Gardes Françaises
Encyclopedia
The Gardes Françaises was one of the two non-ceremonial infantry regiments in the "Maison du Roi" (Household troops) of the French Army
French Army
The French Army, officially the Armée de Terre , is the land-based and largest component of the French Armed Forces.As of 2010, the army employs 123,100 regulars, 18,350 part-time reservists and 7,700 Legionnaires. All soldiers are professionals, following the suspension of conscription, voted in...

 under the Ancien Régime. The other regiment was the Gardes Suisses
Swiss Guard
Swiss Guards or Schweizergarde is the name given to the Swiss soldiers who have served as bodyguards, ceremonial guards, and palace guards at foreign European courts since the late 15th century. They have had a high reputation for discipline, as well as loyalty to their employers...

, which made the Gardes Françaises the only one recruited from France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

.

History

The regiment was created in 1563 by Charles IX
Charles IX of France
Charles IX was King of France, ruling from 1560 until his death. His reign was dominated by the Wars of Religion. He is best known as king at the time of the St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre.-Childhood:...

. With a strength of 9000 men it counted 30 companies
Company
A company is a form of business organization. It is an association or collection of individual real persons and/or other companies, who each provide some form of capital. This group has a common purpose or focus and an aim of gaining profits. This collection, group or association of persons can be...

 in 1635 with 300 fusilier
Fusilier
Fusilier was originally the name of a soldier armed with a light flintlock musket called the fusil. The word was first used around 1680, and has later developed into a regimental designation.-History:...

s per company. They were armed with a form of musket ("fusils") or steel-handled pikes
Pike (weapon)
A pike is a pole weapon, a very long thrusting spear used extensively by infantry both for attacks on enemy foot soldiers and as a counter-measure against cavalry assaults. Unlike many similar weapons, the pike is not intended to be thrown. Pikes were used regularly in European warfare from the...

, and were allowed to conduct a normal civilian
Civilian
A civilian under international humanitarian law is a person who is not a member of his or her country's armed forces or other militia. Civilians are distinct from combatants. They are afforded a degree of legal protection from the effects of war and military occupation...

 life in times of peace. In practice this meant that they could undertake civilian employment when not required on duty.

At Catherine de' Medici
Catherine de' Medici
Catherine de' Medici was an Italian noblewoman who was Queen consort of France from 1547 until 1559, as the wife of King Henry II of France....

's insistence, they were at first spread over several garrisons, but after the attempted kidnapping of King Charles IX near Meaux
Meaux
Meaux is a commune in the Seine-et-Marne department in the Île-de-France region in the metropolitan area of Paris, France. It is located east-northeast from the center of Paris. Meaux is a sub-prefecture of the department and the seat of an arondissement...

 by Huguenot
Huguenot
The Huguenots were members of the Protestant Reformed Church of France during the 16th and 17th centuries. Since the 17th century, people who formerly would have been called Huguenots have instead simply been called French Protestants, a title suggested by their German co-religionists, the...

s, the Gardes were brought back together specifically to protect the monarch
Monarch
A monarch is the person who heads a monarchy. This is a form of government in which a state or polity is ruled or controlled by an individual who typically inherits the throne by birth and occasionally rules for life or until abdication...

.

Privileges, Role and Organisation

In times of war the Gardes Françaises had the privilege of choosing their own battle positions (usually in the center of the first line of infantry). Other privileges included being that of leading the assault when a wall was breached during a siege
Siege
A siege is a military blockade of a city or fortress with the intent of conquering by attrition or assault. The term derives from sedere, Latin for "to sit". Generally speaking, siege warfare is a form of constant, low intensity conflict characterized by one party holding a strong, static...

, the first choice of barracks
Barracks
Barracks are specialised buildings for permanent military accommodation; the word may apply to separate housing blocks or to complete complexes. Their main object is to separate soldiers from the civilian population and reinforce discipline, training and esprit de corps. They were sometimes called...

, and special rights of trial
Trial
A trial is, in the most general sense, a test, usually a test to see whether something does or does not meet a given standard.It may refer to:*Trial , the presentation of information in a formal setting, usually a court...

. When on parade, the Gardes Francaises took precedence over all other regiments in the Royal Army.

The Gardes Francais shared responsibility for guarding the exterior of the Palace of Versailles with the Gardes Suisses. In addition, the French Guards had responsibility for maintaining public order in Paris, in support of the various police forces of the capital.
In 1789 the Gardes Francais constituted the largest element of the Household toops (Maison Militaire du Roi). Six grenadier and 24 fusilier companies were divided into the six battalions that comprised the full regiment. The total number of Gardes Francais amounted to about 3,600 men. The regimental colonel usually held the rank of Marshal of France. Captains of the grenadier companies ranked as colonels in the infantry of the line. There was one grenadier company (109 officers and men) and four fusilier companies (each numbering 132 officers and men) to each battalion.

Image and recruitment basis

The subsequent image of the Gardes Françaises as a socially elite palace unit led solely by courtier officers may not be entirely true. The majority of the regimental officers were from outside Paris and some, such as the future Maréchal Fabert, did not have even the status of provincial aristocrats.

The rank and file were recruited from all over France but through marriages and off duty employment quickly established local ties in Paris - a consideration which was to influence their behaviour at the outbreak of the French Revolution. Guardsmen were enlisted for a minimum of eight years and were required to be French nationals with a minimum height of 1.73m (5ft 8ins), compared with the 1.68m (5ft.6ins) of line infantry soldiers.

Uniform

During the years 1685 to 1789 the regiment wore dark "king's blue" coats with red collars, cuffs and waistcoats. Breeches and leggings were white. Grenadiers had high fur hats, while the fusilier companies wore the standard tricorn of the French infantry. Coats and waistcoats were heavily embroidered in white or silver (for officers) braid.

