Boxer Rebellion-Italian Mtd. infantry

[juergen c. olk]

photos

[juergen c. olk]

one more

[juergen c. olk]

carcano m91 carbine,for mtd.,infantry.

[von Lucky]

Nice find. Did they have an effective role?

[juergen c. olk]

I have no Idea? I just thought the picture was to cool to pass up.

[Elbows]

What's the term for such small horses/ponies?  Cool pictures.

[von Lucky]

Piccolo ponio?

[italwars]

Hello
In my opinion is a quite ridicoulous picture 
the soldier are Bersaglieri Light Infantry whick, for this heavily posed photo, wore that bizarre hat which, in my opinion, is simple an home and occasional conversion of their traditional red fez type headress with a cover/linig made of fur in oder to look like some type of cavlry (Guide Cavalry sported something similar)
i can add that they are not cavalry and neither trained or purpose comanded mounted infantry..because or their footwears and general apperance...take also into account that Bersaglieri Infantry, contrary to popular belief were, and maybe still are, the worst of Italian land forces...from my reading i made the unpolitically correct idea that they were a kind of "scum of the army"...not very tal people, majority recruited from illiterated and low morale peasant class from the poor South of Italy...as example in Adwa..our incompetent generals made an expeditionary corps out of every Regt. of italian Inf and Bersaglieri among unwilling forced volunteers that were simply the worst element of which respective battaillon commanders were happy to be deprived of..so ill, undisciplinated people, thiefs ecc...and i'm sure that same sort of attitude persisted with the China contingent..Foreign German correspondants in china talk about Italian and, in some cases also French, of "undiscliplined, badly equipped and uncleaned soldiers"...in China, maybe, our only good soldiers were the welll led sailors...
So definitivly a posed photo with poor chaps and low morale/bad trained Bersaglieri from remote South ..unelegantly mounted on hired (or "recuperated" local ponies ) certainly afraid if the animal would began to moove or canter 

[italwars]

i can add that the mantel was a typical "Bersaglieri" piece of uniform..and the shortened "Carcano T.S" was not reserved only to Cavalry but frequently used by light troops and artilerry crews..from a WW1 veteran tale..it was only good for "shooting at sparrows"

[juergen c. olk]

Thanx for the spirited information on the photo and the besaglieri. I just finished four units of Italians of my colonial rmy,alas no Besaglieri,because everyone paints them up first,so I painted up 3x askari,all different manufacture and a regular infantry unit,and dismounted cavalry figures. At least now I argue that my Askaris are better troops,as I have always stipulated,oh and good luck against England.

[italwars]

hello Juergen
thanks for your reply...i think that, according to real performances in the colony (Eritrea)...the native troops were far more succesful...not only because the best that could happen to them if captured by Shoa warriors would be to have cut their left foot, right hand or something equally precious  ..while, traditionally, Alpine troops and Artillery could be rated as good troops....while the real élite was the Alpine Artillery
i too i hope we will beat Britain on sunday  ( not least to imagine the face of M. Davies and all those hooligans that marauded into recent Malvinas topic on TMP  )...

[Conquistador]

<snip> on TMP 

Like any good lead addict I went back to TMP - hope springs eternal - recently, once a gain saw the dark side of war gaming, and once again dropped the book mark off my computer.  The useful and/or pleasant people there are simply not worth the "OFM" types there.

Gracias,

Glenn