The Colors

Screen capture from HBO Mini-series "Rome"

In Roman times each Legion was issued a standard, the aquila, a pole topped with a bronze eagle. Sometimes there was a cloth banner attached to the pole with the Legion's symbol and number (LEG XII for example). But the eagle was the important thing, the pole wasn't important, nor was any banner.

When Napoléon became the Emperor of France in 1804, he had eagle standards made for his troops. The initial issue of these eagles was immortalized in a (rather melodramatic) painting by Jacques-Louis David -

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The eagle was often thought of as the "soul" of the regiment. Again it was the bronze eagle atop the pole, not the fancy embroidered flag, nor the pole itself which was considered important.

The French Army of Napoléon was not the only army to carry standards into battle. In nearly all armies of the period the standard provided a rallying point in the heat and smoke of battle. If one stayed with the colors (as they were known) one could not go wrong.

These standards were usually decorated with battle honors for the engagements a regiment had participated in, after the Battle of Austerlitz in 1805, Napoléon ordered that each of the regiments which had participated in that victory were now allowed to attach a wreath to their eagle. It wasn't enough to have AUSTERLITZ embroidered on the flag itself, which was really only a swatch of color in the smoke of battle, the eagle stood out, as did that wreath, signifying a regiment which had fought at the Battle of the Three Emperors. (Another name for Austerlitz as the emperors of France, Austria, and Russia were present.)

Whether the French infantry regiment who lost their eagle to Russian cavalry received a wreath is not chronicled.

Capture of the Eagle of the 4ème Régiment d'Infanterie de Ligne by the Russian Chevaliers-Gardes.
(Painted by Bogdan Willewalde - Source)

British battalions carried two standards into battle, the Regimental color, which had the Union Jack in the corner next to the pole and was typically in the color of the regiment's "facings," that being the color of the color and cuffs of the jacket. The King's Color was the Union Flag and was embroidered with the regiment's symbol and number in the middle. A very nice example of that is here.

The French lost a number of Eagles during the Napoleonic wars, they also captured quite a few. They lost two at Waterloo during the charge of the British heavy cavalry, one taken by the Scots Greys (by a sergeant I might add) and the other by the Royal Dragoons (an English regiment). Now those two regiments, along with a third, belonged to a brigade known as the Union Brigade as it consisted of one English, one Scottish, and one Irish regiment, the latter were the Inniskillings. Rather than capturing flags I'm quite sure my Irish cousins were happily sabering Frenchmen. Nothing like a good fight to get an Irishman to pitch in.

The French seized their last enemy color during the Waterloo campaign. The King's Color of the 2nd Battalion of the 69th Foot, the South Lincolnshires. I wonder if the Duke of Wellington mentioned that in his dispatches?

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While it may seem silly to die for a flag, or an eagle. It was considered a great disgrace to lose the color. As late as our own Civil War seizing an enemy color was considered a brave and heroic act. With good reason, the men guarding the color would rather die than lose it and would fight like demons to keep it.

The French of the Second Empire under Napoléon III also carried standards but not topped with an eagle. I have seen a number of these at the Musée de l'Armée in Paris. These are treated with great reverence by the curators of the museum, as a Norwegian colleague of mine discovered when he walked into the darkened room still wearing his Minnesota Vikings ball cap (no, seriously, a Vikings cap) and was asked to take it off. He, being something of a wit, asked, "But why? Didn't you lose that war?"

No, the French did not find that amusing. Not at all.