Colonel Heinrich Julius von Kospoth

Heinrich Julius von Kospoth (1724-1801) began the AWI as colonel of the Wutgenau Regiment (renamed Landgraf in 1777). In late 1777 he was given command of a brigade comprising three of the four combined grenadier regiments, replacing Colonel von Donop who had been killed at the battle of Red Bank/Fort Mercer. In February 1779 von Kospoth was promoted to Major-General, but appears to have remained as commander of the grenadier brigade. He served with General Clinton at the siege of Charleston in March to May 1780, and then took his brigade to New York where it remained for the rest of the war. Von Kospoth headed the court martial that the Landgrave of Hesse-Kassel ordered into the Trenton affair.  His only daughter married the son of Lieutenant-General von Lossberg. 

In the Caliver/"British Grenadier!" scenario books, von Kospoth appears as a brigade commander at Monmouth, in command of the Hessian grenadier brigade. I painted him in the uniform of the Wutgenau Regiment for lack of any alternative. This is another Brigade Games figure.  The lapels on the coat weren't that pronounced, so this is a good figure for an officer whose uniform doesn't have lapels; which is quite a few of them!

My next post will be on Colonel Carl von Donop, and I'll then do a round-up of modelling Hessian commanders for AWI wargaming. This has been a real blast, to be honest. Getting into the personalities of the AWI was always one of the things I enjoyed most about the period.

1 figure, painted September 2024.