Today in American Revolutionary War History

I used to share a parade square with the QYR.  I never saw that symbol though; I suppose it has long fallen out of use.  But yes, you're quite right.  The regimental association gives exactly the explanation you do:  www.qyrang.ca/blog/2016/4/17/warriors-of-the-crescent-moon  

No, I actually read it on a website, but didn't have to the basic common sense to fact-check it on the QYR's own websites.  I looked at the picture, saw what I thought was a hussar, and looked no further.  My bad.

Regarding Hussars generally, the Hussar (of the light cavalry variety) is most definitely a Hungarian creation, hailing primarily from Serbia.  The name itself is Hungarian.  But now I'm not sure if Serbia has (or had) a high muslim population or not.  I made an assumption there.  Another bad.  

I've also read that the white over red pennon of lancer units is also a nod to their ancestry, in that case Poland, being the Polish national colours.  But I read that long before the advent of the internet and have never tried to verify it.  The adoption of foreign military uniforms and types was pretty common right up to the end of the 19th century.  Look at the American Zouaves.

I just have had a bit of a Queen's Rangers obsession for a while.  I would want to go join and learn to be a killer, survivalist badass of the 1700's - though I probably wouldn't be allowed.  😒


American Zouaves is another topic I'm always talking to Windischer about.  Why did a bunch of random guys in the 1800's decide to dress that way and fight?  Maybe we need a thread about uniforms.

Which is interesting again, because hussars afaik weren't a common thing in the British armed forces until later, in the Napoleonic period, when several Light Dragoons regiments were renamed to Hussar regiments. We see a similar thing happening after Waterloo, when some Light Dragoons regiments get transformed into Lancer units.

Lancers were originally more of a Eastern European thing. Poles (Uhlans) and Russians (Cossacks) used the lance quite a bit. As Poland got partitioned, the tree conquering powers adopted Uhlan units. Napoleon made the Duchy of Warszaw his ally and modelled several units after the Polish Uhlans. The famous "Red Lancers" were a mostly Dutch unit, but their uniform was mimicing the Polish one, especially the square top shako, inspired by a Polish hat called "czapka rogatywka". Because Lancers were used in Napoleon's army with quite some cussess, his enemies (the British) started using them as well, again modeling the uniforms after the Polish style. 

Like you said, the light Hussars as we're most familiar with them were originally a mounted police formation in the Kingdom of Hungary. At first they comprised mostly of Serbs but that changed later on. As part of the lands ruled by the Habsburgs, it became an rule that Hussars were only recruited from lands of the Kingdom of Hungary (that includes Slovakia, Croatia, Vojvodina, Transylvania etc), while the "German" lands (today's Czechia, Austria, Slovenia and parts of Northern Italy) fielded Dragoons and Cuirassiers. So the ethnic makeup was one big mix.

Serbia has a muslim population in Sandjak, on the border with Montenegro. They're called Bosniaks, the same as the muslims from Bosnia and Hercegovina. I don't know if the Albanians living on the Serbian side of the border with Kosovo are muslim or not. I assume there were more muslims in Serbia before its independance in the 19th century. Hungary probably recruited those Serbian Hussars from lands it controlled, which would be Vojvodina (no muslims there). Another point we overlooked is that islam was not tolerated in Austria back then. The 1781 Patent of Toleranation by Joseph II only granted religious freedom to Lutherans, Calvinists and Serbian Orthodox Christians and the 1782 Edict of Tolerance extended it to include Jews as well. Islam was not tolerated because of the constant wars with the Ottomans.