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GRENADIER

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Originally appearing in Volume V12, Page 579 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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GRENADIER , originally a soldier whose See also:

special See also:duty it was to throw See also:hand-grenades. The latter were in use fora considerable See also:time before any special organization was given to the troops who were to use them. In 1667 four men per See also:company in the See also:French See also:Regiment du Roi were trained with grenades (See also:siege of See also:Lille), and in 1668–167o grenadier companies were formed in this regiment and in about See also:thirty others of the French See also:line. See also:Evelyn, in his See also:Diary, tells us that on the 29th of See also:June 1678 he saw at See also:Hounslow " a new sort of soldiers called granadiers, who were dexterous in flinging hand-granades." As in the See also:case of the fusiliers, the French practice was therefore quickly copied in See also:England. Eventually each See also:English See also:battalion had a grenadier company (see for illustrations Archaeological See also:Journal, See also:xxiii. 222, and xlvii. 321-324). Besides their grenades and the firelock, grenadiers carried axes which, with the grenades, were employed in the See also:assault of fortresses, as we are told in the celebrated See also:song, " The See also:British Grenadiers." The grenadier companies were formed always of the most powerful men in the regiment and, when the See also:grenade ceased to be used, they maintained their existence as the " crack " companies of their battalions, taking the right of the line on See also:parade and wearing the distinctive grenadier headdress. This See also:system was almost universal, and the typical See also:infantry regiment of the 18th and See also:early loth See also:century had a grenadier and a See also:light company besides its " line " companies. In the British and other armies these elite companies were frequently taken from their regiments and combined in grenadier and light infantry battalions for special service, and See also:Napoleon carried this practice still further in the French See also:army by organizing brigades and divisions of grenadiers (and correspondingly of voltigeurs). Indeed -the companies thus detached from t he line practically never returned to it, and this was attended with serious evils, for the battalion at the outbreak of See also:war lost perhaps a See also:quarter of its best men, the See also:average men only remaining with the line. This specialorganization of grenadiers and light companies lasted in the British army until about 1858.

In the Prussian service the grenadiers became permanent and See also:

independent battalions about 1740, and the See also:gradual See also:adoption of the four-company battalion by See also:Prussia and other nations tended still further to See also:place the grenadiers by themselves and apart from the line. Thus at the See also:present See also:day in See also:Germany, See also:Russia and other countries, the See also:title of "grenadiers" is See also:borne by line regiments, indistinguishable, except for details of See also:uniform and often the esprit de See also:corps inherited from the old elite companies, from the See also:rest. In the British service the only grenadiers remaining are the Grenadier See also:Guards, originally the 1st regiment of See also:Foot Guards, which was formed in 166o on the See also:nucleus of a regiment of English royalists which followed the fortunes of See also:Charles II. in See also:exile. In Russia a whole army corps (headquarters See also:Moscow), inclusive of its See also:artillery See also:units, bears the title. The special headdress of the grenadier was a pointed cap, with See also:peak and flaps, of embroidered See also:cloth, or a loose See also:fur cap of similar' shape; both these were light See also:field service caps. The fur cap has in the course of time See also:developed into the tall " bearskin " worn by British guards and various corps of other armies; the embroidered field cap survives, transformed, however, into a heavy See also:brass headdress, in the uniform of the 1st Prussian Foot Guards, the 1st Prussian Guard Grenadiers and the See also:Russian See also:Paul (Pavlovsky) Grenadier Guards.

End of Article: GRENADIER

Additional information and Comments

The word Grenadier comes from the Spanish Granada which in Spanish means Pomegranate.The pomegranate fruit was allowed to dry out, the seeds removed the gun powder and stone or metal were poured in through the stem The word "Grenadier" comes from the spanish word Granada, apart from being a spanish town it is also the spanish for pomegranate. The fruit of this tree was dried out the seeds removed to be replaced with gun powder and sharp objects. A rope fuse was pushed into the stem and sealed with wax. From Granada we get the word Grenade.
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