Brendan,

I haven’t studied the Brunswickers sufficiently to know their detailed drills. I have downloaded the excellent free German language books recommended by Oliver Schmidt and will get around to reading these (particularly Wachholz), which may contain such information. All I would say is that they had more than one year in UK between leaving North Germany in August 1809 and arriving in the Peninsula in September 1810. In their new incarnation as the Duke of Brunswick Oels Regiment of Infantry they were part of the British Army, so would have used British drill and had time to learn it.

It is true that some Foreign Regiments of the British Army did retain aspects of their original national tactics. The KGL, for example, from their formation in 1803 initially had 8 companies per battalion and used the Hanoverian system detaching a few files per company (not 3rd rank) as rifle armed sharpshooters to act as skirmishers. However when Wellington issued orders for all of the light companies in the battalions in each Brigade to form a converged light battalion to then act as a Brigade asset, the KGL did so as well, using these sharpshooters to do this, and we know that Major Ally (of 3rd Bn KGL) commanded that light battalion. In December 1811 the KGL adopted totally British battalion structures, including grenadier and light companies.

The Duke of Brunswick Oels Regiment in British service always had 12 companies including a structure for a grenadier company and a light company. This could suggest that they used a totally British system. However many sources state that they were Light Infantry, so every company could skirmish. These two situations are not incompatible, since all British Light Infantry and Rifle Regiments also had a structure which suggests that they had grenadier and light companies, even if in practice all companies acted as light Infantry.

I doubt if the Brunswickers would have used a third rank system for skirmishers once they became part of the British Army.

Rod