Gallery

Role in the French Revolution

The sympathy shown by the Gardes Françaises for the French Revolution at its outbreak was crucial to the initial success of the rising. During weeks of disturbances from June to early July 1789 leading up to the fall of the Bastille
Bastille
The Bastille was a fortress in Paris, known formally as the Bastille Saint-Antoine. It played an important role in the internal conflicts of France and for most of its history was used as a state prison by the kings of France. The Bastille was built in response to the English threat to the city of...

 the regiment initially obeyed orders and on several occasions acted against the increasingly unruly crowds. However in addition to local ties with the Parisians, the regiment was resentful of the harsh Prussian style discipline introduced by its colonel the Duc du Châtelet, who had taken up his appointment the year before. The officers of the regiment had negligently left day-to-day control in the hands of the non-commissioned officers, and had limited interaction with their men. These considerations led to mass desertions from 27 June on and the final defection of virtually all the rank and file on 14 July. Reportedly only one sergeant stood by the officers when they tried to reassemble their men. After playing a key role in the attack on the Bastille the regiment was formally disbanded on 31 August 1789.

The Gardes Françaises subsequently provided the professional core of the new Garde Nationale. As such they acted under the command of the Marquis de Lafayette to restore order when a mob from Paris invaded the Palace of Versailles
Versailles
Versailles , a city renowned for its château, the Palace of Versailles, was the de facto capital of the kingdom of France for over a century, from 1682 to 1789. It is now a wealthy suburb of Paris and remains an important administrative and judicial centre...

 at dawn on 6 October 1789, and escorted the Royal Family to Paris in the afternoon of the same day. In October 1792 the former French Guards were distributed amongst the newly raised volunteer units being mobilised for war. In their final role the erstwhile royal guardsmen provided cadres (officers and senior NCOs) for the revolutionary armies of 1792-1802.

Battles

  • Lens
    Battle of Lens
    The Battle of Lens was a French victory under Louis II de Bourbon, Prince de Condé against the Spanish army under Archduke Leopold in the Thirty Years' War . It was the last major battle of the war....

     (1648)
  • Fleurus
    Battle of Fleurus (1690)
    The Battle of Fleurus, fought on 1 July 1690, was a major engagement of the Nine Years' War. In a bold envelopment the Duc de Luxembourg, commanding Louis XIV’s army of some 35,000 men, soundly defeated Prince Waldeck’s Allied force of approximately 38,000 men comprising mainly Dutch, German, and...

     (1690)
  • Steenkerque
    Battle of Steenkerque
    The Battle of Steenkerque was fought on August 3, 1692, as a part of the Nine Years' War. It resulted in the victory of the French under Marshal François-Henri de Montmorency, duc de Luxembourg against a joint English-Scottish-Dutch-German army under Prince William of Orange...

     (1692)
  • Ramillies
    Battle of Ramillies
    The Battle of Ramillies , fought on 23 May 1706, was a major engagement of the War of the Spanish Succession. For the Grand Alliance – Austria, England, and the Dutch Republic – the battle had followed an indecisive campaign against the Bourbon armies of King Louis XIV of France in 1705...

     (1706)
  • Malplaquet
    Battle of Malplaquet
    The Battle of Malplaquet, fought on 11 September 1709, was one of the main battles of the War of the Spanish Succession, which opposed the Bourbons of France and Spain against an alliance whose major members were the Habsburg Monarchy, Great Britain, the United Provinces and the Kingdom of...

     (1709)
  • Dettingen
    Battle of Dettingen
    The Battle of Dettingen took place on 27 June 1743 at Dettingen in Bavaria during the War of the Austrian Succession. It was the last time that a British monarch personally led his troops into battle...

     (1743)
  • Fontenoy
    Battle of Fontenoy
    The Battle of Fontenoy, 11 May 1745, was a major engagement of the War of the Austrian Succession, fought between the forces of the Pragmatic Allies – comprising mainly Dutch, British, and Hanoverian troops under the nominal command of the Duke of Cumberland – and a French army under Maurice de...

     (1745)
  • The Storming of the Bastille
    Storming of the Bastille
    The storming of the Bastille occurred in Paris on the morning of 14 July 1789. The medieval fortress and prison in Paris known as the Bastille represented royal authority in the centre of Paris. While the prison only contained seven inmates at the time of its storming, its fall was the flashpoint...

     (1789)

Notable Members of the Gardes Françaises

  • Nicolas Catinat
    Nicolas Catinat
    Nicolas Catinat was a French military commander and Marshal of France under Louis XIV. The son of a magistrate, Catinat was born in Paris on 1 September 1637...

  • Abraham de Fabert
    Abraham de Fabert
    Abraham de Fabert, marquis d'Esternay was a Marshal of France,He was the son of Abraham Fabert, seigneur de Moulins , a famous printer who rendered great services, civil and military, to Henry IV....

  • Louis Friant
    Louis Friant
    Louis Friant was born in the village of Morlancourt, 8 km south of Albert near the river Somme. The village would later suffer the misfortune of lying along the Western Front trench-lines of World War I....

  • Lazare Hoche
    Lazare Hoche
    Louis Lazare Hoche was a French soldier who rose to be general of the Revolutionary army.Born of poor parents near Versailles, he enlisted at sixteen as a private soldier in the Gardes Françaises...

  • François Joseph Lefebvre
    François Joseph Lefebvre
    François Joseph Lefebvre, First Duc de Dantzig was a French military commander during the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars and one of the original eighteen Marshals of the Empire created by Napoleon....

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
x
OK