Napoleon's Scouts of the Imperial Guard

by Ronald Pawly, Patrice Courcelle (Illustrator)

Overview

Driven out of Germany after his defeat at Leipzig in 1813, Napoleon seemed to face disaster.

Some 345,000 Allied troops were converging on France from the east; and Napoleon had only about 80,000 men. Most of his veterans had been killed in Russia and Germany, and he was short of cavalry to counter the swarms of Cossacks. For his last and possibly most brilliant campaign, Napoleon raised three regiments of mounted Scouts for his Imperial Guard.

Through the story of these units the reader can follow Napoleon's dazzling manoeuvres in the campaign of 1814; and their widely varied uniforms are reconstructed in meticulously researched colour plates.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781780964157
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Publishing
Publication date:	02/20/2012
Series:	Men-at-Arms , #433
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	48
File size:	7 MB

About the Author

Ronald Pawly was born in Antwerp, Belgium in 1956. He is a respected member of several international societies for Napoleonic studies, and an expert on 19th century military portraiture. He has written many titles for Osprey, including Napoleon's Red Lancers; MAA 378, Napoleon's Guards of Honour; and Elite 115, Napoleon's Imperial Headquarters (1): Organization&Personnel and MAA 429, Napoleon's Mamelukes.

Patrice Courcelle was born in northern France in 1950 and has been a professional illustrator for 20 years. Entirely self-taught, his dramatic and lucid style has won him widespread admiration in the field of military illustration.
Ronald Pawly, born in Antwerp, Belgium, in 1956, is a member of several international societies for Napoleonic studies. His forté is research in the field of military portraiture. He contributed to two major French reference works, Répertoire Mondial des Souvenirs Napoléonien and Dictionnaire des Colonels de Napoléon. In 1998 he published his first major work, The Red Lancers – Anatomy of a Napoleonic Regiment.
Patrice Courcelle was born in northern France in 1950 and has been a professional illustrator for some 20 years. Entirely self-taught, he has illustrated many books and magazine articles for Continental publishers, and his work hangs in a number of public and private collections.

Table of Contents

Napoleon's dilemma in 1813 - shortage of light cavalry, and frustration of reconnaissance by Russian Cossacks
His solution - the creation of three regiments of Mounted Scouts - organization and numbers, officers
Uniforms&equipment: 1er Regt d'Éclaireurs-Grenadiers - 2e Regt d'Éclaireurs-Dragons - 3e Regt d'Éclaireurs-Lanciers
The Scout regiments in the Campaign of France, 1814