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4th Continental Light Dragoons 4th Legionary Corps | |
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Active | 1777-1783 |
Allegiance | Continental Congress of the United States |
Type | Dragoon |
Size | regiment of six troops 116 men in 1781 |
Part of | Continental Army |
Nickname(s) | Moylan's Horse |
Colors | scarlet coats faced with blue (1777) green coats faced red (1778) blue coats faced red (1782) |
Engagements | Battle of Norwalk, Battle of Brandywine, Battle of Germantown, Battle of Guilford Court House, Siege of Yorktown. |
The 4th Continental Light Dragoons, also known as Moylan's Horse, was raised on January 5, 1777, at Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, for service with the Continental Army under Colonel Stephen Moylan. The regiment was known for taking the field in captured British scarlet coats, as noted in a letter from George Washington to Colonel Moylan dated May 12, 1777, in which Moylan was directed to have his uniforms dyed to avoid confusion with British dragoons. The regiment changed to green coats faced in red during the summer of 1778, with Tarleton helmets (black leather helmets in the style associated with Banastre Tarleton).
The regiment saw action at the Battle of Brandywine and the Battle of Germantown in their scarlet uniforms, and at the Battle of Guilford Court House and the Siege of Yorktown in their more familiar green coats. The regiment was furloughed on June 11, 1783, at Philadelphia and disbanded on November 15, 1783.
William Washington was a cavalry officer of the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War, who held a final rank of brigadier general in the newly created United States after the war. Primarily known as a commander of light dragoons, he led mounted troops in a number of notable battles in the Carolinas during the campaigns of 1780 and 1781.
Sir Banastre Tarleton, 1st Baronet was a British general and politician. He is best known as the lieutenant colonel leading the British Legion at the end of the American Revolution. He later served in Portugal and held commands in Ireland and England.
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The 2nd Continental Light Dragoons, also known as Sheldon's Horse after Colonel Elisha Sheldon, was commissioned by the Continental Congress on 12 December 1776, and was first mustered at Wethersfield, Connecticut, in March 1777 for service with the Continental Army. The regiment consisted of four troops from Connecticut, one troop each largely from Massachusetts and New Jersey, and two companies of light infantry.
Red coat, also referred to as redcoat or scarlet tunic, is a military garment formerly much used by British infantry servicemen, so customarily that the term became a common synecdoche for the servicemen themselves.
The uniforms of the British Army currently exist in twelve categories ranging from ceremonial uniforms to combat dress. Uniforms in the British Army are specific to the regiment to which a soldier belongs. Full dress presents the most differentiation between units, and there are fewer regimental distinctions between ceremonial dress, service dress, barrack dress and combat dress, though a level of regimental distinction runs throughout.
Stephen Moylan was an Irish-American patriot leader during the American Revolutionary War. He had several positions in the Continental Army, including Muster-Master General, Secretary and Aide to General George Washington, 2nd Quartermaster General, Commander of the Fourth Continental Light Dragoons, and Commander of the Cavalry of the Continental Army.
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The Queen's Own Yorkshire Dragoons was a yeomanry regiment of the British Army in existence from 1794 to 1956. It was formed as a volunteer cavalry force in 1794 during the French Revolutionary Wars. Its volunteer companies played an active role with the Imperial Yeomanry in the Second Boer War, but opportunities for mounted action were much more restricted during the First World War and it was temporarily converted into a cycle unit. It remained a cavalry regiment throughout the interwar years, and was the last horsed unit of the British Army to see action, in the Syria–Lebanon Campaign of 1941, finally mechanising the following year. It served as motorised infantry in the North African and Italian campaigns of the Second World War. In 1956, it merged with the Yorkshire Hussars and the East Riding of Yorkshire Yeomanry to form the Queen's Own Yorkshire Yeomanry. Its lineage is continued today by A Squadron, the Queen's Own Yeomanry.
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