New Work & Research

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…

Since the old forum is down and I can't add a comment on my old topic, I wanted to post a historical fiction piece I created using the research and translation I did on the 2e Division Artillery in April 1809. Any feedback or comments would be welcome!

Michael

https://researchingthenapoleonicwars.wordpress.com/2025/11/29/the-artillerymans-stand-at-eckmuhl/

As the "Uniformenportal" of Napoleon Online is growing (more than 5,100 images) I added a detailled search as a link at https://uniformenportal.de/uniformenportal_suche.html

You must choose a country and then you may choose further parameters as time range or several unit types. If you choose infantry, cavalry or artillery all sub-types will be chosen. An additional radio button is provided for the selection of guard units.

I think the german texts will be translated via the browser addons so also non-german speaking may use this search engine (which I built with the help of AI 😉). I think the next border of 10,000 images will be reached in 2026/2027, so more and more the search engine will be of help for all researchers of uniform and equipment related questions.

Greetings from Berlin

Markus Stein

Interesting, if rather overlooked, character, who reformed the British cavalry and set up the first British Staff College. I came across this lengthy YT video about him https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eeuC-IpqJRA&t=1836s although I would disagree about the originality of the Light Cavalry sabre. A lot of British kit was copied from the Austrians after the Flanders campaign of 1793-4, including the Hungarian sabre and much of Sharpe's uniform. I can hear Zack saying "No, not more competition", but I have also come across this fairly new podcast, where a recent edition features Dr William Fletcher talking about Marchant and the British Staff in the Peninsular. https://goodpods.com/podcasts/the-history-syndicate-podcast-699044/15-re-evaluating-the-british-staff-contribution-to-the-napoleonic-wars-94797627 Although it is Anglocentric and repeats some mythology about the French staff (there was nothing unusual about the Marshals not knowing Napoleon's overall strategic concept in 1815 as it was always the case and the root of the 1806 near-debacle), Fletcher gives some due accoun…