"Hanovarian questions" Topic

I'm trying to plan my next battalion for Waterloo. I have some Hanoverians from warlord games, and would like to do them a different colour than the usual red and grey.
I have this link which shows different guys in different uniforms, does this mean the battalion had a selection of each of these ?

link

My French is pretty rudimentary, but the text seems to be talking about just one particular unit (which is not named on the page your link provides). It indicates that upon the reformation of the Hanoverian Army, this battalion began as a light infantry unit (dressed like the light battalions of the King's German Legion). Its role changed to that of a line battalion, but still including, in accord with Hanoverian tradition, a rifle section. The author states that during the Waterloo Campaign the battalion PROBABLY wore a mix of the green and the new red uniforms, so this is a matter of opinion, not hard fact.

My French may be even worse, but the new 1813-15 Hanoverian army was governed by the 1803 regulations which called for a small sharfschutzen detachment. This shows one still wearing the rifle uniform with the flat cap, which makes some sense.

But the slam dunk is Kielmansegge's Field Jaeger Corps which is present at Waterloo dressed in--as I recall--a dark green short-tail coat and a flat cap reminiscent of Prussian Landwehr, so they look about as un-British as you can get. (I'm sure of the dark green coat colors, but I couldn't swear it wasn't a jacket.)

Remember all the Hanoverian regulars were raised in 1813 and dressed in anything available, and no one was really expecting an 1815 campaign. A mix of uniforms seems quite plausible and certainly happened in other 1815 armies.

In looking for color, You might put an officer or a senior NCO in the 1803 uniform. They called up all who were sent home in that year, and surely a few poor old-timers brought their old coats back with them. Also remember the Landwehr have a smallish KGL officer and NCO cadre, which will at least justify a few Belgic shakos among the stovepipes.

Ok thanks, this napoleon lark is very complicated. So I presume I can't just paint a hanovarian green, or use a rifles guy. Is a light company kgl a specific uniform? Do I need to buy a couple of metal ones to chuck into the mix? I guess I can use a peninsular officer, and put a few shakes (both type) as well as the caps then?

It is also true that during the Waterloo Campaign the participating King's German Legion infantry battalions (1st & 2nd Light, and 1st to 5th and 8th Line) had the number of companies reduced from ten to six, in order to distribute the supernumerary experienced officers and non-coms as "stiffeners" among the green Hanoverian units. As a matter of both veterans' pride and practicality, they probably retained their KGL uniforms.

Oops! I forgot to include a link for the above statement's source--see below:

link

Happy, I may be burned for heresy for writing this, but I'd say if your existing Warlord Hanoverians can be made up into the red uniform shown or some mix of it and the green, go ahead with it. It may not be spot on, but it's defensible, and there's still a lot we don't know.

If you do Hanoverian Landwehr, you might for your own amusement paint up a company-grade officer and an NCO in the uniform of one of the KGL infantry units, but you wouldn't have to. If my memory is correct none of them went to the Hanoverian regulars who had seen active serice in 1813-14, but I'm not going out in this weather to check.

My research has shown me the following units wore green or dark green jackets. The spelling might be wrong( got a mix of German and English spellings). My sources don't agree whether they are line or light units. The first two could be the same unit with different spelling. The last unit has been listed as red or green jackets by two different resources.

Lauenburg-black facings
Lueneburg-black or light blue facings
Osnabrueck-black facings
Jager Corp(Feldjaeger)-light green facings
Kielmannsegge's Jager Corp-apple green facings
Grubenhafen-dark green or black facings

The mont-saint-jean plate is supposed to depict the Bremen Bn. of 1815. The unit was previously a Light unit and did wear the green uniform as shown, tho probably only in shako.

During 1815 it was partially re-uniformed in red – apparently there were not enough new uniforms for all.
Note that Siborne's uniform chart calls up this unit in green and red coats, so both were worn at Waterloo.

