Horse artillery

Artillery seems to have been little used in the First Carlist War, largely due to the nature of the terrain and a lack of draught animals. Larger guns were difficult to move around the mountains of northern Spain and both sides quickly realised that smaller calibre guns, capable of being carried on the backs of mules, would be the most viable form of artillery support. This required a certain amount of re-training and re-equipping the artillery with mountain guns, usually 6 or 8 pounders and howitzers.

The regular army consisted of Guard, foot and horse artillery units. The horse artillery had a rather flamboyant uniform with a tapering shako and a coatee with red facings and yellow grenades on the collar and turbacks. The horse artillery element seems to have expanded to 12 batteries during the war. The Isabelinos had the edge over the Carlists in terms of artillery support, as the latter had to rely mainly on capturing guns and di not have access to the ready supplies of ammunition that the Isabelinos had. But both sides never really gave full support to their artillery - it was seen as a means of providing some support to the infantry and never an offensive arm in its own right.

These Perry figures have a British 6-pounder gun. I painted the gun with the new Foundry "British Blue Grey" palette, from their "authentic" Napoleonic range.

Painted April 2009.