This product is sold as a single unpainted figure.
Additional Images.
1. Illustration from the brush of Michel Provost. From left to right. Martinique Volunteer. Egyptian Infantry. Mexican Auxiliary in the Torrid Zone.
2. The whole French Intervention in Mexico French and Allied Army range.
THE EGYPTIAN-SUDANESE BATTALION
- The battalion had an original strength
of 446 officers and men plus one civilian interpreter. It departed
Alexandria on a French ship in January 1863.
- The Sudanese were
geographically limited in their operational range, but still engaged in a
variety of missions. Mainly tasked to guard the incomplete railway from
Veracruz and to act as train escorts, they occasionally joined other
French and allied units in counter-guerrilla operations. In fact, the
Sudanese never fought as a battalion while in Mexico. Rather they operated
in companies either independently or as parts of larger forces under
European commanders.
- The Sudanese established a
reputation as skilled fighters among allies and enemies alike. In nearly
all the actions in which they took a part the Sudanese inflicted more casualties
than they absorbed, sometimes routing vastly superior Republican forces.
From their first engagements defending rail traffic, through the nearly
disastrous ambush of Callejon
de la Laja (2 March 1865), to final withdrawal as one of the
last elements of the French army to leave Mexico in March 1867, the
Africans demonstrated fierceness in battle, technical proficiency, and
soldierly professionalism. Of the 447 men who left Alexandria in 1863,
fully 321 returned to Egypt four years later.
Source: ‘A Black Corps d'Elite’, Richard Hill and Peter
Hogg, Michigan State
University Press, 1995. Review by Jerrrey S. Gaydish, Arizona State University.
