"Help with Italians for 1812?" Topic

Any Italy experts out there? Now that I have a decent number of French, I've been thinking of adding some variation to my 1812 collection, and Eugène de Beauharnais' IV Corps looks tempting. Italian Guard, Light and Line infantry, as well as Croat and Dalmatian regiments. That sounds like a lot of variation!

However, I'm seeing some different uniforms for 1812 when I'm looking around, so I'd love to hear some input. Did the line infantry have the "austrian looking" mostly white uniforms with facing colours in the campaign, or the greener version? And did the Legere regimens have the all green uniforms?

Also, is there something I should keep in mind when adding Italians? I must say that I'm not 100% sure when reading the OOB, like the Guard d'Honneurs compared to the Velites, Guard infantry and Guard conscripts(?).

histunif.com

In French, but lots of pictures, too.

This is probably the best site, and in English:

napitalia.org.uk/eng

link

Thanks for the links. I'm not sure though, some of them seem to point towards the 1812 regulation uniform not being impletemented until 1813, just like for France. Can anyone confirm this?

I can't confirm, but I would doubt the Italians received any Bardin uniforms at all.

They switched to white in, IIRC, 1807 with a further switch to the Bardin (also in white) almost certainly in 1813.

The facings are various combos of red and green – sometimes just piping around white.
The light infantry and most of the guard are in green. I think the Croatian units are as well, though IIRC the Dalmatians had a much more Austrian uniform including hat.

If you have the whole corps there are also some treats like some Polish uhlans some Bavarian light horse and part of a Joseph Napoleon regt.

The Guardia d'Onore are a nice cavalry unit to do – each troop had different facings. I have seen quite different numbers given for 1812 – either a decent sized cavalry unit or a fairly small guard. Probably 2 squadrons with a total of about 200 men.

The various guard units did fight (like lions) at Maloyaroslavets so there is more use to be had out of them than the French guard in this campaign. This is the main battle where the 15th division got into action – most of the 1812 campaign saw them relatively unengaged.

Albrech Adam's plates of 1812 are quite useful – he was with IV Corps in 1812 and draw the pictures based on his sketches. link

Thanks, that's very useful information!

Reading up on the history of Joseph Napoleon's regiment, it's hard to refuse including it. :)