"The Royal American Regiment " Topic

"During the struggle between France and Britain for control of North America, in the conflict known to Americans as the French and Indian War, the British forces had met with some early disasters that made it clear that some new military units with special skills would be needed to fight this war. A large British force under General Edward Braddock had been wiped out fighting the traditional way, as if they were on a European battlefield, by a much smaller force of French and Indians who used the wooded terrain to their advantage. After word of this humiliation reached London, King George II gave royal assent to the formation of a new regiment for the British army on Christmas Day, 1755. This was the birthday of the 60th Royal American Regiment (originally the 62nd, it was renumbered a few years later) which was to include four battalions, made up of many foreign soldiers with woodland experience, provided they were Protestant of course (so as not to have any risk of sympathy with the Catholic French), for service in North America.

John Campbell, 4th Earl of Loudoun, who was then commander-in-chief of British forces in North America and Governor-General of Virginia, was appointed to the mostly ceremonial post of colonel-in-chief of the new regiment. The idea for the regiment originated with a Swiss soldier and comrade of the Duke of Cumberland named Colonel Jacques Prevost. It was he who suggested that a special unit of men expert at fighting in heavily wooded areas was what was needed in waging war in the wilds of North America. The ranks were to include a large percentage of Germans, some from the German states, others recruited from German-Americans in the colonies. To fully fill out the four battalions, large numbers of Irish were later recruited. These were men who had been rejected for service in other regiments of the Irish establishment for the British army, a point to remember. The battalions formed up in New York but as far as leadership went, this was a regiment ‘for' America and not ‘of' America to be sure. For the first time ever, the British army also commissioned a number of foreign officers to lead a regular regiment. Out of 101 commissioned officers of the regiment, alongside English, Irish and Scots about half were foreigners, German and Swiss with some Dutch, though none could rise above the rank of lieutenant colonel so as to ensure that a proper Briton was always in command.

The principle behind the Royal American Regiment was not a unique one. Having a force that could fight the French-backed Indians using Indian tactics was also the idea behind the famous Rogers' Rangers from which the current special forces of the U.S. Army claims descent. However, the Rangers were irregular troops and the very nature of their job and how they carried it out ensured that they were a rough, rowdy and undisciplined bunch. With the Royal American Regiment it was hoped that the British army could have a unit that combined some of the backwoods fighting skills of the Rangers with the discipline and reliability of British regulars. Given its background and composition, some have referred to it as a mixture of a colonial regiment and a foreign legion. They were dressed, originally, like any other British regiment save for the fact that they had no lace on their coats, just plain blue turn backs (blue being the traditional color of "royal" regiments). However, they would ultimately look very different in the field than what their original appearance was…"

More here
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Amicalement
Armand

Dude, that is pretty bad history you are posting here.

If you want the definitive modern book on this regiment, this one is the best:

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Long story short, the 60th was just another regular regiment, no better, no worse, and wore red coats the entire time. Some frontier training took place under Bouquet at Raystown in 1758 (4 companies only), but they did not fight very well at Grant's Hill in Sept of 1759, and subsequent to the battle the 60th officer who commanded asked to resign.

"Among the other regiments of the British army, the Royal Americans had a distinctively ‘frontier' look to them, dressed more practically for serious fighting in the woods than for parade-ground panache. What is interesting is that this regiment of American colonists, German and Swiss soldiers of fortune and Irish rejects, proved itself to be one of the best in the British army."

Dude. Seriously? :-( Ugh.

@historygamer: Thanks for the link.

It is a bit academic in places but gives a really good picture of this regiment duing this period.

"One of the battalion commanders, Henri Bouquet, a Swiss, literally wrote the book on tactics that were later adopted by the whole British army and which remained standard for over a century to come."

Yikes, where to begin with this untruth. Bouquet was not a battalion commander, he was a Lt. Col. of the 1st battalion. The commander of the 1st battalion was Col (Brigadier) John Stanwix, who later helped to build Fort Pitt, but was off buidling Fort Stanwix in 1758.

The "standards" for light infantry of the time period (there were no official ones since this branch was new) were written by William Howe, later General during the first part of the Rev War, and an acknowledged expert on light tactics (why he was picked to lead the American Amry in 1776).

"He and his fellow battalion commanders turned their diverse volunteers, many of whom had less than the best reputation, into true experts at wilderness warfare and the changes to their uniform and their habits reflected that."

Just wow, and what a load of horse hockey. The battalions were located all over the place and did not have any special drill, other than Bland's or the Duke of Cumberland's New Exercise. Bouquet practiced specific warfare tatics with the four companies he had at Raystown, but they never used them (documented anyway), and the regiment served as normal line troops – with varying results.

I will say this, that the print posted above isn't bad for a 1759 RAR battalion man. The one behind him in brown gaiters is a little more iffy, and 60th wore (according to the Bouquet papers) black gaiters, then wore green leggins in 1759 – though blue was also common, as noted in Knox's Journal for the same year.

