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Just talking about the Dano-Norwegian Army: units, basic history, and a call for help.

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Not a major power during the war, Denmark-Norway had a relatively small, though well-balanced, army. The country was really two, with a Danish and a Norwegian army, each with slightly different uniforms and organization.

The dragoons largely come from Norway, and the cuirassiers entirely from Denmark. The professional line is largely Danish (or at least, serving the Danish Army), whereas the Norwegians are almost entirely in "National" regiments, subject to less rigorous discipline (the Danes also had National Regiments).

The overall state of the army appears to have been less than ideal: it was not in a shape to fight the Russians during the invasion scare of 1762, and it was only the deposition (and later death) of Peter III that prevented the overrunning of the country by a veteran Russian army that had assembled in Pomerania. As an aside: Peter's invasion plans were actually very practical--contrary to popular belief. He would have almost certainly succeeded in his aims, had the invasion gone ahead. But that's another story.

Anyway, the Dano-Norwegian units proper:

The army is a study in red: nearly every regiment in the army (armies?) wore red. Nearly: there's a dragoon regiment and a militia regiment that wore blue and white, respectively. Then there are the Jaegers, who predictably are in green. Not even the British are this uniformly red! Oddly though, the officers in some of the units (all after 1762) were expected to wear crimson, in contrast to the red of the other ranks.

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Danish National line. The name is a bit misleading, as, in reality, they were just the home guard/militia...sort of. The men would have been conscripted. These and all other infantry units are armed with a 143 cm musket, ~18.3 mm bore--not unlike other European armies. However, the bayonet was unusually long (not as long as the Swedish model), and the musket slings for the militia were red (it was white for the regulars).

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Danish "enlisted" line. These are professional soldiers, raised by volunteer enlistment. The regiments were relatively large, and this is reflected here as well: only the French and Spanish armies have units of a similar size.

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Danish Grenadier Guards. The mitres they wear are the 1758 model. Worth noting at this juncture that the army depicted here was the army that would have faced the Russians in 1761-1762. The reason is that there are few good sources for the uniforms prior to 1758, but no shortage from thence to 1762.

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Danish footguard.

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Danish Cuirassiers

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Danish horseguard.

And here is the Nowegian half:

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Norwegian National line: you can only recruit these in Norway.

And now, what the two armies have in common:

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Dano-Norwegian dragoons

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Dano-Norwegian Artillery. There were actually a few artillery units, but they all had the same uniform and equipment, and are shown accordingly. That is, they have a red coat, faced, lined, and laced in dark blue. buttons and hat trim were brass and yellow, respectively.

While records are clear the state of the army wasn't great, the sources don't elaborate: is it to do with training? uniform issue? equipment? Any clues on the matter would be most welcome, as does any information on the drill and formations in use. If you know of anything, please let me know: I'm available here and on Discord.

Additionally, if anyone has information on the pieces used by the army during the war, let me know: I only have information on the muskets (entirely due to a single Norwegian online) and swords (the latter entirely from pictorial evidence), but little else.

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badfing3r
badfing3r - - 76 comments

mad props to you for the painstaking research that probably went into this. They look beautiful.

Reply Good karma Bad karma+1 vote
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