About Mitteilungen (English)

Volunteers of Infanty Regiment Kolberg 1813/14, Illustration by R. Knötel

About Knoetel´s Notes on the History of the Military Costume

Introduction

I publish here a table of contents of Richard and Herbert Knoetel´s "Notes on the History of the Military Costume" (Mittheilungen zur Geschichte der militärischen Tracht) [1]. The Notes were a supplement to the "Uniform Science" (Uniformenkunde: Lose Blätter zur Geschichte der Entwicklung der militärischen Tracht, 1890-1921) by the same authors, which includes 1.072 colour plates with uniform illustrations. My motivation to present this is threefold: Firstly, I wanted to create an easy access to the wealth of information which is distributed over the Notes. Secondly, I wanted to let other people benefit from my work, similar to the offers by John Schneider, Fons Libert, and other people in the field. Thirdly, I wanted to make the English speaking community familiar with the contributions from the German literature, especially in this case, were I publish something on the inventor of the (auxiliary) science of uniforms.

Of course, this work is based on the previous work of other people. I want to acknowledge here Dr. Jürgen Kraus, who published a (more concise) table of contents of the Notes in the "Zeitschrift für Heereskunde" magazine in 1982 [2]. He and the editors of this magazine allowed me to exploit this work here. Another, very short, country index was included in the 1982 reprint of the Notes, edited by W. Spemann, Stuttgart. Additionally, the table of contents of the illustrations of the "Uniform Science", edited by J. Olmes in 1972 [3], was a valuable source for my work.

The new contribution of my table of contents is that I included all the authors of the submitted articles and postings included in the Notes. Further on, I provide a detailed index for the three grand manuscripts which were originally published in the Notes: Manuscript of Elberfeld, Manuscript of Freiberg, and the works of Christoph Suhr, a Hamburg illustrator and engraver. Additionally, this electronic, WWW-based medium offers all the advantages of electronic media, particularly for retrieval and reuse. Eventually, sometimes the full text of the Notes may be published here (it is currently copyrighted, since there was a reprint in 1982 by W. Spemann) ...

Richard and Herbert Knoetel

I can give here only a short sketch of the biographies of Richard and Herbert Knoetel Junior. Richard Knoetel, born 1857, can be considered as the founder of the auxiliary science of uniforms. His main production, the "Uniform Science" ("Uniformenkunde", 1890-1921) can be seen as the first attempt to provide an overall view on the development of uniforms from the middle of the 17th to the beginning of the 20th century. This work has been later complementary supplemented by the "Short Handbook of Uniform Science", edited by Herbert Knoetel Jun. and Herbert Sieg in 1937 [4]. Richard Knoetel was custos of the major Prussian historical museum´s (called the "Zeughaus", in Berlin) collection. Moreover, he illustrated many books [5, 6] and produced a lot of historical paintings, for example for the officers canteen of the 1st Life Hussars in Danzig. Richard Knoetel did not see the interruption of the edition of the Notes due to World War I, since he died in the beginning of the tragic year 1914. Herbert Knoetel Jun. tried to continue the Notes, the work of his father, after returning from WW I in 1919, but was forced to stop this project due to the economic crisis in 1921.

Addendum and Acknowledgement

I tried to keep the original style as much as possible but I had to correct the text in some cases in order to save its homogenity. The three German clerical states (Cologne, Mayence, Trier) and the three Anhalt states (Anhalt-Bernburg, -Dessau, -Köthen) are presented in one group each, since they belong together. Within each country I tried to keep the following order: universal articles, marschalls/generals, guard units, line infantry, cavalry, artillery, and others. I got the best printing results with Microsoft´s Internet Explorer, where I changed in the "Print..." dialog the Properties / Graphics / Colour mix to "fine" and the printing density to 200%. Don´t hesitate to contact me if you have questions or comments regarding the Notes. If there is anything particularly interesting for you, I will try to summarize the article in the Napoleon Series Discussion Forum.

Beside the people already mentioned, I would like to thank John Schneider, Rolf Eckstein, Oliver Schmidt, and Alexander Baden for their support. Nevertheless all faults are mine.

Literature

1. Knoetel, R. und H. Knoetel, Mittheilungen zur Geschichte der militärischen Tracht. 1892-1921, Rathenow: M. Babenzien. Reprint 1982, Stuttgart: Verlag W. Spemann.

2. Kraus, J., Mittheilungen zur Geschichte der militärischen Tracht. Beilagen zu Bd. III-XVIII (1892-1914/21) der "Uniformenkunde". Gesamtverzeichnis .Teil 2. Zeitschrift für Heereskunde, 1982 (Mai/Juni): S. B-33 - B-35.

3. Olmes, J., Uniformenkunde. Gesamtverzeichnis. 1972, Krefeld: Heere der Vergangenheit.

4. Knoetel, H. und H. Sieg, Farbiges Handbuch der Uniformkunde. 1996, Augsburg: Bechtermünz.

5. Röchling, C., R. Knoetel, und W. Friedrich, Die Königin Luise in 50 Bildern für Jung und Alt. 1896, Berlin: Paul Kittel. Reprint 1981, Darmstadt: Agora.

6. Müller-Bohn, H., et al., Die deutschen Befreiungskriege. Deutschland Geschichte von 1806-1815. ca. 1913, Berlin: Paul Kittel.