British Shipments to Spain during the Peninsular War

Britain sent a lot of uniforms to Spain during the Peninsular War. Some Spanish divisions were wholly equipped by Britain. In 1809-10 the uniforms were dark blue, sky blue, grey, and white (Chartrand, 1999a). By 1811 the uniforms were exclusively blue; sky blue predominated at the start but dark blue quickly took over. It was on 12 Dec 1811 that the so called “English” uniform became the national uniform.

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Albuera Wargaming Project for the Peninsular War

I wanted to build some Peninsular War Armies for Shako based on a historical Order of Battle. The Battle of Albuera (16 May 1811) seems a reasonable starting point or perhaps finale since it requires three armies: Spanish, Anglo-Portuguese, and French. The two overall commanders (Beresford and Soult) were competent and several significant others were also present including Joaquín Blake y Joyes who commanded the Spanish, José de San Martin who was one of the famous Liberators in the South American Wars of Liberation , and José de Zayas who was arguably the best of the Spanish divisional commanders during the entire war. The French and Anglo-Portuguese are roughly the same numbers (ignoring the Spanish). The orders of battle are close to those in pick up lists for Shako.

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