In the Battle of Waterloo, the charge of French armored cavalry played a very important role in the armies of frederick the great and Napoleon. The latter is an absolute fan of armored cavalry. During the reign of Napoleon, the French armored cavalry regiment expanded to fourteen. Because the role of breastplates was increasingly questioned, Prussia and Britain stopped equipping their cavalry with breastplates before the Napoleonic Wars. But Napoleon still believed in the deterrent effect of armored cavalry on the battlefield. After the battle of Wagham, he even equipped two cavalry regiments of the French army with real armor.
After entering the19th century, infantry became the dominant force on the battlefield. Cavalry is mainly responsible for reconnaissance and harassment, and light cavalry has gradually become the mainstream. Expensive and inflexible armored cavalry is no longer taken seriously, and gradually evolved into the security forces of most countries. Only France and Prussia still use armored cavalry in actual combat.
19 14 On the eve of the outbreak of World War I, there were 12 armored cavalry regiments in France, 10 armored cavalry regiments in Germany (two of which were guards) and 3 armored cavalry regiments in Russia (all royal guards). From the end of 19, the armored cavalry of the German army and the Russian army only used armored military uniforms in peacetime. After the Napoleonic Wars, Britain also equipped three Royal Cavalry Guards with breastplates. However, only France put the breastplate cavalry units wearing breastplates into actual combat after the beginning of World War I ... Because it was too conspicuous and out of the way, most French cavalry stopped wearing breastplates a few weeks after the war broke out, but it was not until June 19 15 that the order to wear breastplates was officially revoked.
Italian Presidential Guard Russian and German armored cavalry disappeared with the overthrow of the royal family (Russia February 19 17, Germany February19181). The French armored cavalry was cut after World War I, leaving only six regiments with the most outstanding achievements in the war. Ironically, five of them gave up riding and took part in trench warfare as infantry. The last surviving armored cavalry regiment became the first mechanized unit of the French army in the1930s. Up to now, there are still two fully armored cavalry regiments serving in the French army, namely1-1cavalry regiment and 6- 12 cavalry regiment.
Today, there are still some cavalry units that use breastplate as the dress for official military parade, although most of these units no longer use the name "breastplate cavalry". These troops include the Royal British Cavalry Guard, the Royal Spanish Guard and the Italian Presidential Guard.
In particular, blue and red saddles may be stars. According to the data, after 18 12, the two regiments were replaced by the holy guard and the forbidden star, but the saddle style was wrong. However, there is still a clue that the collars of the two guards above are all inlaid with gold, but they are not in the oil painting, which does not rule out the mistakes of the oil painter. Therefore, unless it is obviously a regiment, all the descriptions in the following picture only explain the Russian armored cavalry, so as to avoid ambiguity and misleading, and hope that the expert can answer it.
During the Napoleonic period, armored cavalry was the elite heavy cavalry of the French army and the best cavalry of this era. They are soldiers riding big horses. Their armor includes an iron armor and a helmet. Their clothes are beautiful and their wages are high. In many battles, its thunderous charge turned the situation in Napoleon's favor. In the Battle of Ailao, Napoleon didn't fail completely because of the attack of French cavalry led by Marshal Miao La.