The Rear Guard by Keith Rocco.

11th Hussars in Germany, 1796. In 1796, the revolutionary government of France lauched a series of military campaigns they hoped would defeat the nations allied against their new republic. While 27-year old General Napoleon Bonaparte was conducting his hard-fought but ultimately glorious campaign in Northern Italy, his military and political rival General Jean Victor Moreau and the ill-clad and worn out French Army of the Rhine and the Moselle desperately tried to stave off defeat at the hands of Austrias able field commander Archduke Charles. On 22 October 1796, Moreau ordered his tired but determined soldiers to stand on good defensive terrain near the Chateau of Schliengen (accurately depicted in the right background) buying time for his supply and ammunition wagons to cross to safety over the Rhine River at Huninge. In such dangerous situations, it was the duty of the Hussars and other light cavalry to cover the movements of the army. The 11th Hussars was raised during the Ancien Regime, from volunteers attracted to the glamorous life popularly attributed to the hussars. While the hussars would indeed fulfill their romantic promise of glory during the Napoleonic Wars, the battles of the revolution served as a trying apprenticeship. Vastly understrength and poorly employed due to inexperience, the hussars were not yet an even match for the more professional light cavalry of Austria and Prussia. But the hard lessons were being absorbed, and a nucleus of hardened veterans would emerge from the Revolutionary Wars to form the Cadre of the great cavalry regiments that Napoleon and Murat would lead to immortality.

Last copy of this sold out edition.

Signed limited edition of 500 prints.

Image size 25 inches x 17 inches (64cm x 43cm)