Napoleonic Wargame Club (NWC)

Does anyone have a complete list of which light infantry regiments outfitted their elite companies with colpacks instead of regulation shakos and bearskins? I know the 7th 10th and 21st used colpacks and I believe the 8th did too based on their sappers using them. 3rd did not (carabiniers wore brown bearskins rather than normal black ones). Not sure about the rest.

Regards,
Marechal Lambert

_________________
Maréchal d'Empire Theron Lambert
Grand-duc de Montereau et Duc d'Angers

Good to see you, Theron. Hope your work is doing well. You still in Idaho?

What years were you inquiring about? The "Glory Years" 1805-1807? Or the later periods - 1810-1815?

In doing some searching I found this nice page of plates. Really good images too. While it doesn't address your need I found the link at a site that was discussing this same question.

Here are the images:

https://plus.google.com/photos/111338976612920961016/albums/5152138188097131265?banner=pwa

And here is the discussion on the colpack:

http://theminiaturespage.com/boards/msg.mv?id=355236

http://theminiaturespage.com/boards/msg.mv?id=271580

I enjoy how one of the folks participating in the discussion said that if any of his guys would have made a stink about the uniforms at one of his miniatures games he wouldn't be invited back. Good for him. The uniforms were rarely ever standard in the Legere anyway and certainly the men often chose to wear a hat that was not standard. Hats were the dreaded item in the Wars with the tarleton that the French revolutionary war infantry had to wear being one of the most distasteful. When the thing got soaked well after several times it stunk! They couldnt wait to get rid of it and wear the bicorne.

Uniform variations are almost impossible to track. One of the guys did mention that the Tir. du Corse wore their colpacks long after 1809. There were absorbed into a Legere regiment (11th Legere - 1st bn with du Po being the 2nd bn.)

I had a difficult time finding the "curate cloth" attired dragoons for Spain. Later found several images of them and also of the Cuirassiers and other troop types.

My fav. uniform variations for the French are their tropical uniforms for the early period (Rev Wars). Egypt in particular. Lots of interesting (not exciting really) uniforms. They were not dazzling by any means but they were unique.

_________________


Generalfeldmarschall Wilhelm Prinz Peters von Dennewitz

3. Husaren-Regiment, Reserve-Kavallerie, Preußischen Armee-Korps

Honarary CO of Garde-Ulanen Regiment, Garde-Grenadier Kavallerie

NWC Founding Member

For Club Games: I prefer the Single Phase mode of play. I prefer to play with the following options OFF:

MDF, VP4LC, NRO, MTD, CMR, PR, MIM, NDM, OMR (ver 4.07)

Bill, thanks for the info. I'm still in Idaho for the time being, but likely moving by January as I'm leaving my current employment.

I'm aiming for 1809. Fur caps for line and light were officially abolished by then, but still in use until 1811 or so. I realize that any answer will be incomplete in that regimental commanders exercised a great deal of freedom and when commanders changed so could the uniform. I don't get picky about how others choose to depict a unit, but when I can I like to stick as close to correct historical uniforms as I can. By 1812 regulations were more strictly followed but with the reverses thereafter it was often a case of making due with whatever was at hand.

The Peninsula was always a case of improvising with whatever material could be obtained locally, but I'm sticking to central Europe.

I'd also like to find a good source for drummer uniforms by regiment as they varied greatly from regiment to regiment. Some were light blue, some pale yellow, some red and even those that were regulation dark blue often had different facing colors.

_________________
Maréchal d'Empire Theron Lambert
Grand-duc de Montereau et Duc d'Angers

I would like to paint some "Peninsular French Dragoons" eventually. The curate cloth uniform looked provincial!

Its all so hard to pinpoint. Just know that the Po and Corse Legere regiment would be one of those that kept the colpack.

Drummers ... if you look at plates of the French infantry long enough you should be able to piece together enough info on those. Again, the officers often had different color schemes than the norm for the musicians.

I would refer you to Paco Palomo as he knows the French army better than I.

_________________


Generalfeldmarschall Wilhelm Prinz Peters von Dennewitz

3. Husaren-Regiment, Reserve-Kavallerie, Preußischen Armee-Korps

Honarary CO of Garde-Ulanen Regiment, Garde-Grenadier Kavallerie

NWC Founding Member

For Club Games: I prefer the Single Phase mode of play. I prefer to play with the following options OFF:

MDF, VP4LC, NRO, MTD, CMR, PR, MIM, NDM, OMR (ver 4.07)