What are Napoleon's soldiers wearing on their heads?

Asked by Jeruba (56106

) August 19th, 2011

I’ve been enjoying the British series of Sharpe TV movies starring Sean Bean and set in the time of the Napoleonic wars in the early 1800s. (The “still sharp” in-joke in LOTR led me there. I didn’t know of him before that.)

In many scenes of encounters with the French army, the French soldiers appear to be wearing bags on their heads.

I know what a shako is, and I’ve looked up French uniforms online and seen the shakos that were part of the uniform of the time. But I don’t see anything that looks like those bags. They appear to be wrapped around the shakos and remind me of a chef’s toque.

Do you know what kind of headgear is being depicted in the movies?

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4 Answers

Haven’t seen this show, but there was a “couvre-shako” like this that was worn to protect the shako. Is that what you saw?

There was a waxed version that provided some rain protection, and it was also intended to keep the glint of the metal decorations on the shako from drawing enemy fire. It was only issued for a short period before being abandoned as pointless.

thorninmud (20495

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Very likely: protect the shako, but probably not the soldier. In the show, they appear white or light blue, and to me they look like they’d make excellent targets, standing right out from the landscape.

Not that anybody is low profile, in their bright colors and plumes and white crossbelts and shiny ornaments. Sharpe and his riflemen, in dark green tunics, look like the only ones dressed for cover.

Jeruba (56106

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They came in white, gray, black or beige.

thorninmud (20495

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