Tuesday, March 18, 2008

Dragoons No. 2 - Mestre Camp de Géneral

Inhaber
1754 Count of Coigny, 1761 Marquis de Ville

Unit History
The regiment originally raised by the Count of Tessé in 1674 as a gentlemen regiment. It became the Mestre Camp Géneral of dragoons in 1684 when Mr. de Tessé obtained this office by purchasing that of Mestre de Camp of the Carabins which at that time belonged to the count of Quincy, Marie François Henri Franquetot. Count de Coigny possessed this regiment from January 24, 1754 to October 16, 1761. The unit ranked second in seniority and was one of the three 'General Staff' regiments with the others being the Colonel General and the Commissaire-General.
Saw distinguished service at the battle of Hastenbeck. Later the unit occupied Minden, Hanover and Celle. It participated in the 1758 campaign in Germany and was present at Krefeld. In 1759, the regiment returned to France to duty along the French coast. The unit performed as a regular unit.

Comments
Originally this unit had three squadrons as I used to group my cavalry into 24 man units but with my switch to Piquet, I decided to split the unit into squadrons of 8 men rather than a single regiment. The best part of the switch is that there are many more uniform variations and lots more colour in my cavalry formations. Unit painted in 1991.

Sources
Flag: Nec Pluribus Impar site at
http://vial.jean.free.fr/new_npi/index.htm
Text: Nec Pluribus Impar site at http://vial.jean.free.fr/new_npi/index.htm

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