"Favorite Armies of the French Revolution?" Topic

I saw that thread on favourite battles and I was wondering what are people's favourite armies, and why. The armies are in many ways very different from their more popular, later incarnations, and change during the period itself, like the difference between the French armies of '92 and '95, or the British from '93 and '99.

Anybody playing Sardinians, Neapolitans, or Spanish? I rarely hear anyone that interested in the Prussians… not a lot of figures available anyway.

I am interested in the Prussian Army – as along with the rest of all armies of this period

First of Regt. Kuhnheim

and British

and of course Austrian

and Bavarians

Big fan of the Russians. Got to love those unusual facing colors.

and French of course

so there are quite some possibilities, just painting now

Hessen Kassel

more Prussians

Göcking Hussaren (no these are not Blücher's)

I rarely hear anyone that interested in the Prussians…

Maybe because they left early, one of the reasons being that it was easier to help partition Poland instead of fighting the French…

Of course, if you can paint like that, any army is going to look amazing ….

I'm fascinated by the 92-94 French, the wide variety of uniforms, flags, quality, and political situation.

Yes indeed
ca ira

les blancs

et les bleues

in case eclipsing binaries did a lot of other interesting units too, like from Venice.

of course as a Dutchman I like the Dutch States army for the 1793-1795 period and the Batavian for the 1795-1806 period.
I'm trying to build a 1793 army for the Crisis show November 2020

Sho Boki made some nice Dutch as well.

Brechtel I wonder if thr French at Pirmasens and Kaiserslautern would agree with you?

Vendee!

Having just painted up a big bunch of Vendee rebels, I agree with DinOfBattle2.

Oh and the Republican French to fight them also of course.

The Irish for the '98.

Doomed, but interesting and fun to play, with the right crowd of course.

Eric

Like the French but favourite are the Austrians

@epturner, the situation in Ireland in the 1790s strikes me as offering a great deal of opportunity for various scenarios involving (among other things) different degrees of French support – Hoche in 1796 rather than Humbert in 1798, Humbert and Tone both in the West and the North-West in 1798 itself, Boney NOT to "set sail with his army to Egypt" even – as well as a great variety of combatants. Had Lord Edward and other leaders managed to avoid arrest, had there been better co-ordination, the campaigning might have proved rather less "asymmetrical". Need large armies of peasants, though.

Apart from a dozen or so "characteristic" figures in each of four categories, the majority of the figures in my still unfinished Horde could do service as United Irishmen, Vendeeans or Parisiens (change a flag here and there and don't look too closely), Spanish guerrilleros or even Cossacks, on foot of course. Get one with a big black beard and they could become Tyroleans. I suppose they could be American Militia too – many of these 15mm multinationals were converted from such figures anyway – but that's a different Revolution altogether.

Still, my favourite army would be Revolutionary French. No two uniforms patched the same. Good Luck.

In the painted collection of 25/28mm:

Austrians for 1790 and 1798, France, Vendee, Other Royalist like Conde, Prussians 1790 and 1806, Russian 1790 and 1807, Sardinia/ Piedmont 1796, Minor Italian duchies, some Naples for 1796, Ottomans of course, Islamic states, 1790 USA (Legions), odd Bavarians, Riecharmee 1790, Batavia (ex Dutch) army 1796, Spain 1793, Portugal for War of the Oranges 1801, Hesse Darmstadt, Hesse Kassel, Saxony 1806/7.

So a good representation for the tabletop FRW period into the early French Imperial era.. Most 50-100 miniatures each, the major powers 300-500 painted miniatures.

FRW games or scenarios commonplace in the warren three or four times per year.

As for favorite armies….. Tough one…. but the French fought almost all of them so my hat goes with the French. As for color…. Ottomans hands down.

Why this Napoleonic discussion is removed from Napoleonic Discussion Messages board?

good question, maybe it is 18th century related, on the other hand, this thread, also 18th century related stays on Boney board.

TMP link

Very odd move. Most of us consider the Napoleonic Wars to date from 1792-1815. Yes you can break it down by period and coalition.

I play Coalition armies. I have pre-1798 Austrians, some Saxons and Hessians, Emigre and British/Hanoverians. My opponent plays the French but for variety bought and painted a Russian army! We use 10mm so it was hard to find the figures (mostly Pendraken) and we did a good amount of modifying…

Each army has it's strengths and weaknesses, it's good and bad generals. It's a challenge fighting the post-1795 French but they are far from unbeatable. My favorites will always be the Austrians! Not the most decisive generals and the troops aren't as good in the attack, but solid. Better cavalry, too!

