j1mwallace wrote:Yep. Same hats. More lace on their uniform though
Err, actually no. French grenadiers did
not wear laced coats, unless they belonged to a unit whose musketeers also had buttonhole lace, such as
Du Roi. Grenadiers wore the exact same coats as the rank and file, the accoutrement and moustache being the distinguishing features of the grenadier company along with the flintlock musket and curved sabre. A typical late C17th French grenadier would look something like this :
Grenadier figures with buttonhole lace are a mistake repeated by most manufacturers, notably Front Rank and Ebor, probably because they are all using the Giffard plates as a reference. The problem is that Giffard used the Gardes Françaises - a regiment in which everybody wore laced coats - as his models, and the uniforms are not representative of those worn by the overwhelming majority of line infantry regiments.
Headgear was most commonly the black felt hat mentioned above, worn increasingly cocked in the French army by 1690. Some regiments also had their grenadiers in stocking caps with cloth turnups which closely resembled those worn by the French dragoons, but it is not known which units adopted this practice. The figure below shows such a cap (and the buttonhole lace disposition clearly marks this lad as a Gardes Françaises grenadier)
One morning I shot an elephant in my pajamas. How he got into my pajamas I'll never know.
