Spahi
The modern French Army retains one regiment of Spahis as an armoured unit, with personnel now recruited in mainland France.
[1] Following the French occupation of Algiers in 1830, detachments of locally recruited irregular horsemen were attached to the regiments of light cavalry assigned to North African service.
A detachment of Spahis served as the personal escort of Marshal Jacques Leroy de Saint Arnaud in the Crimean War and were photographed there by Roger Fenton.
[4] A serious uprising against French rule in Algeria during 1871–72 was sparked off by a mutiny of the 5th squadron of the 3rd Spahis, who had been ordered to France to reinforce those units already there.
[6] While a visually conspicuous presence in any French military force, the Spahis usually served in small detachments as scouts, skirmishers and escorts.
During their period as mounted cavalry the Spahis comprised for the most part Arab and Berber troopers commanded by French officers.
In contrast to the North African tirailleur (infantry) units the mounted spahis were drawn from "the big tents": i.e. the higher social classes of the Arab and Berber communities.
The expanded and mechanised regiment served in Egypt, Libya and Tunisia, and was part of the French forces that liberated Paris in August 1944.
In the course of World War II most Spahi regiments were mechanised, but several squadrons remained mounted for patrol work in North Africa[13] plus escort and other ceremonial duties in France itself.
Until 1961 the annual Bastille Day parade in Paris always featured Spahi cavalry in their traditional dress uniforms, on white Arabian horses.
While Arab and Berber troopers continued to make up the bulk of numbers in the mounted units retained, mechanisation led to French personnel becoming a majority in the armoured regiments.
Except for one mounted platoon per squadron and the regimental fanfare (trumpeters) the unit was finally mechanized in 1961 and its several hundred horses either sold in Algeria or shipped back to France.
The 1er Spahis are currently based in Valence, the French department of Drôme, 100 km (62 mi) south of Lyon, in the Rhone Valley, or what is commonly referred to in France as The Doors of Provence.
[22] From 1915, in common with other units of the Armée d'Afrique, a more practical khaki uniform was adopted for service,[11][23] but the classic red and blue tenue orientale with white burnous reappeared for parade and off-duty wear in 1927.
The mounted squadrons retained for ceremonial duties wore a slightly modified version of this parade uniform, with a plain white turban, until they were disbanded in 1962.
The modern 1er Spahis still wear the traditional white burnous and red sash, together with the blue cloaks of the former Moroccan regiments, for full dress.
[28] Senegal maintains a mounted cavalry detachment of spahi origin as its modern presidential security unit and ceremonial guard.
The Senegalese Spahis saw extensive active service in the French West African territories of Tchad, the Sudan and the Congo between 1853 and 1898, as well as serving in Morocco between 1908 and 1919.
The Italian Spahis differed from their French namesakes in that their prime role was that of mounted police, tasked with patrolling rural and desert areas.
