1870 Prussian flags - colorful or black and white?

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

No not the cornflower blue! Here's take 3.

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

And I've finally found my post where they are finished and reflagged!

Talking of the 91st Oldenburgers, here they are before I changed the flag:


And here it is after:


(Just of note, the one reference I came across for the flag says that by 1866 it was in tatters, lawd knows what it must have been like in 1870)

[cameronian]

Nice touch Lemmey, Prussians need a touch of colour.

[Leman]

Certainly smartens up that base Lem.

[Oat]

If I can just hop in here and throw in my 2 cents regarding the Oldenburg Flag colour.

I've done some research into it both online and in my book collection and will present my findings into why I believe that the blue is in fact a darker blue rather than a genuine cornflower blue.

In the regimental history I have from 1898 I think I've found some of the most tantalizing description of the real color of the flag (Geschichte des Oldenburgischen Infanterie-Regiments Nr. 91.  by Frhr. von Puttkamer)

The Description of the flags is as follows, translated by me:

Each flag consists of a 3m long banner pole, in darkblue, flag tops (the metal bit on top), the standard, streamers, and tassels.

In the lower of the banner pole is a metal ring with unit designation, such as  "I.R. 91. I. B". The banner of the III. Battalion still uses the old identification "F.B" (Fusilier Battalion)

The flag tops carry the name of the founder of the regiment on one side and these are as follows:
    I. Battalion "P.F.L" (Herzog Peter Friedrich Ludwig)
    II. Battalion and III. Battalion "P.F.A" (Grossherzog Paul Friedrich August)

On the other side of the flag top is the Iron Cross which was presented by Kaiser Wilhelm I. in 1872.

The II. Battalion flag lost the entire flag top from a rifle round on August 16, 1870 in the battle of Vionville. The flag top was later renewed  

The flag top of the III. Battalion was bent after receiving a strike from a round on 15 January 1871 in the battle by Sille le Guillaum.  

There remains little of the standards. The standards were made from heavy blue silk and included the Oldenburger Coat of Arms from the time of presentation.  
  The territories that that were given to Oldenburg during the Vienna Congress of 1815 were only included on the Coat of Arms from 1829.  That means the coat of arms on the standard of the I. Battalion is  
  different than the coat of arms on the standards of the II. and III. Battalions.

The coat of arms had a mantle and crown above them. It also had a golden fringe on the edges.

The standard was fastened to the flag pole with brass nails. Beside each brass nail was an iron auxiliary nail.

Above the standard attached to the flag pole are two even 1/2 meter long gold tassels in the Oldenburger colors (blue-red). These are attached by a loop. On the same spot can be found two  1.5 meter long streamers. I. and II. Battalion were presented with these in 1842 by Grossherzogin Caecilie and the III. Battalion in 1863 by the Grossherzogin Elisabeth.  These streamers are white silk edged in gold stitching and attached by means of a loop.  They contain the names of the presenters in gold stitching. In addition each standard carries the award for the 1866 campaign, the Oldenburg'she Commemorative medal for 1866. The ribbon band for this medal is blue and red. As well, they carried the Prussian commemorative cross for the same campaign of 1866. These was on a black and yellow ribbon band which had a two crossed swords sewn on.

Each standard also carries 25th anniversary black, white, and red ribbon band for famous actions, presented by His majesty the Kaiser.
On these bands there is a golden bar with the name a battle that they took part in during the 1870/71 war.  From bottom to top:
Vionville-Mars la Tour,  Gravelotte-St. Privat (18. August), Metz, Diedenhofen (Thionville; only II. Battalion), Ladon & Maiziers, Beaune la Rolande, Orleans (3. 4. Dec), Beaugency-Cravant (10. Dec), Vendome (15. Dec; only I. and III), Villeporcher (only I.), Montoire les Roches, le Mans, (only I. and III.), Chassille (14. Jan only II.), Sille le Guillaume (only I. and III.) and St. Jean sur Erve (only II.)
 



But I think the best proof comes from Fiebig even if he mistates what color the blue was with his descriptions of the flags after they were renewed by Kaiser Wilhelm II in 1905. It should be noted at this point that the original and the renewed flags had the same image on both sides of the flag.
"When the flags were renewed, the old beautiful pattern was kept but with small changes. The cornflower blue standards received red wedges, the flags fringes were removed, the laurel branches became gold. The corner initials were rearranged to point inward. The corner initials now had two W.R and two times the previous initials, for example PFL for the I. Battalion, and PFA for II. and III. Battalions.

Included in Fiebigs book is also a color image of the renewed flag in the so called corn flower blue.



Finally I have some better images of the renewed standard which I contend continues the tradition of the original dark blue cloth colour that was found on the flag carried in 1866 and 1870.