Also, the painting of Sir William Johnson by Benjamin West, seems to show cape collars on both of those Light infantrymen before those were generally worn. Interesting. This is likely due to him painting it sometime between 1764 and 1768 when the clothing was changing. I see the same type of cape collar on Johnson's coat too. West had a reputation for getting such details wrong. though his artwork is impressive:

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At the end… thanks of the thread… I have lern a lot about this unit thanks to historygamer…. (smile)

Amicalement
Armand

The plate shown is lifted directly from either the Funcken book on American armies, or Lace Wars. Probably the former.
No attribution given of course. Hey! If it's in Google Images, who needs to give attribution? I wonder if it's still copyrighted, but that boat has long sailed.

Well not wanting to hijack the thread on the Royal Americans. Great info from history gamer as usual, thank you.

Attribution is for plagiarism which is a totally different form of copy right. When it comes to copy right for images and those found on the internet. Most people who use copy righted images for non-commercial use are covered under the fair use doctrine. Under the fair use doctrine, copy righted images can be used in reviews, educational purposes, comments, criticism, news reporting and research. But having friends who are artists and make a living off their work. They tell me they don't mind if you use their work in non-commercial things like webpages and such. But its just being polite and respectful to site the artist whose work you are using on your blog or webpage.

Bouquet led them to victory at the battle of Bushy Run which culminated in a fearsome charge by the Royal Americans that is still remembered.

By who, I wonder? IIRC, weren't there just a handful of 60th men with Bouquet in comparison with the contingent of Highlanders, as reflected in the proportion of casualties between the 42nd and 60th?

My understanding is that the key charge was made by Highlanders filtered out of the side of the position to catch the Indians in flank when they were lured forward by a planned withdrawal on the perimeter.

Not terribly impressive. Why do people make these offerings when…? Oh, never mind.

You are correct 42nd. There were hardly any 60th there as they were all garrisoning the outposts (or captured, or dead). Bushy Run was largely a Highlanders' battle. The victory was a bit dubious. They had no idea how many Indians they actually killed. IIRC the Indians sniped at them all the way to Fort Pitt. What was somewhat novel was Bouquet's defensive formation (well, it had long roots in history actually) and his feigned withdrawal and counter attack that threw the Indians off.

What, you mean a redoubt of flour bags?

chirpy smiley face

I've always had slight trouble with the decisive withdrawal and ?left flanker. As you indicate, I suspect it wasn't quite as neat a manoeuvre or as comprehensive a rout as accounts suggest.

The flour bag "fort" was mainly to protect the wounded, not to fight behind. It was not Rourke's Drift.

Some interesting things about the present day park:

1. No one is really sure where the actual battlefield is. Yes, there is a park there, but there is an interesting story about the land being bought later by a participant, and sub-dividing it among his family members. The topography across the street is roughly the same as the park, meaning, no one is sure which was the actual site of the battle.

2. No one is really sure there are graves at the top of the hill either. My understanding is that whatever search was done was tainted by the high power lines that run overhead of where the graves supposedly are. The search was apparently conducted from the air using some sort of magnetic imaging which would be affected by the large high power lines there.

3. The old red dog (stones) trail leading up to the flag pole and concrete flour bags and marker were places there in the 20s or 30s to allow automobiles to drive up to the area. The stone road is not known to be part of the Bouquet Road, which was a post-Forbes road creation, and perhaps not used that much.

After the Highland counter-attack, the Indians drew off, but they were still in the area. It did allow the relief column to proceed to Fort Pitt though.

Sorry, I'm not sure then what you meant by "Bouquet's defensive formation."

Did you mean the falling back by one section of the perimeter to trick the Indians to break cover?

Maybe it was simply a desperate gamble that paid off, but can you imagine both halves of that manouevre working smoothly without training, given that the Highlanders reportedly couldn't be trusted to stray more than a few yards from the trail without getting lost.

I can see it in the movie version, though, very thrilling too, but..

What is the original source for it; Bouquet's dispatch?

His defensive formation was used on his subsequent march into the Ohio country the following year. It was a defensive formation that the Indians could not outflank (their only real tactic – that and ambush).

He had some rather unique camp formations as well (square).

But WHAT defensive formation? There's only so long I can keep my pencil poised above my notebook!

Have to dig it out to go into detail, but it was the way he arranged his forces while on the march – basically a kind of box formation – that way there were no open flanks to attack. It so frustrated the Indians they never did attack and he marched right into the heart of their homelands and demaned the return of all whitemen held by the Indians, adopted or otherwise before he would negotiate with them. They did comply as they knew they had been bested- all this without a shot being fired.

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Here is the book:

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I had to wonder if the British were using his camp layout (or something similar) during the AWI period, as Ewald referred several times to the square English camps when certain units went out on foraging expeditions.

I was just going to chime in, didn't Ewald refer to square English camps. lol Thanks for all the information historygamer.

I need to pull the thread on that some more. I am reading the new book on Monmouth and there is a passage in there about Andre making a drawing of the Crown Camp at Mt. Holly, NJ, and I am trying to find a picture of that. Any help would be appreciated. :-)

There is André's drawing of the camp at Tredyffryn, if that is at all useful. Apologies for woefully bad online article to which this is attached.

I saw this but I don't think that is the map I was talking about. That may be the Paoli attack map.

It is but it shows Howe's camp as per caption.

I'm looking for one he supposedly drew in June of 1778 just prior to the battle at Monmouth. The Brits were camped at Mt. Holly. What I'm really looking for is to see the arrangements they camped in – Lochee, square (tied back to Bouquet's camps), or other.