Battle of Dunes 1658 - Fronde Rebels

[Mpanko]

Building out units for the 1658 Battle of Dunes.  Does anyone have a source or information on what flags - if any- the French rebels would have used with their infantry under Conde?

I am tempted just to use some spare French regimental flags and not worry about.  Any thoughts would be most welcome.

[TheDilfy]

If you can name the regiment(s) ( I have list somewhere here) I can find you some details.

[Mpanko]

The only source I have that lists them follows:

Left: Louis II de Condé (4 battalions & 22 squadrons) Prince de Condé, commander of the left wing

Comte de Coligny – 4 battalions – 1,600 men Guitaud (German); Condé [2] & Persan (Condé)

Not all that helpful I think….

[TheDilfy]

I would recommend the following excellent and highly recommended books in order of detail and information (all from Helion):

The Colonial Ironsides- English Expeditions under the Commonwealth and Protectorate 1650-1660 by Jonathan Riley

"Better Begging Than Fighting" - The Royalist Army in Exile in the War against Cromwell 1656-1660 by John Barratt.

There was also an article on the battle by Simon MacDowall in Wargames Illustrated no. 359 September 2017.

Spain and her allies, The Dunes (Dunkirk) 1658:

There were 3 Fronde Rebel regiments - Condé Regiment in 2 battalions, Regiment Clommes and Regiment Persan.

For Colours I can find the following:

Condé and Persan
The Drapeau Blanc is the company Colonel's colour.

Further reading for the campaign I would recommend Cromwell Et Mazarin: Deux Campagnes De Turenne En Flandre by Jules Bourelly

and

The Grand Condé in exile by Inglis-jones attached pdf (freely available via Oxford Uni)

https://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:3ab667bf-f5af-45b7-985f-1d936f8299a4 .

I hope this helps.

[Patrice]

I'm certainly not a specialist of this period, but at this time, after the end of the proper Fronde, Condé was in Spanish service? So he would not have used French white cross flags?

[TheDilfy]

I'm not sure on that myself to be fair, do you have a source that states that? I thought the blanc drapeau (mestre de camp) was given to a regiment by the King of France as recognition for the unit not disbanding between wars? I guess the regiment of Persan and Condé could have kept theirs alongside their regimental flags as although technically allied to the Spanish they were in effect continuing the Fronde and hence I would expect them to carry their drapeaux d'ordonnance alongside their mestre de camp? In René Chartrand's - The Armies and Wars of the Sun King vol.2 (Helion) mentions a curious incident of the two colonel's colours (mestre de camp) when the Prince of Carignan's regiment merged with that of the Marquis de Sallières regiment; neither colonel would relinquish their colour, so both were allowed and the regiment carried two blanc drapeaux (mestre de camp) until 1718. For a regiment to be specifically mentioned would suggest to me this was the exception rather than the rule?

[Mpanko]

Hey thanks a lot….the flags and the info is most welcome!