As you can read, the regimental history only says it's a blue and not the  cornflower blue that is mentioned in Fiebig's Unsterbliche Treue. This idea that the blue is richer and deeper than a proper cornflower blue is also supported by the idea that the ribbon bands are using the same oldenburg color scheme that's found on the state's flag. The blue used by Oldenburg can be seen in these images too. I think that it might possibly have been called officially cornflower blue, but I think it was a much darker blue than what we consider cornflower blue. A similar situation in my mind as with the case of the cornflower blue of bavarian uniforms being darker on surviving uniforms from 1870 than those commonly illustrated in post 1870 images and in the FPW osprey book.





On that last image I mean to draw your attention the lance pennant.



Hopefully that wasn't too tedious for everyone!

Patrick

[Techno]

Not at all, Patrick !

I found it very interesting.
I sometimes wonder whether different artists have shown what their eyes have interpreted as a/the 'correct shade'.
After all, we each see (and probably describe) colours in a very slightly different way, anyway. (Sometimes fairly drastically !)
Hope that makes sense !

Cheers - Phil.

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

Great find.
Might be the definitive answer to that flag question.

[mollinary]

Hi Patrick,

A fascinating discussion, and excellent research. Your illustrations clearly show the problem, as they seem to show at least three different shades of blue!  I would be inclined to go with the colour blue shown on the Lance pennon, and the medal ribbon. I agree that cornflower blue is a much darker shade than is commonly thought, and both Bavarian and Saxon surviving uniforms of the period appear much darker than many nineteenth century prints would imply. My own figures for both armies use Vallejo medium blue as a base colour.

Mollinary

[cameronian]

The problem being that 1) there would be no batch uniformity in the dye colour since at this time dye manufacture was more a craft than an industrial process 2) before the advent and widespread use of the anilene dyes (German invention) the plant/insect/mineral dyes in common use would wash out/fade with alarming rapidity.

[Oat]

It's true that there are a whole host of issues that also need to be considered. As Cameronian rightly states that dyes could be different with each batch, something that still is a problem to this day! Additionally the exposure to UV can alter the colours and mute them and cause them to alter.

And as Mollinary also points out correctly the images I posted show many different shades of blue, which can be chaulked up to a number of different factors, artist interpretation of the correct shade of blue, the photograph settings of whoever scanned the images I used, and finally the dyes used in the lithographs.

I've also looked in Regimental Colors of the German Armies in the War of 1870-71 by Gherardi Davis and unfortunately Oldenburg's regimental flag is not illustrated, he also only uses the term Blue to describe it without giving a more detailed shade name.

So what's this all mean? Well without real research into the colour and or tracking down what's left, if anything, of the renewed flag, we might never know. However I'm still of the mind that it was a darker shade of blue than what is called cornflower blue.

Also here's image of a surviving example of a dragoons lance pennant from 1882 which shows a fairly dark blue.



Finally, as someone that does book restoration and encounters blue fabrics/papers often enough, I can personally attest to the fact that seem to be a million shades of blue and that the eye had a knack for discerning them a lot more easily than various shades of red. This makes restoring/color matching blues so much harder with materials I have access to. The old dyes produced shades that are hard if not impossible to recreate with the synthetic dyes used in papers, clothes, inks that are used today.

[Leon]

Really interesting stuff there, thanks for posting it.

[cameronian]

This is really good stuff Oat, between you and Mollers I think we have a tremendous resource here.

[mollinary]

Great stuff Patrick,

Of course, if you have Fiebig, you will also have the black and white photo of one of the originals, in which the field does look much lighter than the later ones.    I am not sure what effort would have been made to match the field of the originals when they were replaced, or even, as you indicate, whether the same dyes were still available. Great and fascinating debate. Many thanks.

Mollinary

[Techno]

I see the flag above as so dark, I'd have said it was black, rather than dark blue.
Excellent discussion though, chaps !

Cheers - Phil

[Oat]

I'm glad to see that people are enjoying what I've posted and that it's creating more discussion into the proper blue! 

I also looked at the black and white photographs in Fiebig and you're right the field itself is much lighter than what I'd suppose a dark blue would be. Just like the lithographs (which like the large image with the soldier in white pants uses the same blue on the uniform as the flag) is limited by so many technical considerations Who knows how long the exposure was for the image, which could make the whole thing appear lighter than original. Sadly I think we might never know but I think it's probably a mid level blue, similar to the blue used on the medal's ribbon...not the faded part but the little bit of thread near the top that seems to be the original color that hasn't been faded with time.

I'm trying to get into contact with the German Historical Museum (DHM) to see if they have any knowledge of what happened to IR 91's flags, if there is anything left etc. I'm also going to put a call out to a historian I know with the Bundeswehr to see if they have the flag in one of their officers halls, ie the Stauffenbergsaal in the Officers school in Dresden.
If I find anymore information I will share it with everyone

Regards,

Patrick