mercenaries from continental europe were mercenaries who fought for the british.
mercenaries from continental europe were mercenaries who fought for the british.
who were mercenaries who fought for the british?
mercenaries from continental europe
for much of the 18th century, the army was recruited in a wide variety of places, and many of its recruits were mercenaries from continental europe, including danes, hessians and hanoverians. these mercenaries were hired out by other rulers on contracted terms. other regiments were formed of volunteers such as french huguenots. by 1709, during the war of the spanish succession, the british army totalled 150,000 men, of whom 81,000 were foreign mercenaries. the rest of the army consisted of natives of the british isles who, apart from the officers, were mainly recruited from the poorest sections of society. each regiment was responsible for the recruitment of its own troops, and individual colonels would lead recruiting parties on tours of the towns and villages. this was emphasized by a popular play of the time called "the recruiting officer". other powers were given by the british government to allow the forcible enlistment of vagrants and vagabonds. some of these powers were abused by recruiting officers desperate to fill their quotas, although a legalized royal navy press-gang system would not be implemented yet, even though normal recruiting methods failed to supply the required annual influx of troops, as the army was not a popular profession, with low pay, flogging and other barbarous disciplinary measures. the army's recruiting methods and treatment of its soldiers would remain the same for the rest of the 18th century.
recruitment in the british army
from the 11th century on the commander-in-chief of the army was the king (kral), a veliki vojevoda or 'high military chief, equivalent to the byzantine grand domestic, being appointed in his absence. however, since any call to arms had to be approved by the sabor (the national assembly) the king actually had limited military power, in effect being no more than a glorified grand župan, or elected tribal leader. although dušan stripped the sabor of much of its power, the crown's dependence on a permanent nucleus of mercenaries that was not subject to the assembly's whims had by then already evolved, constituting the core of all serbian armies throughout this period. under stephen uroš ii milutin (1282-1321) these mercenaries included such diverse elements as cumans; anatolian turks (some 1,500 were employed in 1311 from amongst those who had been allied to the catalans in thrace and macedonia); tartars from south russia; and christian ossetians (jasi in serbian and russian sources) from the caucasus. however, it was western european style heavy cavalry which soon came to predominate. as early as 1304 a certain francisco de salomone is mentioned in an inscription in trevise as having distinguished himself in the service of 'orosius, rex rascie' (i. e. uroš, king of serbia). mercenaries in stephen uroš iii's army that defeated the bulgarians at battle of velbazhd in 1330 were 1,500 aragonese, spaniards, and germans, and it was the latter who seem to have predominated during dušan reign. the papal legate to his court reported seeing 300 german mercenaries there under the knight palman bracht, who held the rank of capitaneus. in addition we know that the serbian troops supplied to the byzantine emperor, john vi kantakouzenos, in 1342-43 were germans, and that the troops garrisoning beroia in macedonia in 1341-50 were german mercenaries too. even at the battle of kosovo in 1389 it is significant that many of lazar men were german and hungarian mercenaries according to a florentine account, while a mid-15th century ottoman source reports that his army included wallachians, hungarians, bohemians, albanians, bulgarians and franks, doubtless chiefly mercenaries. another says he employed many mercenaries from among the serbians themselves as well as the hungarians, bosnians and albanians. serbian documents indicate that as well as germans the other predominant european mercenary elements comprised spaniards (possibly as many as 1,300-strong at one point) plus hungarians, frenchmen, italians and swiss. one prominent name to appear in their ranks was that of philippe de mézières, in later life chancellor of cyprus and one of the last protagonists of the crusade. inevitably, in the 15th century ottoman auxiliaries were also used, for example by vuk lazarević against stephen, 1409-13. in addition to the king or despot, the larger cities also employed some mercenaries of their own to back up their militia.
medieval serbian army