"Early Russian Artillery Drivers" Topic

I always believed these guys wore bicorns, but recently I saw some in the early model shakos. Anyone have a good source on this? I'm looking at the 1805-07 period.

All my sources seem to show that drivers in the period 1805-07 wore shakos like the rest of the artillery of which they were part rather than a separate organisation.

I think I saw in Viskovatov that they were still wearing bicorns in this period. That's what has me worried.

Shakos were used.
Here are the illustrations of Viskovatov that interest you:
link

Second (top) image.

Ok, the other thing about these guys is the jacket, described by Viskovatov as a frock coat, but this illustration shows the corners turned back. And the turnbacks, or lining of the coat, look darker than the dark green jacket itself, so must be black? And it's single breasted. Short of using a single breasted model and adding the bottom parts in paper or lead sheet, I have no idea how to create this uniform in 1/72 plastic.

Any ideas?

Maybe I could use HaT cossacks, with an early infantry head swap. No – jacket's too short.

Prussian dragoon maybe

"Рисунки, изображающие различных видов одежду и прочую аммуницию артиллерийских служителей в правлении инспектора всей артиллерии графа Аракчеева 1807 года" shows in shako with shortish jacket and turnbacks, grey buttoned overalls.

Sorry the Cyrillic title won't hold… "Drawings depicting different types of clothes and other artillery armoury" published St. Petersburg 1807

Essling, thanks. I think I got it. A transition out of the frock coat around 1807. That's certainly the easy way out, and I might take it. It's one thing to put a lot of time and effort into a conversion for a unit of, say, cuirassiers. But artillery drivers? Not so much. Of course, that just makes me want to do it. I'll let you know.