At the end of the 18th century, military strategy was based on manoeuvres such as encirclement, pursuit and flanking, as well as a combination of shock and fire attacks. While the fire of the infantry and artillery and the shock of the heavy cavalry can be assigned, the dragoon regiments occupied a special position in battle. In most cases, dragoons were deployed at the front and often mixed with heavy cavalry divisions, with which they formed a powerful shock force. Sometimes they fought at the forefront of the light cavalry, thus contributing to the manoeuvres. After all, they were able to fight both on foot and on horseback and, like the infantry, hold a position to which they were sent. It was precisely these principles that were decisive for Napoleon's establishment of 30 dragoon regiments within the Grande Armée. In his work, which appeared in the cavalry magazine between 1887 and 1892 and was compiled here for the first time, Commander de Juzancourt (1845-1896) tells the story of each individual dragoon regiment back to its origins among the mounted troops formed under Louis XIII and Louis XIV. Based on the changes and new formations during the Revolution and the First Empire, he then traces the history through the people until their disbandment in 1815. However, from the Second Restoration onwards, new regiments were formed that had no direct connection to the previous ones. The Précis then recounts their development throughout the 19th century up to the early years of the Third Republic, based on the sequence of numbers.
