Friday 22 November 2013

Rossbach French Flags Project - Infantry Regiment Cossé Brissac

First raised in 1674, Cossé Brissac Infanterie had 2 battalions and in 1757 was part of Soubise's Army of Saxony. The regiment was at Rossbach, brigaded with the St Chamond regiment. Cossé Brissac was in the left hand column of the three infantry columns just behind St Chamond; it was also badly mauled and its colonel was wounded and taken prisoner. The depleted regiment was sent back to France to reform and from 1758-61 was on the coast of Brittany. From 1761-2 it was in Germany. From 1762 it was renamed after the province of Vivarais.





The flags of this regiment are very confusing - not to mention somewhat hallucinogenic in appearance! Although the four colours in each quarter are recorded in e.g. the État Général of 1753, their actual placement is not clear. Every modern version I have seen differs, so I have decided to use the contemporary depiction on the 1757 manuscript, as shown below. Contemporary does not always mean correct, of course, but in this case I prefer this version - it also seems more convincing to me.

And this plate shows the uniform and flags as depicted in 1757:



4 comments:

  1. Now, that's a standard! Suddenly, I want to paint up a large unit of French infantry, just for the flag.

    Best Regards,

    Stokes

    ReplyDelete
  2. And why not, indeed? :-)

    Thanks, Stokes. I've just thought that the flag actually reminds me very much of the clothing of a Dervish at Omdurman... ;-)

    All the best,

    David.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Nice work Dave, its almost psychedelic!!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Thanks, Ray. Isn't it just! :-)

    All the best,

    David.

    ReplyDelete

Saturday 6th June 2020 I've decided to allow comments from Anonymous Users but I'll still be moderating posts, as I'm sure the spam will probably flood in now! We'll see...