There were several corps of Maltese in British service during the period, the earliest being the proposal in February 1795 by a M. de Corn to raise two battalions of Maltese for service in Corsica. In May of that year, however, the Grand Master of the Knights of St. John, endeavouring to preserve Maltese neutrality, forbade overt recruiting, and de Corn's regiment was never formed; but enough Maltese were recruited to form an artillery company in Corsica, which in June 1799 numbered 4 officers and 77 other ranks. It was amalgamated almost at once with French emigrant gunners from Elba (originally from Toulon known variously as the "Compagnie Toulonnaise" or "Company of Toulon Gunners), and later transferred to the larger emigrant corps, Rotalier's Artillery. In early 1800 a corps of Maltese Light Infantry was formed (also known as the "Cacciatori Maltesi"), two companies strong by 1 April, eight by June, but this appears to have been formed on a provincial footing, as no estimate was reported to the House of Commons. In 1801 some 300 Maltese light infantrymen were sent to Elba, and in 1802 the unit was ordered to be reorganized into two battalions, but this was never carried out and the corps was disbanded. Other units included Maltese Militia (formed January 1801, 900 strong), Coastal Artillery, two pioneer corps (one formed 1800 for the expedition in Egypt, the other, the Maltese Military Artificiers, formed 1806 and re-titled Sappers and Miners in 1813), a Veteran Battalion (formed about 1802, four companies strong) and two Provincial Battalions (formed 1802 and amalgamated in 1806 with a strength of 918 of all ranks). The Royal Regiment of Malta was formed in 1805, and numbered some 700 men in 1808. Organized as an ordinary infantry battalion, it served in the unsuccessful defense of Capri in October 1808, where it performed disappointingly; and due to to the difficulty of obtaining suitable recruits, it was disbanded in 1811, leaving the Provincials the principal military unit until 1815, when they were disbanded, and the new Royal Malta Fencible Regiment formed. The Royal Regiment of Malta was formed as a British line regiment, in red with blue facings, and lace apparently like that of the King's German Legion (i.e. for the rank-and-file square ended, white with a blue stripe), the loops evenly spaced. One feature which did distinguish it from the ordinary British infantry uniform appears to have been the design of the shako-plate, being a crowned Garter enclosing a shield bearing the Royal Arms, with a scroll below inscribed "Royal/Malta/Regiment," a shape of plate more often used by British volunteer corps, rather than the almost-rectangular plate of the ordinary infantry. Details of the Maltese units may be found in Historical Records of the Maltese Corps of the British Army, Maj. A.G. Chesney, London 1897; and in History of the Uniforms of the British Army, C.C.P. Lawson, Vol. V, London 1967. An illustrated article, Regiments of Malta" by R.J. Marrion, covering this period, appeared in Military Modeling magazine, April 1990; brief details are also given in "Foreign Regiments in the British Army 1793-1802" C.T. Atkinson, in Journal of the Society for Historical Research Vol XXII (1944), and in the Auxiliaries: Foreign and Miscellaneous Regiments of the British Army 1802-1817", R.L. Yaple, Journal of the Society for Army Historical Research, Vol. L (1972) which, evidently by a misprint, gives the date of disbandment of the Provincial Battalions as 1805). Back to Empire, Eagles, & Lions Table of Contents Vol. 2 No. 5 Back to EEL List of Issues Back to MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 1994 by Emperor's Headquarters This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com