I'm with Brownand, batavian republic troops are cool, got mine painted by Big battalions from AB french
what I find odd for the period is the fact that bicorn on minis are mostly represented "line " sided, which insure that it would be stuck by the musket or sabre and fall to the ground during normal weapons movement. It should be represented "column " sided.

Painting-wise, pre-Empire period has tons of cool uniforms, which will become a bit more, well, uniform later on. Too bas command is so much crap almost everywhere

von Winterveldt,
I know sho boki does great Dutch (and other) figures but I started years ago the FR in 28mm

Regarding the removing of this post from the Napoleon board; Wikepedia show the end of the FR period in 1799 (coupe d'etat de Napoleon in december 1799) so 18th century?

@Brownand

When I am finished with the Hessians, next will be a unit of French, but then Dutch – do you have information for the colours they carried??

Also I see I could use the Sho Boki – Bavarians for Löwenstein Regiment

Hope to see those figures at some point in future, von W., especially the Hessians (some of this "big black-whiskered set" were deployed in Ireland in 1798, you see). Certainly admired the detachments shown above.

If your French is any good, and you want to read a regimental history that is not about the British or the French (which are much easier to find), try this one. It's the history of the Austrian Regiment de Clerfayt (IR 9, "Walloon"), and a large portion of it covers the Revolutionary wars period in extensive detail, basically every posting, campaign, engagement and skirmish, even for the detached Grenadiers!

Really worth reading, even if you have to get the text version and run it through google translate…

All for free.
link

There is also a very nice regimental history in German available, also for down load

link

very detailed account about the French Revolutionary Wars

Here Grenadierbattalion von Zschock

vonW, I'm working on my first Boki Dutch now. Have been in touch with the guy who does the Ca Ira blog about Dutch flags and he doesn't have much. In short the army was reorganized to regimental numbers in 1752, and he suspects got new flags at the time but just guessing at info.
For wargames purposes I got Austrian succession flags from vaubanner graphics and figured out lineage for those units to see what flags belonged to units that still existed in 93. I think that covers about half the battalions I want to do.
Phil

I bought

Marc Geerdink – Schaftenaar : For Orange and the States, the Army of the Dutch Republic 1713 – 1772, there are some colour there, as for Vaubanner graphics, do you have a link?

In case let us know about what you figured out for regimental lineage as well – would be highly appreciated.

link
Gets you to the French Revolution page.
I used for orange and the states to see what the regiments Vaubanner printed became in the 1772 list when they became numbered. Easy to go from there. I'll have time to post my list later.
Phil

AFAIK Vaubanner use WAS flags which imho are totally differet to flags of the FR period

Brownand,
Well aware that they are WAS. Do you have any idea where to find any info on what the Revolutionary period flags looked like? I've been looking for some time and got virtually nothing. I'd love to get it right.
Phil

Valmy92- so this is my not particularly educated stab for the general style of Dutch flags in the Revolutionary era.

It is an impression pieced together from peering intently at small flags appearing in a few contemporary pictures (one of the clearest is on the cover of 'for Orange and the States' Vol 1), inferences from the regularisation of Dutch uniforms post 1752, and inferences from the general stylistic development of military flags in Northern Europe in the late c18th, and inferences from the significant 'Prussian' influence seen in other aspects of the Army in the 1760-80s- especially under the Duke of Brunswick till 1782.

From these admittedly slightly shaky foundations I would conclude that the flags-

- were likely of a more consistent and simpler design than in the WAS,
- that they were somewhat similar to the Prussian style of flag without 'rays'- so central device (maybe crowned), mottoe underneath, with wreath round the central device, and small devices in the corners.
- Germanic devices such as eagles would have been replaced by the Lion
- Given that this was a period of history with a Stadtholder in power and the Organist influence much more powerful and overt than in the WAS- I think the corner devices were likely to have been crowned Stadtholder monograms.
- Colour of flags very open to question, but pretty sure white colonel's flags. For the Footguards and 'Orange' Regiments, regimental flags probably orange. 1770s painting of Footguards shows this white/orange combo. Other units regimental flags- I've no idea (???facing colour maybe logical) …..
- Possibly flags still had small Province devices in the corner as in the WAS.

There- that's a load of half baked guesses for you!

