To Flag Or Not To Flag? That Is The Question...

I like an authentic flag as much as the next man (probably even more so, as I am a registered Vexillomaniac :-)). On the Fife and Drum Forum there has lately been some discussion about adding flags to historical wargame units that (as far as we know) probably did not have them. My feeling is that, ultimately, we are playing with toy soldiers here and it is all our version of a fantasy of whatever period we are depicting, and so if we feel like doing so we should add plausible flags. Yes, I know, this is probably heresy, but in the end, for the horse and musket period, we mostly want something that looks good, don't we? I know that at least Willz Harley will agree with me that every unit should have a flag if at all possible. Even Willz's grenadier units carry flags - but they are admittedly ImagiNations units! I have done a number of speculative flags for people over the years for historical armies (e.g. https://nba-sywtemplates.blogspot.com/2022/08/speculative-but-plausible-flags-for.html ) and am currently doing some for the French 18th century Chasseurs de Fischers.

I have lately done flags for Lauzun's Legion in the AWI, which I posted on the Fife and Drum Forum and which prompted this discussion; the hussar guidon was carried by the later Lauzun Hussars from 1783-1791 but it seems perfectly possible that something similar might have been carried by the hussars of the Legion in the AWI. If they didn't, they jolly well should have done! ;-) The square standard is suggested for Lauzun's Legion in the AWI by the authors of "Officers and Soldiers of the French Hussars: 1 From The Ancien Regime to the Empire" André Jouineau and Jean-Marie Mongin, after discussion with acknowledged French flag expert Pierre Charrié. By which troops of the Legion it was possibly carried, they do not say.

Anyway, for those who might possibly like these flags, here is the sheet with the guidon and standard:

I look forward to comments! :-)

P.S. I have decided, to give my future French flag production some focus, to do the flags I have already not done for the Battle of Warburg 1760. That means 10 flags to do, including four Swiss and one French-German. That will bring my total of French flags posted on the blog to 100! Hurrah. :-) (Actually, it will be more than that, as for a number of flags I have done variants...)

Flags of the French Militia (Milices Régionales) of Dunkerque

I have quite a large backlog of flags waiting for their texts now but the recent cold weather has made the study, where the computer is, pretty uninhabitable except for very short spells of work; it has always been a very cold room but is much worse now the central heating has packed in! Even the small fan heater does not make much impression on the cold. We are promised a thaw now and hopefully that will make longer spells of work in the study more tolerable...

Anyway, domestic woes aside, I here present the flags of the French militia of Dunkerque (Dunkirk) to keep things ticking over on the blog. As I have said before, we have relatively little information on the French militia flags and this is one of the few that is known. The Milices Régionales were raised to protect the coasts and frontiers of France and were maintained by the provinces.