New: WAS Austrian Regt. Sprecher

Austrian regiment "Sprecher" from the War of the Austrian Succession
(later known as the "Lacy" regiment in the SYW)

I finished the basing of my newest Austrian infantry battalion for my War of the Austrian Succession project. It is the Sprecher regiment, later known as the Lacy regiment during the SYW. The battalion had been sitting in the area where I do all of my basing and terraining for several weeks, but on Monday of this week I finally found some time to add the grass and finish the bases.

A closer view of the command stand and those wonderful "Pete's Flags".

If you click on any of the pictures to enlarge them, you can probably guess why I chose this particular regiment to paint. It is the only regiment that used a two-color uniform combination - red facings (turnbacsk, cuffs and lapels) with dark blue waistcoat, making it a very unique looking regiment. This uniform was worn during the first couple of year of the SYW (1756 and 1757). By 1758 the regiment had gone through several inhabers and now wore a fairly standard uniform with red cuffs and lapels, but a white waistcoats and white turnbacks.

A side view illustrating Der Alte Fritz's now-famous 3-rank basing system.

As with the other Austrian regiments in my WAS Project (now that it is an official project, it should have capital letters instead of common lower-case letters), there are 40-42 figures in the battalion based on five stands that give the unit a symetrical look. This unit has three 8-figure stands and two 9-figure stands. This give me the option of removing one of the 9-figure stands, reducing the battalion to 33 figures, which puts it on par with my 32-figure Prussians and Russians.

How the battalion might look utilizing only 4 stands.

Another view of the 4 stand organization

The WAS organization of my forces places most of the rank and file soldiers and the command stand figures in the front two ranks. The base is 60mm by 80mm deep. The frontage matches that of my Russian and Prussian new battalions.

I then add a sort of third rank consisting of a drummer at the end of each flank of the battalion plus either an NCO or an officer in the rear behind the rank and file soldiers.

The two pictures below provide a good look at the sort of three rank basing system.

Of course, my cavalry regiments have to be increased in size from 24 figures to 36 figures in order for them to be able to contend with the larger battalions. In my Der Alte Fritz rules (free download on the Fife and Drum Miniatures webstore site) a full cavalry regiment stands a decent chance of charging into an infantry battalion and winning the melee, but at the cost of being nearly destroyed from the casualties. Generally, it is not a good idea for cavalry to charge a full strength infantry battalion. 

For the Austrian cavalry, the solution might be to use my existing 24-figure cavalry regiments and then add 12 horse grenadiers or carbiniers to bring the regiment up to 36 figures. I use a 1:20 figure to man ratio in my wargame units (32 figure infantry and 36 figure cavalry}.

I now have 9 infantry battalions in my WAS Austrian army and I think that 8 battalions will be enough, given my table dimensions of 12ft by 6ft. I used to have a 15-17 foot table with two side tables, but I got rid of these when I redesigned my Man Cave last year.

My Croat battalions and grenadier battalions from the older SYW basing scheme can be used, "as is" with 24 figures. I can simply take a stand from a grenadier battalion and add it to one of my other grenadier battalions to create a 30-figure grenadier battalion. Light infantry can be any size, so I won't be increasing the size of my Croat battalions.

The WAS Project will hopefully be completed by the end of this summer.

War of Austrian Succession - Austrian Army Project

Luzan Regiment shown with 32 figures in two ranks plus a row of file closers.

I have embarked on a new 18th Century painting project: building an Austrian army for the War of Austrian Succession with battalions sized at either 32 or 40 figures. I had been experimenting with basing 32 figure Austrian battalions (so that they would be the same number of figures as my new Prussian battalions) on deeper bases, but the same frontage as before. 

This started when I painted a battalion of Austrians in a firing line, which required deeper bases to protect the extended musket and bayonet. The extra depth of the stand made it possible to add a third rank of file closers (NCOs, officers and drummers). The end result looks realistic to me (see the next two pictures below).

Two ranks of musketeers and some NCOs and drummers behind them.

War of the Austrian Succesion Austrian Army

The War of the Austrian Succession (1741-1748) Austrian army has a different look from its Seven Years War (1756-1763) counterpart, a look that makes it more colorful. For starters, many of the infantry regiments had colored waistcoats and turnbacks in the facing color. For example, the Deutschmeister and the Baden-Baden regiments had dark blue cuffs, waistcoats and turnbacks. The Luzan and the Wied regiments had green cuffs, waistcoats and turnbacks. However, in the SYW, the regiments no longer had colored turnbacks, using white instead, and most no longer wore the colored waistcoat. The drummers' uniforms were in the reverse colors with white cuffs.

