Sunday, December 16, 2018

Tiroler Schutzen #6, "Anton Kerschbaum"

The last of the "Green Brigade" is this unit of Schutzen, lead by Herr Anton Kerschbaum. 


Olive Drab coats, yellow shirts with scarlet braces, hats in shades of Brown and pants in shades of Grey are the order of the day for their attire. 


Note the green and white rosettes on their hats. 



Resuming our narrative by Charles Morris:

    A second corps d'armee advanced up the valley of the Inn as far as the bridges of Pruz. Here it was repulsed by the Tyrolese, and retreated under cover of the darkness during the night of August 8. The infantry crept noiselessly over the bridge of Pontlaz. The cavalry followed with equal caution but with less success. The sound of a horse's hoof aroused the watchful Tyrolese. Instantly rocks and trees were hurled upon the bridge, men and horses being crushed beneath them and the passage blocked. All the troops which had not crossed were taken prisoners. The remainder were sharply pursued, and only a handful of them escaped.




    The other divisions of the invading army met with a similar fate. Lefebvre himself, who reproached the Saxons for their defeat, was not able to advance as far as they, and was quickly driven from the mountains with greatly thinned ranks. He was forced to disguise himself as a common soldier and hide among the cavalry to escape the balls of the sharp-shooters, who owed him no love. The rear-guard was attacked with clubs by the Capuchin and his men, and driven out with heavy loss. During the night that followed all the mountains around the beautiful valley of Innsbruck were lit up with watch-fires. In the valley below those of the invaders were kept brightly burning while the troops silently withdrew. On the next day the Tyrol held no foes; the invasion had failed.

    Hofer placed himself at the head of the government at Innsbruck, where he lived in his old simple mode of life, proclaimed some excellent laws, and convoked a national assembly. The Emperor of Austria sent him a golden chain and three thousand ducats. He received them with no show of pride, and returned the following naive answer: "Sirs, I thank you. I have no news for you to-day. I have, it is true, three couriers on the road, the Watscher-Hiesele, the Sixten-Seppele, and the Memmele-Franz, and the Schwanz ought long to have been here. I expect the rascal every hour."

18 comments:

  1. Peter, you are providing an interesting glimpse of this under-appreciated campaign. Very enjoyable history lesson and fine troop additions.

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    1. Thanks, Jon. I am re-reading the "Alps Aflame" chapter of Gill's "With Eagles to Glory" now. The narrative is pretty similar to that of Morris, albeit of course with more military details and less romanticism!

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  2. Great looking unit - love the lady patriot.

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    1. Thanks, Dean. There are a smattering of women in the various units, as was the case historically as well.

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  3. Lovely looking Tyroleans! I'm enjoying the potted history,its always just been a sideshow in everything else I've read!
    Best Iain

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    1. Thank you, Iain. Gill's book, cited above, contains the only English language account readily available that I know of which addresses the Tyrolean revolt in any detail.

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    2. I am with you, Iain. Until I visited Innsbruck earlier this year, this part of the war was only a sideshow to me. Now this theater is of much more interest. Peter is doing a fine job of expanding my knowledge. Gill is a great resource for the 1809 campaign.

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    3. The only other reference I have seen cited which might have more detailed information is: Bernhard Wurzer - Tiroler Freiheitskampf 1809. published in 1984. I doubt my German is up to making better sense of that than Gill has already done for us!

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  4. Another great-looking unit Peter. How many is that completed now?

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    1. With the "Brown" and "Green" Divisions completed, that makes 6 units of Schutzen and 4 of Landsturm. With the addition of the "Black" Division to come, there will ultimately be 9 units of Schutzen and 6 of Landsturm. Then to be added to that will be a wooden gun and crew, and command stands for Hofer, Spechbacher, and Haspinger... one for each "Division". Total figures in the project will be about 150.

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    2. That’s a nice size for a project. It will be great to see them fully assembled.

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    3. There will of course be a "class picture" when the project is completed! :-)

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  5. Very nice Divisions they will be too

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  6. This is one of my favorites of your projects. I must admit I did not catch on the naming conventions until Karl Montag. Nicely done.

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    1. It's one of my more eccentric as well! :-)

      Glad you noticed the naming.. nothing worse than being overly clever and having nobody notice. Hmpf!
      So, the Landsturm, taking after the starting point of our freind, Jon, have leaders with last names from the days of the week in German. How about their first names? And how about the names given to the Schutzen units? :-)

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    2. Ferdinand, Karl Ludwig and Johann are all Holy Roman Emperors. I based on Brenner, Iselberg and Pillersee I am assuming you are talking about mountain passes. I admit I have not cracked the nut on the Schutzen first names though. It is an excellent diversion however.

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    3. Very good.. the first names of the "weekday" Freiherrs of the Landsturm are all names of Archdukes (Erzherzog) of the HRE/Austrian Empire during the Napoleonic Wars. The last names of the Schutzen commanders are all alpine passes in the Tyrol. Just like Jon Freitag set the pattern for then Landsturm, my freind Ingo Brenner, who lives in Dresden and loves both the mountains and the opera, set the pattern for the Schutzen. I wasn't clever enough to come up with a pattern for the first names of the Schutzen commanders, though! :-)

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