Prussian Landwher 1815

Prussian Landwher 1815
My buddy Greg and I had a long discussion today on what color to paint the coats on his next Prussian Landwher (sp?) regiment (Newmark I think). We only found one source (without color pictures) that suggested they were clothed in an Aquamarine Blue coat. Greg seemed to think this was a bright(er) almost medium blue. I suggested he stay with a darker Prussian Blue. Who knows what aquamarine blue looked like back in 1815? We do have a couple of sources that agree that the Prussian Landwher at Waterloo were fairly well armed and clothed. Can anyone out there offer any suggestions? Thanks Mike B

Darker rather than lighter imo, and certainly not anything as light as aquamarine, even in it's 1815 Prussian incarnation.

Yes some books state the Neumark Landwehr wore aquamarine Litewkas but I have not seen any plates showing that. The Knotel plates in Rudorff's post although not contemporary normally use contemporary documents such as the Eberfeld Manuscript as a source. I would suggest that if they did wear aquamarine that the shade would have been similar to that worn by Prussian Dragoons but as this is depicted as anywhere between sky and royal blue that's not much help. I lean towards the darker end of the spectrum for this and funnily enough use artists acrylics and the colour I use is Aquamarine and they look a bit lighter than the figures in the second plate. If you were to do your Landwehr in aquamarine you would really be limiting them as depicting the few regiments which may have worn lighter coats, so I would suggest going for a darker shade so they could also be used for Kurmark & East Prussian regiments.

Having been surprised at how dark (and dull) the "cornflower blue" of surviving Bavarian uniforms of this period are - items kept in storage for over a century, so not exposed to wear/weather - I'd be reluctant to rely on late-19th Century artists, like Knotel (whose Bavarian uniforms are much too sky blue). I know it can be a tall order, but maybe try to find relevant German museums that might have period clothing still surviving? Alternatively, look at contemporary stuff like the NYPL collections:- http://digitalgallery.nypl.org/nypldigital/dgkeysearchresult.cfm?parent_id=769546&word=

I've always considered Late Prussian uniform guides from the period to be far more open to interpretation than most others. Much of the equipment was simply cheap and easily put into the field. Aquamarine could mean a batch of coats dyed with a much lighter blue such as that described for the dragoons or even coats that had been in service for almost two years and generally looked much lighter than others around them. My suggestion is find a nice blue that looks good on the troops that you are comfortable with using. Martin

Ronan, Alot of the images in the NYPL are by 19th(late) Century artists like Knotel ect, Regards,

Are they? Thanks for that - I'd been told they were all from the period. :oops:

Ronan, to be fair there are a lot of them that are contemporary, but you have to search through to sort out which is which, and I've found quite a lot that appear to be mis-dated, so you have to check out the cartons pre and post the ones you are at first interested in.

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