Really Cool Looking Flags

At the start of the WAS, the Austrian army was still using flags of Charles VI, the father of Maria Theresa. Charles died in 1740 and while it was customary for new flags to be issued bearing the cypher of the new monarch, the Austrian army of 1741 did not have time to change its standards.

There were a variety of designs including horizontal stripes bordered with flames of alternating red, yellow and black; also flags that had a checkerboard pattern of red and white around the edges of the flag. Another flag pattern had a green field with the Austrian eagle and coat of arms in the center and the edges were bordered with red and white flames.

My newly painted Deutschmeister regiment has the red and white striped flag, which I hand-painted over an image that I captured from Pinterest.

Deutschmeister Regiment with old style flags

Close up of the stripped flag

The first battalion of my Deutschmeister Regiment sports a white Colonel's Color and an orange-yellow regimental flag

An example of the flag with the checkerboard pattern.

Front view

Austrian Senior General

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Austrian Flags of the War of Austrian Succession

Captured Austrian Colors at the Battle of Hohenfriedberg in 1745.
Richard Knotel, artist

One of the attractions of building armies for the War of the Austrian Succession is the variety of unusual flags that were carried by the Austrian army during this period (1741 to 1748). The famous print by Richard Knotel depicts the Bayreuth Dragoons parading all of the captured Austrian colors after the Battle of Hohenfriedberg in 1745. Instead of the familiar SYW Austrian flags with the yellow field and alternating red, yellow and black flames, we can see some flags bordered in a checkerboard pattern or triangles rather than flames.

It is these different flags that has drawn me towards the period and the decision to build and paint my own WAS Austrian army that is distinct from my Austrian SYW army. Yes that is correct, Fritz now has two Austrian armies.

The death of the Austrian emperor Charles VI was the event that triggered the War of the Austrian Succession in 1741. His daughter, Maria Theresa, inherited the thrones of Bohemia, Hungary and Austria as the queen of each of those lands, but Salic Law prevented her from having the title of Emporess of the Holy Roman Empire ("HRE"). In order to get around the Salic Law restriction, it was Maria Theresa's plan to have her husband, Charles of Lorraine, to be elected the new Holy Roman Emperor.

Her enemies (Bavaria, France, Prussia and Saxony, among others) started the war that threw a spanner in the works and so the Elector Charles Albert of Bavaria was crowned as the new HRE Charles VII (not to be confused with the late Austrian Charles VI) in January 1742.

Some silly law required Austria to remove all imperial insigna from its flags, including the colors black and gold. Thus new flags were issued to the army in 1742. 

The Flags of Charles VI

We are getting a little bit ahead of the story, so let us go back to Charles VI of Austria and his flags. It was common practice that when a monarch died, new colors were issued to the army that bore the royal cypher of the new monarch. In this case, the old flags prior to 1740 has the initials "CVI" on them to indicate Charles VI. Normally, new flags bearing the initials "MT" for Maria Theresa would have been issued to replace her father's flags.

However, time and money (the lack there of) delayed the replacement of the flags and so many Austrian regiments went in the field bearing the old CVI flags. John Ray has given me permission to post two pictures of Austrian flags from his collection (images are copyright of John Ray and may not be used without his permission) and these depict flags that were likely from the time of Charles VI, but still in use during the WAS.

War of Austrian Succession flags from the collection of John Ray
(C) John Ray

The striped flag as shown in the Richard Knotel drawing. Flag and figure from the collection of  John Ray.
(C) John Ray

 John states that "my view remains, that flags possibly as far back as the late 17th Century may have been carried. Not in quantities as many were ravaged by war and time wear. However, given most hobbyists only show two flags to represent the many within a regiment, it is not inappropriate to use the last of the older flags a regiment may still of had.

Dr. Stephen Summerfield in his book "Austrian Infantry of the Seven Years War" concurs that Charles VI flags were still in use during the early part of the WAS. His book provides a nice variety of flags illustrations from the reigns of Leopold I (early 1700s) and Charles VI. So if you are interested in using some of these early flags in your Austrian army, then this book is worth having in your reference army.

Flag Sources for Wargamers

The actual Charles VI flags, alas, are not readily available for wargamers from the companies that provide paper flags for wargame armies. One vendor, Pete's Flags, did two sheets of WAS flags, but the company doesn't seem to be trading any longer. Hopefully I am wrong about this and if anyone of my readers has information to the contrary or contact information, then please provide the information in the comments section of this blog posting.

