French mercenaries in the Royalist army

[wdrenth]

dear all,

Not an expert on military matters of the English Civil Wars, I was triggered by a reference to the employment of French mercenaries in the Royalist army between 1643 and 1645. This is stated in 'The Civil Wars. A Military History of England, Scotland and Ireland 1638--1660', edited by John Kenyon and Jane Ohlmeyer, on page 105 in Ian Gentles chapter on the Civil Wars in England. The related note refers to an unpublished thesis.

So I am curious if this statement is correct, i.e., this Charles employ French troops.
And if this is true, I would be interested in details of these foreign troops: what was the treaty between Charles and Louis for these troops, how many of them where there, what was the composition, etc. I tried Google on this, but surprisingly little comes forward.

kind regards, Wienand

[simon boulton]

I don’t think there were actual regiments of French troops in the Royalist army, having Catholics in the army in small numbers was controversial enough, but whole regiments of foreign Catholics would have been very dangerous for the royalist cause. What I think is more likely is that certain regiments may have contained a high percentage of French volunteers or mercenaries. The Queens regiments of Horse and Foot are said to have contained a number of Frenchman.