Did line infantry units have designated marksmen?

Question

I've found the picture below on the TotalWar game series forum, but doing the reverse image search, shows that it is actually quite popular (however, I couldn't find the author or the title):

It depicts a Prussian line infantry unit marching towards enemy. My (actually pretty silly question) is: why is the soldier at the bottom left of the drawing shooting during the march without waiting for the command from the officer?

The Wikipedia article on line infantry says:

The soldiers were supposed to fire volleys at the command of officers, but in practice this happened only in the first minutes of the battle. After one or two volleys, each soldier charged a musket and fired at his own discretion, without hearing the commands of the officers.

Line tactics required a strict discipline and simple movements, practiced to the point where they became second-nature. During training, the drill and corporal punishments were widely used.

However, this scene takes place before the unit has "connected" with the enemy: the officer is in front of the soldiers and the front row is marching instead of kneeling. So why are the two soldiers on the bottom left already shooting/reloading after the shot?

Is it

1. Artistic licence - such thing would never happen in a disciplined Prussian army (at least not so early in the battle), but it shows nicely how the line infantry works?
2. Just two undisciplined soldiers that can't wait for the fight and shoot prematurely?
3. Some sort of marksmen expected to shoot from the greater distance?

If indeed the 3rd answer is correct - was it a common practice to have such snipers attached to a regular unit? Were they armed differently than the rest of the squad? While the smooth-bore muskets are horrible to be used in marksmanship, there were already in use proper rifles, such as the German Jager rifle or British Baker rifle. I know about designated UNITS of sharpshooters (like the British Green Jackets), but this doesn't seem the case.

Answer 1

why is the soldier at the bottom left of the drawing shooting during the march without waiting for the command from the officer?

He's waiting for a severe punishment from his sergeant.

In that period marksmanship was something rare. Muskets are notoriously inaccurate. Most muskets don't have sights (there was really no need for them), and especially the Prussian army fired from the hip.

The idea was to let an entire regiment fire simultaneously on an opposing regiment. Usually you hit something. If within range. Shooting at anything over 100 meters was hopefully optimistic. Even if one regiment fired on another regiment.

The illustration is created with what is called artistic licence. The uniforms are pretty decent, but the action is anything but. Why would a drummer walk in the front line? That's one musket less for shooting, and a more valuable target (the drummer) needlessly exposed.

Muskets in the era didn't have rifling. The bullet was round, fitted not too close in the barrel. A tight fit would help with the accuracy, but at the cost of reloading speed. Which wasn't particularly fast to begin with. So, the musket couldn't be accurate. That's why it didn't have sights, or at best a front sight only. And it's the reason why entire regiments shot at other regiments. You needed that many muskets to shoot at such a large target in order to hit something.

Your main question was: did line regiments have designated marksmen?

Not really. Many regiments had a grenadier and light infantry company, which were elite. Or at least better than average. The light infantry you can see as 'marksmen', but most were armed with the same muskets as the rest of the battalion. Those infantrymen (I wouldn't call them marksmen) had the same limitations as other infantry, but they could aim at their targets.

There were specialized rifle companies and regiments, such as the 95th Rifles, 60th Rifles (British Army), Jaeger battalions in the Austrian and Prussian army and similar units with rifled guns. Those units were much better and sometimes used for sniping. They usually worked independent of line infantry units. Not as a part of the line infantry. French Voltigeurs were light infantry, not equipped with rifles but standard muskets. They were not riflemen, just better trained (?) regular infantry with a different title.

Those real riflemen (voltigeurs and Jaegers with non rifled muskets aren't riflemen) were elite units. Which automatically means: there were not a lot of them.

Answer 2

This picture is from a boxed set of figures (Zvezda's Prussian Grenadiers of Frederick the Great) and is illustrating the figures within. It shouldn't be taken as an accurate representation of the subjects in action!

Answer 3

Expanding on Jos’ answer:

This is a modern military illustration of a weapons system in action. This is not a great example: line infantry is only shown in battle line march and fire. The ancillary musicians are at the front to allow reenactors and modellers better view of their different dress and kit. The man firing and the man loading also illustrate the diversity of the weapons system. Ideally they would also be shown in rout, retreat, square, bayonet charge / receipt, charge column and column route march. However the illustrator has failed to depict the full some diversity of the system.

Answer 4

Picture is plausible with certain limitations

It is usually assumed that infantry organization in Napoleonic times was based on regiments (and cavalry on squadrons) . Although mostly true, it should not be taken for granted that all companies in a regiment were uniformly armed, trained and equipped.

For example, in British Army during Napoleonic wars each regiment would have nominally one company of light infantry. Russian Army usually did have uniform infantry regiments (grenadier, musketeer or jager, with jagers(hunters) being trained as light infantry) . However, they would occasionally deploy parts of musketeer or grenadier regiments as skirmishers, when circumstances pressed them to do so. Prussian Army, most interesting in this case, stood somewhere between British and Russian system. They too had dedicated jager regiments, but they usually dispersed them throughout the army in battalion or company formations. Interestingly enough, their musketeer or grenadier regiments did have their own platoon or company of Schützen which were specially trained sharpshooters.

Picture in question therefore could be plausible, with skirmishers accompanying line infantry, with one possible flaw: jagers(light infantry) usually had different uniform then grenadiers. In this case soldier kneeling is clearly wearing grenadier hat, while jagers usually had much less colorful uniforms and hats, to remain hidden in forests. Therefore, he is not a jager, but grenadier like rest of them, maybe specially selected (Schutzen) and trained to act as skirmisher in case jagers are not available.

Answer 5

I don't know what historical time the picture refers to. Most of the answers assume the Napoleonic era. However, according to Alexander Pushkin's depiction of a Battle of Poltava (Canto the Third, line 159)

> The marksmen fill the scattered brush.

the marksmanship was a common tactics as back as 1709. Pushkin was a very accurate historian. In any case, by the time of writing (1828) the mention of marksmen did not surprise anybody.

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Russian original:

> В кустах рассыпались стрелки