Carabiniers du Roi 1693-1791 - Carnet de la Compagnie d'Elite

Here is a regiment that stands truly apart by virtue of its recruitment method, its organisation, its strength and its employment.

Thus,

- This regiment did not recruit directly, but was "fed" and replenished with recruits by the other cavalry regiments, following a system analogous to that in force for the Compagnie des Grenadiers à cheval de la Garde;

- It was organised (at least in its early days) into 5 brigades of 10 squadrons of 2 companies;

- Its strength, even if it varied according to circumstances (war, peace), was in no way comparable to that of a regiment of the « la Cavalerie légère françoise & étrangère » to which it belonged, from the same period;

- It was commanded by a « personnage considérable »;

- It could be deployed either concentrated or simultaneously across several (at least two) armies;

- Finally, it had to be capable of fighting on foot as well as on horseback, in the manner of the Grenadiers à cheval or the dragoons (the latter being « réputés troupe d'infanterie »).

« Le Régiment Royal des Carabiniers, wrote Father Daniel in 1724, étoit le plus beau Régiment de Cavalerie qu'il y eût dans les troupes de France à la fin du dernier règne. », and General Vanson (NF.AR.NOT at the Musée de l'Armée) notes that, despite its rank within the light cavalry, the Royal des Carabiniers corresponded to a genuine cavalry division of 5 regiments, comprising approximately 4,000 elite troopers assembled, in 1693, within 100 companies whose officers were appointed (commissions were not venal) by the King. In the King's conception, this was indeed a regiment gathering the elite of his cavalry, commanded by the best of his officers. Some authors of the period already referred to them as the Grenadiers of the cavalry.