There are problems with the plate:
The red coat should have black facings – there is an existing uniform with black facings.
The new uniform was worn with a Belgic style shako (from Siborne)and caps were not likely worn either.
The blue trousers and black belts are correct and apparently wings for all, tho I've also seen them shown as all black.

As mentioned above only the Landwehr units had K.G.L. officers and sergeants transferred into them.
The 1813-14 Hanoverian army had quite a few 'Light" units wearing green, but by Waterloo only the Luneberg and Grubenhagen Light Bns., the Feld Jager Corps and a portion of the Bremen Bn. wore green.
Hanoverian Line and Landwehr Bns. were made up of 4 companies, each of which had a number of men trained in skirmish tactics. These were used as skirmishers and likely only had muskets. Only the Feld Jager Corps and 1/3 of each of the Luneberg and Grubenhagen Light Bns. had rifles.

Say Grubenhagen, Luneburg and Kielmansegge Field Jaeger Corps. I'm a little suspicious of the Osnabruck. (I had family from there, so I tend to remember the name.) There was an Osnabruck Landwehr which figures in a nice Knoetel painting. One thing to watch for was that in 1815 there is a paper association--"no such thing in the field"--of the regular battalions with the landwehr: one regular to three Landwehr, but they only had nine regular battalions, and the "brigade" name of the three and one combination was not necessarily the name of the regular battalion--which may account for the Osnabruck here.

Anyway Happy, we've got you at least three regiments not in red and gray, and one which doesn't look even vaguely British. Go for it!

Thanks for the replies, though I'm not sure I understand all of it.. So did Bremen not wear caps? Most of my guys have caps and I mostly want to use them cos caps are cool, which did wear caps ? all the hanovarian minis come with caps, I presume to distinguish them.
I have a cunning plan for green guys (some have arms covering lace so you can't tell lace or buttons, I'll paint then green).

Black facings? Does that mean black collar and cuffs? And lace ? Still white leather ?

Sorry if I'm a bit slow, I'm new and not really sticking to the simple stuff. Why'd they put caps on guys that didn't wear caps?

@HappyHiker,

First, don't be embarrassed by not grasping everything immediately. Everyone has to start somewhere, and I give you credit for admitting to what you do not know. Also, don't get too wound up in trying to get every minor uniform detail right. The main thing, in my opinion, is that you have painted units to put on the table. Of course, there is always bound to be some wise guy eager to point out every mistake, but nothing says you have to take that much to heart.

Facings does refer to the color of the collar and cuffs (and also to the lapels for nations which had them in a contrasting color to the body of the coat). Lace is basically white in most cases, but there was some use of yellow lace for artillerymen, cavalry, or guards (I'm speaking here of the period in general, and not of any one nation). Also, in the British Army, each infantry regiment had its own particular pattern of lace, with various combinations of mostly black, blue, red or yellow woven into the white, but that is pretty impossible to paint on a wargaming miniature. Belts should be black for the Hanoverian light infantry battalions. Their green uniforms were based on those of the British 95th Rifles and the two light battalions of the Kings German Legion. Red-coated line and landwehr battalions were supposed to have white belts.

I am no expert on the Hanoverian Army, but my impression is that the vast majority, including the Landwehr, wore shakos. There was at least one unit depicted wearing the cap, but that may have been during the 1813-14 period, when they wore whatever they could get.

So, you ask why the manufacturer of your figures would provide only caps? My best guess is a combination of ignorance and carelessness. To have a viable business, the manufacturer has to offer a wide variety of troop types, periods, and nations. It is hardly possible for them to be all that expert in everything they offer, especially minor nations like Hanover. So, I suspect someone happened to see the illustration of the unit which did wear the Prussian style cap and just assumed that was typical of all the Hanoverian troops. This would certainly not be the first case or the only manufacturer to do something like this.

