"French Heavy Cavalry During the Revolution" Topic

I am starting to gather information for a French Revolutionary period army and am wanting to confirm the facing colors for the French Heavy cavalry.Using Haythornthwaite's "Uniforms of the French Revolutionary Wars" as one of my sources, there were 24 regiments of heavy cavalry, with the facing colors in groups with the colors being scarlet, yellow, crimson, pink and orange added in 1793. He gives full details for each regiment, so I have that.

However, what has me wondering is this old print which shows French heavy cavalry with light blue facings. I have not been able to find any reference that confirms this, but wonder if I am missing something. Does anyone know???

[URL=http://s257.photobucket.com/user/terry37photos/media/Napoleonic/French%20Heavy%20Cavalry_zpss1pyujra.jpg.html]

Thanks for the help,

Terry

That Picture is a black and white illustration by Edouard Detaille, and published in a book. The colouring has probably been done by a third party, so don't take the accuracy of those colours to heart. They are water-colours and the book is probably over a hundred years old.

Paul :)

The caption seems to be 'Regiment de Cavalerie 1793'. Is this necessarily heavy cavalry? They seem to be carrying slung muskets. They don't have cuirasses. Could they be dragoons?

The French Regiments de Cavalerie (cavalerie de bataille) during the Revolution and before were the French heavy cavalry, plus the two regiments of carabiniers. Only one of the heavy French cavalry regiments of that period wore cuirasses, the 8th regiment.

Dragoons wore the helmet, not the hat, for quite some time, so the cavalry in this picture are not dragoons. And the dragoons were uniformed in dark green, not dark blue and for a long time were 'listed' as light cavalry. They rode smaller horses than the heavy cavalry.

When Napoleon became First Consul he converted the first twelve regiments of 'cavalerie de bataille' to cuirassiers, abolished seven of the twenty-five heavy cavalry regiments and the last six were converted to dragoons. The men and horses of the seven abolished regiments were put into the first twelve and made cuirassiers.

These are cavalarie (or heavy cavalry). They had no cuirasses (even the old 8th didn't wear them anymore, I thought) up to the moment they became cuirassiers. Dragoons had the helmet afaik
There was no regiment of cavalry with blue facings (so dibble is probably right, a mistake when colouring in).

And even dragoons had no regiment with blue facings

Lienhart and Humbert aslo show no blue facings for the cavalarie link

this was disucssed before
TMP link

I would agree overall--probably a colorist's mistake.

But I was an OOB analyst too long. A couple of the pre-Rev cavalry regiments (Dauphin? Bourogogne?) had dark blue coats with either gray or light blue facings. (Can't be sure which: cataracts is not helping my color sense.) It's hard to get all the old uniforms out of the system TODAY. You don't want to think what it was like when a good wool coat might cost more than the enlistment bonus. Soldiers can get huffy about that sort of thing too. Just because a bunch of jumped-up lawyers in Paris have a new "rational" system doesn't mean a quartermaster will stop handing out perfectly good coats he has in store, or that the squadron will turn the old ones in. At best, there's a time lag. At worst, the new uniform comes and goes officially without any soldier ever seeing one.

I don't think light blue in 1793 is likely. But if I were painting French Rev and really wanted it, I'd cling to my color plate and scream defiance at the regulations. Many soldiers have, after all.

And it should also be noted that French regimental commanders as a group would ignore any and all uniform regulations at their leisure. This was definitely the state of uniforms during the Empire even after the Bardin regulations of 1812.

As for the period of the Revolutionary Wars, anything approaching uniformity would have been a blessing.

As for uniforms in general, in all periods, Roger Forthoffer got it right:

'There are three sorts of uniforms for every period of history; those described in the uniform regulations; those shown by the artists of that period; and what the soldiers really wore!'

And by my own years of service, that quotation is right on the money.

Thank you all. Your thoughts mirror mine exactly. I knew L&H did not show the light blue facings, nor do any of my other books/references. In fact I am not sure I ever recall a French heavy cavalry regiment wearing light blue facings.

Many plates from that time period were printed in black outline and then hand colored – i.e. the Knotel plates I have about half of them, and the Bouquay cards which I have many of as well are all done as such printed and then hand colored/painted. In fact one of the Knotel plates was painted in two different uniforms for the same regiment and If memory serves only one of them was correct. I was fortunate enough to get both versions though.

Would have been fun to do them though. Guess I'll go with pink as I already have the 25th (orange) for my 1800-1804 army.

Terry

And my maxim is to go by what is known historically, not by your own personal whim.

Paul :)

here a contemporary print

the ci devant cuirassiers du roi did wear a cuirass during the Revolutionary wars, they were the only regular cavalry unit to do so

Dibble, I totally agree. I want to be able to support a uniform I use. And that is causing some difficulty as well with the French color Aurore – which I see depict as a strong yellow, a yellow orange and a light orange????

Terry

Terry

According to Funcken's 1700's book the French Heavy Cavalry as of April 1 1791 consisted of 24 Regts. with blue uniforms and facing colours in series of six regts. The first six had scarlet facings, the second jonquille, third cramoise, fourth rose. Same as Haythornthwaite.