinskiy)

Thank you again!

Frayer

Frayer,

The name of the artist is Averyanov Alexander Y.

More paintings by the same Russian artist…

Click on the pictures to enlarge them.

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Hi
Here are some more paintings by the same chap:

link

Super stuff.

Malcolm

A little late seeing this post but wanted to say thanks for posting. Some great paintings and links. Just started painting a brigade of Russian cuirassiers.

I do have a question on Russian cuirassier horse furniture that does not appear to be addressed except in photos. You see the great coat rolled to the rear of the saddle and the forage bag rolled just forward of the great coat. I'm guessing the rolled item forward of the rider is a blanket, but what is the dark (black/brown) cloth that covers part of the blanket? It is shown is several paintings and is also shown in one of the non-color Osprey sketches of Russian cuirassiers.

It's an oilskin water deck. A pretty universal item of equipement for cavalry.

Thanks. That was what it appeared to be but wanted to confirm. The Essex figures I'm painting are the first I've painted with this.