French colonial forces

[Bryanbowdell]

Has anyone got any pics/photos of Frencg colonial troops, in particular native soldiers and police.

Cheers

[former user]

now You have opened a can of worms 

that is not so simple

period? region?

Colonial troops in the strict sense would be metropolitan regiments from 1900-1963 in overseas deployment
white/light blue uniforms, later Khaki, pith helmet

[KraVseR]

For example, Tonkinese and Annamites  Rifles.

[former user]

oh, yes, and of course tirailleurs outside of french North Africa
Annamites, Tonkinois, Malagaches, Senegalais etc

great pics btw, THX @KraVseR

[Bryanbowdell]

Great photos.  I am primarily interested in the 1860's to 1900 Africa, though the whole colonial period is fascinating.

[former user]

Africa
well, Africa is big
here is an overview
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_colonial_empire

basically, all colonial troops belonged to the navy in that period and would wear dark blue or the tropical outfit of the campaign/time

apart from North Africa that technically belonged to Metropolitan France

[Just John]

Here are some links that I found useful when I started into the same period.

http://www.spahis.fr/

http://www.chasseursdafrique.fr/19.html

http://www.maquetland.com/article-843-armae-d-afrique-4th-part-the-native-troops--english-version-

[former user]

let's start
in general, note that whenever You see a double breasted tunic (paletot, not the greatcoat), it will be troupes de marines (coloniales after 1900) same goes with an anchor on the headdress
here is a nice family picture


Troupes de Marine


marine infantry (Fusilier Marins is something entirely different), these are the successors of the "Compagnies franches de la Marine" of FIW fame


Tirailleurs Senegalais, very often employed


note that it is not a zouave uniform

[Arthur]

Confusing as this may sound, the military forces used to expand and defend France's colonial empire were divided into two distinct groups.

The Armée d'Afrique (which included the Foreign legion, the zouaves, the tirailleurs algériens/tunisiens/marocains, the bataillons disciplinaires d'Afrique/infanterie légère d'Afrique, the chasseurs d'Afrique and the spahis) was stationed in North Africa and was technically a part of the Army, being attached to the Ministry of War. Although these troops took part in just about every colonal expedition undertaken during the third republic, they weren't used to garrison the colonies once the fighting was over : they simply returned to their bases in North Africa after military operations ended.

The true colonial forces, or troupes coloniales, were originally raised and administered by the Ministry of Navy, which also ran the French colonial empire. The naval infantry, or infanterie de marine, was composed of white French metropolitan soldiers who effectively stopped being marines after 1846 (armed sailors, or fusiliers-marins, took on that role from the mid-C19th onwards and regularly provided naval brigades for short-term land operations). The other component of the colonial army were the native soldiers raised throughout the empire and known as tirailleurs indigènes. The Tirailleurs tonkinois and Tirailleurs annamites shown above were raised in French Indochina and Cochinchina, while Africa relied on its Tirailleurs Sénégalais, which weren't all Senegalese in any case (tirailleurs sénégalais became the generic name given to all black infantrymen used in both the AOF and AEF - Afrique Occidentale Française and Afrique Equatoriale Française, i.e French Western Africa and French Central/Equatorial Africa). The African colonial establishment also included mounted native units soon known as Senegalese Spahis, not to be confused with the spahis of the Armée d'Afrique who were Arabs and not negroes.      

In 1900, the whole of the troupes de marine were withdrawn from the naval establishement and placed under the authority of the Ministry of War, taking the troupes coloniales name in the process.    

In terms of deployment, major military expeditions such as the conquest of the Tonkin in the 1880's, the Dahomey expedition of 1892 or the invasion of Madagascar in 1895 usually involved a combination of colonial troops and Armée d'Afrique units. The Foreign Legion and the Naval Infantry usually provided the bulk of the force, with additional contingents being drawn from the zouaves, the turcos, the colonial native troops and whatnot. On the other hand, small-scale expeditions and internal security operations in western and central Africa tended to be conducted almost solely with native African soldiers (though their officers and senior NCO's were obviously white Frenchmen), mostly Senegalese tirailleurs and spahis.  



The uniforms worn by these troops evolved considerably between 1870 and 1920. White soldiers started out with second empire type dark blue uniforms until more practical khaki - or proto-khaki - garments started appearing in the 1880's. The Naval infantry in particular experimented with a series of campaign uniforms in the 1880's and 1890's - with varying degrees of success - before settling for khaki in 1900. Similarly, the tirailleurs sénégalais adopted khaki at the same time (the zouave trousers shown above by former user were a full dress item used only for parades, by the way : short tight trousers were used in the field instead). Given the variety of uniforms used in the period, it would be rather fastidious to list them all here : just tell me which specific units and which decade you're interested in and I'll see what I can dig up.

Hope this helps a bit    
  

[efredbar]

I have a question about Tonkin. 

I've seen pictures of a black (or maybe dark blue) helmet being worn by Foreign Legion troops. How widespread was the use of these dark helmets?

[Arthur]

The helmet you are referring to is the M1878 sun helmet, which began to be issued to the troops in Tonkin in 1885 - and possibly earlier. It was normally white, but it was found preferable to wear it with a dark cover to avoid drawing sniper fire. The cover wasn't really black, but naval blue (which amounts to the same thing since naval blue actually was an almost black shade of very dark blue). In addition to those issued by the intendance, locally-produced bamboo helmets were also used : instead of being covered with cloth, these were painted a very dark shade of green which would have looked black in most circumstances (see the Osprey MAA on the FFL 1872-1914 for a good illustration of this).

These dark-coloured helmets seem to have been very common in Tonkin from 1885 : even the turcos/tirailleurs algériens were issued with them

[efredbar]

Thank you sir.

I've been working on some Tonkin-ish forces. I'm using Scruby 25mm figures for IndoChina and converting their dervish into generic "Chinese" soldiers/pirates.

Works in progress.



I think some dark helmets would be sharp...especially with some red britches.

[Arthur]

I think some dark helmets would be sharp...especially with some red britches.

The red cloth trousers would only have been worn during the cold season or in the chillier highlands. White fatigue trousers were the norm during the Tonkin campaign, with the M1873 dark blue paletot (the naval troops' trademark double-breasted jacket) apparently worn by most French soldiers, including the French Foreign Legion and the regular metropolitan troops. The second figure from the left shows a typical marsouin of the period, though the men would have looked much scruffier in the field. Note the fusilier marin sailor on the left who has replaced his naval cap with a local conical hat :



The turco/tirailleur algérien would have quickly discarded his turban and jacket and campaigned instead in a white bourgeron (a white smock issued for fatigue duties shown in my prevous post's pics) and black covered sun helmet. In the summer, a local jacket known as a keo was experimented with by both the naval infantry and the FFL, but it was ultimately abandoned after the campaign as it looked sloppy and unmilitary. Here are two marines photographed wearing it in the Tonkin circa 1885 :

[efredbar]

That's the beauty of doing toy soldiers...the threshold for feasibility drops considerably once the crystal cote comes out. Ha.

I'll do at least one unit in red trousers.

I really appreciate the information.

[Bryanbowdell]

Arthur,

the information you have posted has been a great help.  I am doing a french force for "darkest africa" scenarios and am looking to do some native troops, particulary gendarme units.  The main period I am looking at will be the 1870's.  I would also love to see pics of troops/police wearing zoauve style uniforms.

I was also wondering if you had any info on locally raised native troops/tribesmen and whether the French used any private commercial companies to administer her colonies such as the British South Africa Company.

Thanks
Bryan