Napoleon's Officers
Napoleon's Officers: Uniforms and Equipment. Paul Dawson. Frontline. Nov. 2026 ISPN 9781036141844.
200 color illustrations.
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New Work & Research
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A British PhD about Austria!
I came across this interesting PhD: Fighting for the Habsburgs: Community, Patriotism and the kaiserlich-königliche Armee, 1788-1816 by Kurt J. G. Baird PhD of the University of York from 2022, which will be published in early 2027 as an academic book, so it is priced at £50. However, it is currently available for free on the Net at https://etheses.whiterose.ac.uk/id/eprint/31909/1/Baird_204038989_ThesisClean.pdf
After the recent thesis by Gramm on “the unfortunate General Mack” (in German) at https://phaidra.univie.ac.at/api/object/o:1249109/download , which also contains a lot of useful background political material, it is good to see increased interest in the Imperial Austrian army, especially in English. The book will include uniform plates, but also some of another set created in 1801, which illustrated various heroic acts during the Second Coalition.
The work of Ilya Berkowich and Michael Wenzel in the Vienna Kriegsarchivs, alongside printed material from a century ago, has produced a collection of statistical material,…
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Napoleon and His Marshals
Due out in August, Andrew Roberts, Napoleon and His Marshals: Victory, Rivalry, Betrayal. ISBN: 97820241711354.
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David Hollins
5 days ago
I have been looking at the workings of the Austrian War Ministry and the General Staff’s work on planning possible campaigns. This included mapping territory and obtaining maps of neighbouring areas. It put me in mind of Carnot’s Topographical Bureau, where Napoleon briefly served, and a Google search threw up this interesting exchange about Roberts’ claims in his Napoleon book https://history.stackexchange.com/questions/16987/curious-office-hours-of-topographical-bureau-where-napoleon-served-in-1795 A chap called Gil Olivera takes Roberts’ claims apart: “. I've got to the decrees organizing the bureau in a very detailed way, but I'm still looking for the source of the Roberts extract. Also, Napoleon was a very short time in the bureau. I'm very suspicious of the accuracy of the information” and “Roberts has a good narrative but only on secondary sources. No need to agree. I like the sources first.”
And finally, a pretty devastating critique:
“(Roberts) has only two references for the passage that don't justify the points of fact (even less the reasoning). A primary source, i.e. a quote from a letter that Napoleon wrote to his brother. A secondary source, p. 128 of a book from historian Howard Brown.
Andrews use of Napoleon's letter is strange: "three days later [20/08/1795] he was crowing to Joseph: ‘I am at this moment attached to the Topographical Department of the Committee of Public Safety for the direction of armies.'"
The full letter is available in translation. It starts "I am attached for the present to the topograpical board of the Comittee of Public Safety for the direction of the armies; I replace Carnot."
It then goes on for a full page on completely unrelated matters. I don't see any crowing. Self-agrandizement (to replace Carnot?)? well it's Napoléon...
As to the analysis of the Bureau functions it seems to be based on a page of Brown. I couldn't check this book but I would be surprised that it would bring something new to this answer (a part giving some credibility to Andrews ideas about the Bureau). The assertion about the hours goes without reference and its not clear that its source is Brown (there's another unrelated reference before the assertion).”
Shadowy advisers and scandals - nothing new
In view of current events in UK politics, I thought I would put up some research I have been doing on one of Austria’s shadowy figures: Matthias Von Fasbender. I was going to place this on Wiki, but they have said there is too much primary material and not enough “reliable secondary material” - the lack of the latter is why Fasbender is a shadowy figure! He is also called an ‘eminence guise’, so I was interested to read that this term does not derive from Cardinal Richelieu, but his own adviser, who as a Capuchin monk, work the grey robes of that order.
So, you will all be saying “Fasbender - who is he?”. He was the chief civilian adviser to Archduke Charles from 1796 to 1805 and did much of the implementation work in the First Reform Period (1801-5), before siding with the Archduke’s opponents in 1805 in…
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Alfred Brans
Feb 09
On my website I do have a little bit on Fassbender, but he shows up in only two articles, (2 in 14.313) so very shadowy indeed)
On my wiki the prerequisite is that the content has to be primary and contemporary. And in german, although that should be no problem with this person.
Matthias von Faßbender | Von Bastille bis Waterloo. Wiki | Fandom
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Baird has also looked at the key role of honour in the Austrian officer corps as it transitioned from an imperial to a more national force after the Holy Roman Empire’s collapse. https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/austrian-history-yearbook/article/according-to-the-strict-principles-of-honor-loyalty-ambition-and-service-in-the-habsburg-army-during-the-coalition-wars/42E9960DDE634A820192B82FE3C782AE