Monday, 11 August 2025

The colours of Jacobite Infantry Regiment Sir Maurice Eustace 1689-1691

I did these some time ago and had almost forgotten them!

D'Alton's King James Irish Army List 1855 has a list of officers (see attached table below) and mentions that on the 10th May 1689, in a letter to Lieutenant General Hamilton, King James mentions (inter alia) that "Ten companies of Eustace's will be soon with you, all well armed and clothed" (quoted from King James's Letters, Trinity College MSS E 2 19).


The motto "Dum Spiro Spero" means "While I Breathe I Hope".


From Sapherson William III At War In Scotland and Ireland: Eustace's is given as 51 officers and 783 men (British Museum list) and 454 men from a list by the Comte d'Avoux. 13 companies and one battalion strong according to John Stevens.

After the Boyne listed as 13 companies strong with a total (nominal?) of 650 men (Sapherson).



D'Alton quotes from Story's Impartial History (which seems to be far from impartial!) that, after the Capitulation of Limerick, "On the 16th of October there marched out of Limerick Sir Maurice Eustace's Regiment, Major General Talbot's, Lord Bellew's, Prince of Wales (so Story styles Fitz-James's), Lord Clanricarde's, and Colonel Bermingham's; yet they made in all only 618 men". So by that late date Eustace's was clearly very weak.

Mark Allen in his article THE WAR OF THE GRAND ALLIANCE French Foreign Regiments Part Two: The Irish shows Eustace's in red with yellow facings, which I suspect is supposition rather than fact but most wargamers do seem to depict Eustace's dressed like that.

8 comments:

  1. Wow, that's a bright set of flags.

    Willz.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you, Willz. :-) Isn't it just? I'm sure it was designed to blind the enemy... ;-)

      All the best,

      David.

      Delete
  2. Replies
    1. Thank you, Jon. :-) I rather like it, I confess, even if I did almost forget I'd created it...

      All the best,

      David.

      Delete
  3. Lovely flag David, really nice and handy for wargaming the Jacobite war in Ireland.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you, Donnie. Yes, it's certainly one worth creating; should look good in action... :-)

      All the best,

      David.

      Delete

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...