Nigel Billington has copies of the M1743 model flags and a couple of the Charles VI flags in his reprint of the book "Uniforms of the Seven Years War - Austria, Uniform Reference No. 2" . My recollection is that the original book was published by Greenwood & Ball in 1975, authored by J. Braithwaite.

The pictures shown below were found in a google search on the internet. I believe that they are images of Pete's Flags. The standard bearer figures look like Front Rank Austrians.

An attractive set of flags. The striped flag is from the Charles VI era and the green flag is the M1743 flag.
(c) Pete's Flags 2015

The green flag clearly shows the CVI initials of Charles VI
(c) Pete's Flags 2015

Mid-period 1743 Flags

In 1742, the Bavarian Elector Charles Albert was elected Holy Roman Emperor, so because the House of Hapsburg no longer held this position, it had to remove all imperial devices from its military flags, including the colors yellow and black in the flames pattern.

Dr. Summerfield indicates that on October 19, 1743 all German and Hungarian regiments would carry a liebfahne with a white field and the Madonna in the center, and an ordinairefahne with a green field, edged with red and white flames on the flag. The flags resembled what we commonly refer to as the "Hungarian" flag, however in this case, all regiments carried this new flag, called the M1743 flag.

Summerfield also notes that as long as existing flags were serviceable they were not replaced by the new pattern flags. The picture below is from the New York Public Library Collection, which is available on line. Again, Summerfield's book is a good reference source as it has seven illustrations of various M1743 flags.

The model M1743 regimental "ordinairefahne" with the "MT" initials.
New York Public Library

Late Period M1745 Flags

HRE Charles VII died in 1745 and his replacement was Franz I (Charles Francis of Lorraine), the consort of Maria Theresa.  Consequently, all of the imperial insignia could be restored to the Austrian flags.

The new flags are the ones that we are familiar with as used by the Austrians during the Seven Years War. The M1745 liebfahne was white bordered in black, red and white triangular flames. On one side it had the Madonna and on the reverse side was the was the Austrian coat of arms - the black double eagle.

The M1745 ordinairefahne had the familiar yellow field, bordered with alternating black-yellow-red flames and the double eagle insignia on both sides.

Here is an image of my new basing system for my WAS Austrian army. This is the Luzan Regiment and you can see that it carries the M1745 liebfahne. GMB Designs provided the flag.

Conclusion

I hope that this article is helpful to anyone with an interest in the Austrian army, or anyone who would like to build a WAS Austrian army.

Here is a work in progress of the Deutschmeister Regiment. I hand painted the flags.
The figures are Minden Austrians painted by Scott Alexander.

SYWA Pictures - Part III Fontenoy

French Marshal Maurice de Saxe riding in his wicker chariot, due to a bad case of the gout.

CLICK ALL PIX TO ENLARGE

This is the final installment of pictures that I took at the recent SYWA Convention. All of the pictures are of the Fontenoy game hosted by Dannie Fogelman and Richard Goetel. The figures are largely Crann Tara War of Austrian Succession figures, with a few Minden Miniatures as well. This is the nice thing about Crann Tara, Minden and Fife & Drum figures - they are all compatible with one another since they were all sculpted by Richard Ansell.

This was a superb game as the pictures below will attest:

The Irish "Wild Geese" Brigade in French service.

Here is a series of pictures that I took of the French fortifications near and around the town of Fontenoy. Regardless of the rules used, Fontenoy is a tough nut to crack and I wonder if anyone has ever actually capture the town?

French defences surrounding the town of Fontenoy.

French redoubt facing the Dutch attack.

Same redoubt as above.

The famous Redoubt d'Eu which covered the French center on the rise between the
town of Fontenoy and the Bois du Berry wooded area.

One of the British brigades which were part of that "infernal column". Historically, they marched into t
he teeth of the French center and nearly pulled off the victory. I wonder how they did in this game?

Well, that is the end of my pictures from this year's SYW Association convention. Next year's convention will fall on the last weekend of March, unless it is an Easter weekend, in which case the convention moves to the first weekend in April.

These pictures depict but a few of the games that were staged at the convention, all of which were well presented and good looking games. If you have any interest in military history of the 18th Century, then you owe it to yourself to visit our convention.

Next year, my convention game is likely to be the Battle of Kunersdorf to mark that battle's 260th anniversary. The Minden Russian Observation Corps figures will be in production well before the convention so I will be busy with my pot of Reaper Blood Red paint.

Or, I could stage an AWI game.....

Maurice de Saxe Coaches Have Arrived

I received the wicker coach models today so I can begin shipping pre-orders this week.