The Cent-gardes Squadron (French: L'Escadron des Cent-gardes), also called Cent Gardes à Cheval (Hundred Guardsmen on Horseback), was an elite cavalry squadron of the Second French Empire primarily responsible for protecting the person of the Emperor Napoleon III, as well as providing security within the Tuileries Palace.

Napoleon III however had a farm built in the Swiss-style to lodge the Cent-gardes squadron and their horses in the new Pavillon des Cent-guardes in Marnes-la-Coquette, near the castle, in the area of Villeneuve-l'Étang.

On Palace guard duty, the Cent-gardes were issued with a surcoat of fine chamois cloth, decorated with gold braid on the chest' and embroidered with the Imperial coat of arms.

[3] Their weapons consisted of a snap-clasped[clarification needed] Treuille-de-Beaulieu breech-loading falling-block pinfire carbine, 9 mm caliber, unusual in that it fired from an open bolt.

The straight cavalry sword issued to Cent-Gardes could be fixed to this carbine as a sword-bayonet, forming together a monstrous, more than 2 meters long fusil-lance (pictured here).

The Cent-gardes escorted the Emperor during the Second Italian War of Independence at Magenta and Solferino where Verly, serving in the field as commander, was wounded in his arm.