French Hussars..what colour is sky blue?

[forrester]

I finally got round to buying a box of Perry Napoleonic French hussars.
It contains the usual excellent painting guide, but this time I was puzzled.
Any uniform book I have  [and admittedly theyve been on my shelves for decades] depicts some regiments in sky blue ie light blue clothing.  However in the Perry guide "sky blue" is being depicted as more like a basic mid blue. A marked difference.

Has there been some more recent research or revised thinking that I've missed?

[Patrice]

Not sure of the answer, but direct translation from a language to another is not always clear.

For example, British "royal blue" seems darker than Old French "bleu de roi" whatever modern sources say.

I've always understood the French hussars sky blue as being ...light blue.

...But when in campaign and under hard weather etc. it could probably become darker with dirt, etc.?

[bluewillow]

French sky blue is hard to define really, it is a light blue with a hint of grey.



Looking at a portrait of French hussar officer tunic in the Musee de Armee



Cheers
Matt

[Patrice]

It looks dark to me, closer to WW1 French "bleu horizon"... but that may be caused by ageing of paint on the picture(?)

[John Boadle]

I think the French term used at the time was "bleu ciel", ie sky blue. However, that's of limited help because "sky blue" now seems to mean a very pale, ethereal shade to many people, and that's not what bleu ciel meant. You will not go far wrong if you aim for a vivid bright blue. Perhaps you could call it half-way between the familiar dark blue of many uniforms, and a pale blue.

I have to say I don't agree with bluewillow that there was supposed to be any hint of grey in it, although the colour would fade with long wear and weather and end up that way no doubt.

[Arthur]

Caveat emptor : before we get into specific colour considerations, remember first that we are talking about the pre-industrial era and a time when vegetal rather than chemical dyes were used, with hues varying from one batch of cloth to another. It is also useful to keep in mind that until 1810 cloth was procured locally rather than issued from central stores, which would not have been capable of supplying enough suits of clothing for tens of thousands of men.

In the French army, colonels were directly responsible for the clothing their men until 1810. each regiment having a conseil d'administration (literally a board of administrators) made up of seven officers (including the colonel) which essentially functioned as a clothing committee. This conseil would pass contracts with local clothiers to procure batches of material which would be turned over to tailors to be made into suits of clothing. Uniform patterns and cloth samples were issued to all units to guarantee homogeneity and (theoretically) uniformity, but subtle variations in hue could be seen from unit to unit. Regiments (both cavalry and infantry) were inspected on a yearly basis to ensure that they followed regulations, though inspectors were generally willing to turn a blind eye to deviations from regulations provided the men were well clothed and the regimental finances were sound and balanced. This came to an end in March 1810 when a decree was passed abolishing the role of the conseils d'administration and dictating that from then on all clothing would be supplied centrally from large national stores. It speaks volumes about the difficulties of clothing large numbers of men through a centralised system that Bonaparte was forced to partially return to the previous system a year later since stores were often unable to keep up with the demand from field units (the conseils d'administration were again allowed to place local orders for up to one third of their clothing requirements from 1811 onwards).

I suspect the above may appear as something of a digression but I believe the issue of colour is best tackled with a good grasp of logistics in mind.

On to the matter of colours themselves, the official shades of blue used by French hussars were the following : bleu céleste foncé (1st regiment) and bleu ciel (9th, 10th and 12th : pelisse / 5th and 10th : dolman). Bleu céleste foncé (dark sky blue) was a fairly dark shade of deep mid-blue which many illustrators mistakenly render as a pale shade of sky blue. Bleu ciel (sky blue) was obviously lighter, but not as much as many people believe : once again, most illustrators make it appear too light as it was effectively a bright shade of light/mid blue rather than the very light hue we have come to associate with that colour. Bottom line : the various shades of blue used by French hussars tended to be darker than we think.

To prove my point with something other than long-winded sentences, here a cloth sample from 1823 labelled as bleu de ciel clair (i.e light sky blue). It is admittedly post-Napoleonic (although not by much) and the effects of time and fading must obviously be taken into account along with lighting and the vagaries of the photographic process, but I think it still gives us an idea of what bleu ciel might have looked like in the early C19th :

[Arthur]

Here is one more example dating from late 1799 with cloth samples (now kept in the Vincennes army archives) for the so-called "Kléber" uniform issued to the armée d'Orient in Egypt. The 21st and 22nd light infantry demi-brigades (3rd and 4th from the top, left hand column) were ordered into bleu céleste coats : note how the two samples provided differ in hue despite being both labelled as the same colour (the explanation being that they obviously come from different cloth batches) :

 

[Arthur]

That shade actually looks more like gris argentin to me : gris argentin was basically a shade of light grey with a slight pale blue tint to it. That colour was used exclusively by the 3rd hussar regiment.

[SteveBurt]

Does indeed look very like the blue-grey of the 3rd Hussars (someone complained mine were too blue, but really they are blue-grey)

[ARKOUDAKI]

As Arthur rightly pointed out, the colors used by the French Army did change a bit over time, and most definitely so did their uniforms. Hence, a few key questions to ask you is what period are you modeling your Hussars (there are up to four different head variants in the Perry box covering 1793-1815), and secondly what specific regiment are you trying to recreate?

In terms of references, a good starting point is the Perry painting guide but the H&C Hussars books are also quite useful. From there, depending on how detailed you want to go on your research, there are other sources available.

[forrester]

Some very interesting information, thank you.

Initially I'm looking at 3rd Hussars about 1810 in Spain , but if I get round to a second regiment it's likely to be 10th , same period.

It looks like I should be going for a bit darker than the usual perception of sky blue, but probably not too much as it helps to be a touch lighter than the real thing for small toys.

[Arthur]

If you opt for the 3rd, then the uniform should be more grey than blue : gris argentin is a tricky colour to render and most illustrators and painters often depict it wrongly as light blue. As stated above, it was effectively a light shade of grey with a slight blue tinge to it and should look something like this (note how Rigo came up with two slightly different hues of gris argentin in two different Le Plumet plates, though that may have to do with the printing and the scans as well) :