My best general advice for historical wargaming is to always research first. If you come across figures you like, research before buying to make sure they are right for what you are aiming at. Then do more research about the uniform details before ever dipping a brush. And, as far as I am concerned, historical wargaming is pointless if you do not understand what you are trying to simulate; therefore, research the organization and history of each particular unit you intend to build, and seek to understand the strategy and tactics of the period, not just blindly follow one particular rules set.

Good luck to you and happy gaming!

What a brilliant response above.

We all increasingly pick up on common errors. There is no harm in pointing them out and folk can pick or choose to respond. As long as they are not then feeling insulted. Some are.

I have a thing about placing artillerymen correctly around a cannon (usually a random thing for modellers), I like to see King's and Regt Colours correctly placed for British units, I like to see Grenadiers right of the line, not left. But then I am just about to show a bunch of Guard Engineers and Sailors (Marins) on the bridge at Charleroi…in full dress! Plumes, lace and all…..clearing a barricade…..looks good. Totally wrong

@attila, thanks for the response, that does make it clearer. I might change my plans and go with a landwehr that did have caps then. I can always do another minor state to add colour later. According to mont st jean pages most landwehr had a mix of caps and shakos and I think they're militia so that's another excuse. I will of course be doing 95th rifles sometime to add green anyway.

robert

The Osnabruck Line Bn. was also called the Duke of York's.
It had worn a green uniform in 1814, but Siborne lists them in red with blue facings in 1815.

Did anybody check the corresspondance of Clinton on that?
He did frequently comment on dress, and outlook of units when he was inspecting units in 1814 and 1815, the two volumes are a must read about 1814 and 1815 and the quality of units.

@Deadhead,

Thanks for the kind words about my last post in this thread.

@HappyHiker,

Okay, just to make sure you are clear about it, most of the German states, including Hanover, used the term "landwehr" for troops we call militia in English. Since my last post, I did some checking and found that apparently most of the Hanoverian Landwehr units at Waterloo wore the older "stovepipe" style of British shakos, while the regulars of the line infantry wore the newer "Belgic" shako. There were still shortages of arms and equipment for the Landwehr (some had no proper backpacks and just used folded blankets, while few of them had bayonets), so some of them may indeed have worn the caps for lack of proper shakos. At this point, I do not think anyone could actually prove you wrong if you threw a few into the mix for the sake of variety.

Also, I double-checked my recollection of the specific Hanoverian unit which wore the Prussian-style cap. It was the Feldjaegercorps von Kielmannsegge (mentioned by Robert Piepenbrink in his first post above), which was formed in the spring of 1813 with an initial strength of two companies, growing to four companies by October of that year. It also included two 2-pounder field pieces and a section of 12 mounted men. The unit was disbanded in September 1814, but two companies were reformed in 1815. The uniform, as of 1814 was a green short-tailed coat with gray trousers, black leather equipment, and the soft-topped cap. They were armed with rifles (not all units called jaegers were necessarily riflemen). So, as Robert Piepenbrink already said, there you have at least one unit in green wearing the very un-British looking cap. Hopefully, you did not buy a whole horde of Hanoverian figures in caps.

Thanks Attila the pun, landwehr with stovepipes and caps it is, grey trouser but a couple of green jackets thrown in, and I'll sound authorative and blag it if anyone questions it :-)

Luckily I just have the one box of hanovarians from the Waterloo starter set
Thanks for dumbing the answers down to my level too.

Another way to make your Hanoverians stand out from the British and KGL is that the backpacks of some regiments appear to have been yellow rather than black. It is likely this would have been a fairly subdued ochre colour rather than a bright yellow: TMP link

You could say the the Kielmansegge Bn didn't look British, but IIRC actually its outfit was a British Rifles jacket with British line infantry type overalls, and (possibly in 1815) a Germanic Landwehr style cap- so maybe not quite so-unBritish looking perhaps.