I'd be surprised if somewhere in Dutch archives there wasn't something lurking there about flag patterns. The Duke of Brunswick who was very influential in the 1760-80s and particularly basically ran the Army was quite big on regularisation- so it's hard to see flags escaping his attention for so long.

PS V Winterfeldt- beautiful painting of Boki/AB figs

As you noticed, I suppose that after the reorganisation of 1752 in which some regiments were disbanded and all the other national regiments which on that moment consisted of one battalion were combined into two battalion regiments. Exception the walloon regiment (3 batts) and swiss guard. I think that most colours were changed after this period as a lot of colonels died or were replaced.replaced.
As you probably know the battalion had two colours; the first mostly of the province who payed the regiment or battalion but regiments who were connected to the house of orange oftenhad some Orange-Nassau coat of arms. German and Swiss regiments had mostly ananother system. A part of the National, German and Swiss I have by various sources.
the problem are the second colours as these had a connection to the commanding general and were decorated with personal coat of arms etc; of these I have a lot of personal/family coa's gathered but it is not known how these were portrayed on the flags. I have almost all swiss 2nd flags and various German ones.
I have sent Maverick some days ago all this information to see if he can and will make those flags, even the imaginary ones.
PS I am the Ca-ira guy and Ihave worked the last month to collect the info but it is very possible that somewhere more info con be collected in lybraries, personal letters and stuff etc. So this is probably not the last word on this theme.

@Brownand

Thanks for the blog, excellent and also for your suppling interesting information, keep us informed about Maverick colours, I would need some for my Dutch regiments.

My thanks as well. Your blog has been my best source of information on the revolutionary period Netherlands. I think all the books I have were originally referenced by you. I look forward to your more info on flags.
Phil

For those of you who are interested in the Orangist army, what's your take on their record, 1795-1795? Do you have any details on the performance of their different arms (infantry, cavalry, artillery), specific units, and their commanders? I guess that could include the many Emigre units as well.

Most of the information I have about them comes from English sources only.

Paul Demet's book is a good start, though not covering directly the Dutch

Demet, Paul, We are Accustomed to do our Duty

For the Allies, the Russians.

For the French, the Armée du Rhin/Armée de Rhin-et-Moselle/Armée d'Allemagne

Perfect captain,
some remarks:
the Dutch army was inexperienced; their real last war was the WAS in which they had a mixed reputation; but even that was 45 years ago.
Regarding the infantry; the regiments (nominally of 12 musketeer and 2 grenadiercompanies) were small because the company strength was nominally small and even then, they were not up to strength. In 1793 their combined musketeers and grenadierbattalions had 8 companies.
The 1794 combined battalions only had 6 companies with a theoretical battalion strength of 430 to 510 men (this at the start of the campaign and of this strength men were taken for the regimental artillery, logistical activities and officer services)
The 1794 grenadier battalions had only 384 men at the start of the campaign.
There were some 4 light infantry battalions but these were also small (mostly theoraticaly 280 men)

Cavalry had the same understrength problem; of the nominally 4 squadrons only 2 could take the field. This was the same for hussars, dragoons and line cavalry.
Artillery had regimental guns (mostly crewed by infantry), horse artillery (2 batteries raised in 1793) and field artillery. They had civilian drivers.

Regarding quality I think they were normal line troops, some regiments behaved good, some less. As only few unbiased reports are available it is difficult to know their quality exactly.

It also didn't help that the allies were very divdided regarding war goals and more and more allied troops disappeared and left behind the dutch troops to defend the Dutch state. And as a lot of troops were hired you can doubt that these would fight to the end for a lost cause.
The last effect was the appointment of officers by stadtholder William V, I get the impression that not always the best officers were nominated but that being a supporter of the Orange family was a great asset. Also, some experienced officers left the army after the Prussian invasion of 1787.

The Dutch had only two emigré units; Beon and Damas. Afaik their sercvice record wasn't great

Lacking a reason to rate them otherwise i planned to treat them as standard line infantry. The rules my group uses (black powder) reduces staying power and combat power for small units. I'm currently reading The Duke of York's campaign in Flanders (through 1793 so far) the Brits seem to think the Dutch slow to act, maybe reduce command activation ratings (may not be fair at the tactical level though, more operational)
Phil

just finished

Hessen Kassel, Regiment von Hanstein

Great stuff People, thanks for all the info.
Next up, painting 10mm Prussians…

Superb painting Von SWinterfelft, who manufactures the figure or are they a mix?