Photographs of Napoleon’s Veterans in Uniform
April 12, 2013 by rness | Comments Off on Photographs of Napoleon’s Veterans in Uniform
Grenadier Burg of the 24th Regiment of the Guard of 1815
Digital Production Services has been digitizing Prints, Drawings & Watercolors from the Anne S.K. Brown Military Collection for over a decade. 25,000 Digital objects from this collection are currently available, with additional artwork being added all the time. Over the years, there have been some memorable moments of discovery during the digitization process. I am always extra intrigued when a box of photographs from this collection arrives in the department. Old tintypes, daguerreotypes, and carte d’visites offer a clear and detailed window into the past, and I open these boxes with more relish and anticipation than most. When reviewing the materials in a box of French photographs, I was fascinated to have in my hands twelve original sepia views of aging members of Napoleon’s army, wearing their original uniforms and insignia. I now know that the twelve Frenchmen are quite possibly the earliest uniformed soldiers ever caught on film. The dignity, swagger, and intensity of the poses and the expressions of the aged men, combined with the extravagant Napoleonic military costumes, including bearskins, plumed shakos, shapkas, and mameluke swords, make these images truly exceptional.
Monsieur Moret of the Second Regiment, 1814/15.
It is not known at which studio the photographs were taken, or who the photographer was, but penciled on the back of each mounted print is the name of each veteran and his regiment. They all wear the Saint Helene medal, which was issued on August 12, 1857 to all veterans of the wars of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Empire, and it is possible that the men were in Paris the following year, for the annual May 5th anniversary of the death of Napoleon.
Peter Harrington, the curator of the Military Collection has written a detailed blog entry on the twelve men represented in the photographs, and made available a 2001 article entitled “Napoleon’s Veterans” he wrote for Military Heritage in which the photographs are featured.