Portuguese Napoleonic Line Infantry

The Portuguese army underwent major reforms in 1806, in an attempt to modernist the force and make it more effective, Unfortunately for them, there was insufficient time and funds to fully enact these reform before the joint Franco-Spanish invasion of Portugal, led by French General Junot, in November of 1807. By the 27th of that month, the Prince Regent, Joao (John) VI, along with most of his court and some 15,000 people, had departed in a vast fleet for Brazil, to continue the government of Portugal from exile. Junot entered Lisbon on the 30th of November. The Portuguese army was largely disbanded, and its best elements swept up for service in the newly formed French "Portuguese Legion"; it ultimately was composed of three regiments of Infantry and one of Dragoons. They were of course soon dispatched for service outside of the Iberian Peninsula, and participated in the 1809 campaign against Austria, as well as the 1812 invasion of Russia.

Junot's occupation of Portugal would be short lived. The French occupiers displayed little tact or restraint, and by May 1808, the country was rising in revolt against French rule. British troops arrived under the command of Sir Arthur Wellesely at the beginning of August, 1808, and with Portuguese assistance, defeated the French at Rlica and Vimiero, leading to the evacuation of all French troops from Portugal by the terms of the Convention of Cintra. Command of the British forces passed to Sir John Moore, who was then pursued across Spain my a large French army under Napoleon himself. The army was evacuated form Spain in January, 1809, Sir John perishing in the battle of Corunna. At the request of the Portuguese Government, in march, 1809, a British officer, William Beresford, who had accompanied Sir John Moore to Corunna, was named Marshal of Portugal and assigned to reorganize and modernize the army, which he did very successfully, with assistance of large infusions of cash, uniforms, and weapons from Great Britain.

In 1808, there were 24 single battalion regiments of Line Infantry in the Portuguese army. Each battalion had one company of grenadiers, one of light infantry and eight of fusiliers, with a nominal strength of just over 1500 men. A dark blue single breasted jacket was worn For recruitment purposes, each regiment belonged to one of three divisions; the division a regiment came from determined the color of its turnbacks, and the piping in its (dark blue) shoulder straps, collars and cuffs. These colors were yellow for the Northern division, white for the Center division, and scarlet for the Southern division. The following table lists the regiments with their individual facing colors.

Portuguese Line Infantry Facing Colors, 1806 - 1815

Regt.	Name	Collar	Cuffs	Turnbacks/Piping
1	Lippe	Blue	White	White
2	Lagos	Blue	White	Scarlet
3	1st Olivenza	Blue	White	Yellow
4	Freire	Blue	Scarlet	White
5	1st Elvas	Blue	Scarlet	Scarlet
6	1st Porto	Blue	Scarlet	Yellow
7	Sebutal	Blue	Yellow	White
8	Evora	Blue	Yellow	Scarlet
9	Viana	Blue	Yellow	Yellow
10	Lisbopn	Blue	Sky Blue	White
11	1st Almeida	Blue	Sky Blue	Scarlet
12	Chaves	Blue	Sky Blue	Yellow
13	Peniche	White	White	White
14	Tavira	White	White	Scarlet
15	2nd Plivenza	White	White	Yellow
16	Viera Telles	Scarlet	Scarlet	White
17	2nd E/vas	Scarlet	Scarlet	Scarlet
18	2nd Porto	Scarlet	Scarlet	Yellow
19	Cascaes	Yellow	Yellow	White
20	Campo Major	Yellow	Yellow	Scarlet
21	Valenza	Yellow	Yellow	Yellow
22	Serpa	Sky Blue	Sky Blue	White
23	2nd Almeida	Sky Blue	Sky Blue	Scarlet
24	Braganza	Sky Blue	Sky Blue	Yellow

The 21st (Valenza) Portuguese Line Regiment. From the table above, this regiment has yellow  collars, cuffs, and piping. As is often the case, the blue of these uniforms is much darker than it appears in the photos. 

The front stand is a Grenadier company, and has fringes on the shoulder straps - these were blue mixed with the piping (divisional) color, in this case, yellow. 

The cords on the "Barentina" shako, which clearly influenced the later British "Belgic" shako which started appearing after 1812, were blue mixed with the piping (divisional) color, in this case once again yellow. 

This unit was known to have carried this variant pattern of standard, possibly issued prior to 1806.

The next unit is the 14th  (Tavira) Line. This picture clearly shows the usual pattern of the King's color. Each regiment had a second, regimental standard, with the field in the color of the division (piping color), the arms of Portugal in the center, a blue scroll bearing the regimental title beneath the arms, and the royal monogram "JPR" in the corners. Although I hand painted all of these flags, you can download them from Warflag, which also gives the details of the minor variations, cravat colors, etc. Several commercial versions of Portuguese flags are also available. 

Once again, from the table above, the 14th Liner had white collars and cuffs, with red turnbacks and piping.

The piping color (red) once again appears mixed with blue on the shako cords, and the fringes of the Grenadier's shoulder straps. It seems that the Light companies may have had green fringes to their shoulder straps (not shown). 

The Portuguese cockade should be blue and red, in a quartered, bow-tie sort of fashion. 

This unit is the 16th (Viera Telles) Line. I do love those Portuguese flags with their "gyronny" background pattern in blue and red! 

The drums were painted blue with the Portuguese arms on the front, with red rims. Colorful! Drummers wore the same uniforms as the men, with the addition of a special lace to the collar, cuffs, turnbacks and seams. This lace was blue, edged on both sides with the divisional (piping) color, and with small crosses in the same color down the center. 

The 16h, per the table above, has red collars and cuffs piped white, white turnbacks, and white mixed with blue shako cords (and shoulder strap fringes for the grenadiers). 

The last unit is the 24th (Braganza)  Line; light blue collars and cuffs piped yellow, yellow turnbacks, yellow mixed with blue shako cords and grenadier fringes. 

The Barentina shako has an oval brass plate on the front with the arms of Portugal stamped upon it, a brass band beneath it at the bottom with the regimental number engraved upon it, and in between, a hunting horn or grenade badge for the light and grenadier companies  respectively. The plumes on the left side of the shako were white for the Grenadiers and center companies; green for the Light companies.

All of these troops are 25mm Minifigs, painted by me over 20 years ago. Sadly, they have never sen action on the tabletop as yet, a drought which my growing British forces (and eventual Spanish ones as well) ensure will not last too much longer! By the later part of the Peninsular War, the Portuguese troops were considered fully the equal of their British allies. Indeed, Wellington famously referred to his Portuguese allies as "the fighting cocks of the army". 

Royal Arms of Portugal

Sources:

North, Rene Soldiers of the Peninsular War. Almark Publications, London, April 1972

 Chartrand, Rene and Younghusband, Bill,  The Portuguese Army of the Napoleonic Wars. Vol 1,2, and 3, Men at Arms #s 343, 346, and 358. Osprey Publishing, London, 2000. 

Over, Keith Flags and Standards of the Napoleonic Wars. Sky Books, 1976.  (I see this can be obtained as a free pdf download from several sites now).

I will cover the Cacadores (Cazadores), Dragoons, and Artillery in a future post. 

Peter