Quite unBritish & not Rifles jackets:

link

great link, Attila – many thanks!

p.s. I've already had a rant about how the Warlord Hanovarian box is a cheeky recycling of the British box which doesn't really work

TMP link

Can anyone thrown any light on how the "sharpshooter" platoon fitted into the light company of the "typical" KGL Line battalion during the Peninsula War and Waterloo campaign? I understand that they were a relic of the old Hanoverian organisation, in which each company had a number of schutzen who provided the battalion's skirmishers, and that they were rifle-armed. But did they form the entirety of the new light company when the KGL battalions adopted the 10-company British organisation, and was that light company all rifle-armed, or did it have musket-armed men, too?

Supercilius,

I wish I knew the answer to your question, but I do not. Have you tried using the search feature on the Message Boards page? Someone may have already had a thread on this subject.

I was under the impression that all of the K.G.L. light cos. had rifles at Waterloo.

There is a little info on the K.G.L. rifle-armed troops in the following post on the Napoleon Series:
link
Mainly about the Light Bns. but he does give some numbers for the Line Bns.

According to Reitzenstein/Brandis KGL had first 6 companies, then 8 companies and finally 10

When they had the 8 company organisation (which had neither grenadier nor light company) the pecularity of the "Scharfschützenabteilung" was permitted – at each battalion there was a Schützenzug of 1 subaltern officer, 2 Sergeants, 2 Corporals, one bugler (Hornist) and 52 Schützen. out of each 2 companies the first one provided 1 NCO and 6 rank and file and the other 7 rank and file.
The officer had initially blue wings with gold, the bugler the uniform of the drummers and also wings in red and white and white fringes (instead of the woolen tuft) the bugle was carried with green cords and tassels, the NCOs and men had red wings but with a woolen and like those of the light battalions. Those 56 men were armed with rifles and as side arm the "Hirschfänger" hunting sword and a long black varnished pouch – the belts were white – as well as the small ball pouch (white) which was also varnised as well as the rifle strap.

p. 252 / 253

rather freely translated

Reitzenstein

Übersicht der Geschichte der Hannoverschen Armee von 1617 bis 1866
von einem Hannoverschen Jäger
Hautpmann Schütz von Brandis
Hannover und Leipzig 1903

This book is a gold mine of information

publised in the series

Quellen und Darstellungen zur Geschichte Niedersachsens
Band XIV
Übersicht der Geschichte der Hannoverschen Armee von 1617 bis 1866

Osprey Men-At-Arms 338. The King's German Legion (1) 1803-12 by Mike Chappell.

"Within the Infantry each of the ten battalions of the KGL (Two Light and Eight line) had ten companies. The establishment of a company is as follows:

1 captain (commanding)
2 lieutenants
1 ensign (junior officer)
5 sergeants
5 corporals (one of whom was the company quartermaster)
1 drummer (bugler in the light infantry companies)
96 privates (from which were found a second drummer/bugler, pioneers, bandsmen, grooms and officer's servants).

Companies were designated alphabetically. ‘A' being the grenadier company and ‘J', the junior, the Light company. Each battalion had a platoon of ‘Sharpshooters' armed with rifles instead of smoothbore muskets. This consisted of:

1 lieutenant (commanding)
2 sergeants
2 corporals
1 bugler
52 privates (the light battalions had a higher proportion of rifles to muskets.)

Each battalion had a colonel-commandant, but his duties rarely brought him into contact with his unit. At battalion headquarters were:
1 lieutenant-colonel (commanding)
2 majors
1 adjutant
1 paymaster
3 surgeons
1 quartermaster
1 sergeant-major
1 quartermaster-sergeant
1 paymaster-sergeant
1 armourer-sergeant

The colour party, pioneers, band, servants and helpers at battalion headquarters were all ‘found' from within the companies."

I would suggest that the Sharpshooters within the battalions would have been clothed as the rest of the battalion otherwise (as with the mention of the weapon they carried) it would have been recorded had their uniform been different.

Chappell shows this:

link

Paul :)