"Help with colors for British 1st Royal Dragoons." Topic

I'm completely new to painting Napoleonics and am just getting into the history of it all. I picked up a group of Foundry British Dragoons and wanted to paint them up as the 1st Royal Dragoons. The figures are the "Late Dragoons."
1. What color were the pants during the Peninsular campaign and would the "Late Dragoon" figures be suitable for this period? Also did the pants have that red stripe at the time?
2. If I paint the pants the light blue color I've seen for Waterloo does anyone have a suggestion as to what Vallejo Model Colors to use for shade/base/highlight colors?
3. Finally, do I need to paint any of the horses a certain color or was it a random mix?

Thanks.

Here is information on the regiment at Waterloo. You can see that the stripe down the overalls is blue, but I have seen red listed (along with the "light blue" pants thing, but overalls were usually grey).

link

The regiment served in the Peninsula from 1809; until 1813 at least, they would have been wearing the older style uniform with either a bicorne hat or a version of the stove-pipe shako known as a watering cap (similar to the Peninsula British infantry shako). This may have been the period where the men's grey overalls had a red stripe; officers had a more relaxed attitude to uniform and – as was common with "Royal" regiments – it is possible some may have worn dark blue overalls, or dark blue breeches with boots.

The 1812 uniform, with the brass helmet, would have taken a while to reach them, and it is just possible that they were wearing the older style even when they entered France in 1814.

I am afraid I cannot help with the Vallejo colours, as I don't use that brand; however, any light grey, or blue-grey would do.

(Back after three years years!)

On the parade ground horse colours were theoretically by squadron but out in the field I am sure it did not take to long for this to break down.

Previously I have complied for guard or elite troopers but mixed up the colours for line or veteran regiments. The visual difference works well.

As newly migrated English horses often fell ill at the first whiff of Iberian air it was sometimes necessary to condense squadrons from four to three further mixing up the horse. (See Oman.)

Thanks for the help guys. I was thinking I read somewhere the trumpeters had grey horses to differentiate them from the others. Is this accurate or was that a French thing?

Yes, "grey" (includes white) horses for trumpeters.

In the 17th and 18th centuries, there was a theory that the darker the colour, the stronger the animal. By Napoleonic times, even the British cavalry arm – which was smaller and thus could be more selective than other, larger European armies – used a wide range of horse colours. "Heavy" cavalry – the Household regiments and dragoon guards – had black (which included very, very dark brown). With a few exceptions, the dragoon regiments rode dark browns; and the light cavalry (hussars and light dragoons) chose horses by size and activeness, rather than colour. In all cases, the regiments attempted to gather horses of similar appearance within a troop or squadron, as far as possible.

In 1809, the Royals may have still been adhering to 18th Century practices and riding very dark browns, or even blacks. A few months in Spain would have changed that. By the end of 1814, they would have presented a very patchy appearance. In 1815, they would probably have been back to some sort of regularity, with dark browns, but the overall appearance of the regiment's horseflesh would have been noticeably "lighter" than in the early 1800s.

No- proper black horses were the standard for the whole Royal Dragoons, except their trumpeters.

In 1796 there was an Army order that only the Lifeguards, Blues, 1st KDGs, Royals and 3rd Kings Dragoons should ride blacks- all other units except the Scots Greys were to have brown horses of various shades, which were becoming more common due to changing breeding practises. The other regiments transferred the best of their black mounts to the above units and sold the rest. The black horse regiments were very choosy as the colour of their mounts, and could generally afford to be.

The Royals remained mounted on blacks for many years after the wars, and in their current amalgamated form, still use them today.

Re Spain, although some brown horses were definitely brought in (eg about 80 from the 4th Dragoon Guards who were being sent home in 1812), the Royals stayed mainly on black horses, as their principal source of remounts was drafts shipped over from the one third of the regiment which stayed in UK as depot.

Captured French horses it seems were generally considered too feeble to be adequate mounts for the British cavalry. They may have done temporary duty as fill ins but were often handed over to the Portuguese army when proper mounts became available/acclimatised. Quite large margins were build into remount numbers to take account of heavy wastage en route, but brand new regiments arriving with no seasoned horses would sometimes be unable to take the field for several weeks.

By 1815, the regiment had swapped or sold out its brown horses and was again mounted wholly on blacks.

Supermax is quite right about the Royals still wearing their old uniforms probably into 1813. To make life even more confusing, the early pattern of Dragoon helmet issued in 1813-14 did not have a horseshair mane but a crest like those of the Lifeguards! The maned helmet famous from Waterloo was only adopted in late 1814-early 1815.

seneffe,

I knew one "plain" dragoon regiment had retained black horses, but I thought it was the 6th (Inniskilling) who were known as "the black dragoons" around about this time.

If the Royals were on blacks as well, the Union Brigade would have resembled a giant liquorice allsort!