"Grenzers?" Topic

Don't forget that you had the Grenzscharfschützen with the Grenzer as well, armed either with the double barreled special rifle, one smoothbore, the other rifled, or just the plain rifle, in the Revolutionary Wars they were grouped together from the regiments to form two fully rifled battalions.

>>All I was saying is that, in general, there was surely some significant qualitative difference between the Grenzer and the Jaeger (in 1848-1849, anyway).

Yes I agree and in many ways, the 'regular' Grenzer were a lot more militarily 'experienced' ANd competent than the amateur rifle corps' IMO- that Austria turned too time and again, with perhaps exception of Tyroleans of course.

However I'm not seeing either broken down to be just ;scouts; for the line, if that was part of the implication. I have no problem with comparisons of like eras and firepower- after all these empires crawled along at a snails pace when it came to killing technology.

looking at Aspern-Essling, the deployment of Grenzer definitely shows a pattern:

1st Column (VI Korps Hiller):
Avant Garde 1 Hungarian Regt, 2 Vienna Volunteer Bttns, 2 Grenz (one severely understrength)
Rest of Korps – No Grenzer

2nd Column (1st Korps Bellegarde):
Avant Garde 1 'German' Regt, 2 Jaeger bttns
Rest of Korps – No Grenzer

3rd Column (II Korps Hohenzollern-Hechingen):
Avant Garde 2 Jaeger Bttns, 1 'German' Regt, 1 EHKL Bttn
Rest of Korps – No Grenzer

4th Column (IV Korps Dedovich):
Avant Garde 1 'German' Regt, 1 Jaeger Bttn
Rest of Korps – 1 Grenzer bttn and 1 Moravian volunteer Bttn

5th Column (IV Korps Hohenlohe):
Avant Garde 1 Grenz Bttn, 1 Freikorp Company (Carneville's)
Rest of Korps – No Grenzer

Obviously the Avant Garde divisions also contained cavalry and artillery.

But they all include either Grenz or Jaeger. Only one Grenz battalion is not in the Avant Garde divisions.

Cannon fodder? Only if you say that of the Jaeger as well. They're all cannon fodder of course but there seems to be more purpose than that for them virtually all being in the Avant Garde formations.

Cheers,
John