"Prussian Jager weapons allocation" Topic

Painting some of these boys (actually converting Italeri AWI French figures) at the moment and I read on Kronoskaf that the were armed 25% with short rifles and 75% musket & bayonet. Does anyone know how these were distributed tactically – either rifles dispersed and spread across the musket platoons, or concentrated in one rifle armed group?

I think they were probably well distributed since part of the purpose was to provide a bayonet armed back up for the riflemen who were vulnerable to cavalry. As far as I can remember it was done after a large number of them were run down by a force of cossacks.

In which year,please?

Could you link to the relevant Kronoskaf page please?
I can't seem to find any item on the Feldjäger there (only the Jäger detachment of the various Freikorps which are not the same thing).

It appears after the 34th Regiment on the Kronoskaf page.

The cossack incident ocured at Charlotteburg in 1760 (I think).

Ah thanks, I would never have thought to look under "Musketeer regiments"…

Right, back with my books now. Bleckwenn doesn't mention the mixed armament, and according to Haythornthwaite it was only introduced with the expansion of the corps in 1773.

As to their putative distribution, Clib's assumption makes tactical sense at first sight. However it should be noted that Hanoverian Jäger of the Seven Years War, which did carry a mix of weapons according to Niemeyer/Ortenburg, organised their riflemen and musket-armed soldiers in distinct companies, so other considerations would seem to have been in play as well.

To my understanding Frederick's Royal Corps des Chasseurs was all riffle armed, throughout the 7YW. I think they received modified sidearms that could be plugged to the riffle. I'm checking Curt Jany on the Prussian army. The most trustful source out there. But this book is missing a crossword index, so I will have to search this detail.

Cheers,
Christian
crogges7ywarmies.blogspot.com

A point that would promote the all riffle armed therory is the fact that the Jägers made only around 150 men each for the mounted and foot Jägers. Only much after the 7YW they were augmented to several battalions and escadrons.

I don't know how helpful this is, but the practices of the German contingents in the AWI (and to some extent the British forces as well) closely reflected Prussian practice of the time. The Hesse Cassel jaeger invariably operated either alongside the British Light Infantry battalions, or with the support of their own grenadier battalions; in both cases, the other units provided formed platoons on which the jaeger could rally. The Brunswickers formed a "light battalion" of one jaeger and four musketeer companies, albeit the musket-and-bayonet support for the jaeger came much more often from the Grenadier Battalion von Breymann than the Light Battalion von Barner.

In the first year or so of the AWI, the British Army armed at least two (and sometimes more) men of each light company with British-made rifles, often called the "Tower" model (a similar number of men in each Light Dragoon troop were given rifled carbines). Presumably these men were chosen as being the best shots in their company.

When the light companies were removed and converged into the famous Light Battalions under Howe, the rifle-armed men were themselves detached and grouped together under one of the senior Lieutenants as a "point platoon" which preceded the battalion on the march. This unit would be backed up by the leading company of the battalion (musket-armed).

The Company of Select Marksmen in Burgoyne's army consisted of the two best shots in every battalion company of the regiments then based in Canada (excepting the 24th, which was kept intact, and the 8th which was out on the Great Lakes). About a third of the company was given rifles, many of them captured from Morgan's men at the siege of Quebec.