Who were the Zouaves? In their day they were better known than the French Foreign Legion, revered by their countrymen as tough, dashing, roistering daredevils -- the heroes of many a hard-fought battle, and the stuff of legend.
Young U.S. Army Captain George B. McClellan, who observed the colorful and exotic fighters in 1855, praised the Zouaves as "The finest light infantry that Europe can produce....the beau-ideal of a soldier." It was not long before American militia units began to adopt the baggy trousers, braided jacket and tasseled fez of these famed Gallic warriors.
Above right, a dying Zouave sketches his name with his blood in "Le Dernier du Bataillon." Jules Monge, 1870
The origins of the Zouaves can be traced to the Zouaoua, a fiercely independent Kabyli tribe living in the rocky hills of Algeria and Morocco. In the summer of 1830 a number of Zouaoua tendered their services to the French colonial army, and in October of that year were organized into two battalions of auxiliaries. Over the following decade these Zouaves -- as the French styled them -- proved their valor in dozens of bloody desert encounters under the command of the intrepid General La Moriciere. Although the Zouave units were increasingly comprised of native Frenchmen, their distinctive uniform remained a derivation of traditional North African dress: A short, collarless jacket; a sleeveless vest (gilet); voluminous trousers (serouel); 12-foot long woolen sash (ceinture); white canvas leggings (guetres); leather greaves (jambieres); and of course the tasseled fez (chechia) and turban (cheche).
The pose of a French Zouave in Tunis in the 1880s, to the right, suggests the elan that was the hallmark of the Zouaves. 
In 1852, President Louis Napoleon, soon to become Emperor Napoleon III, ordered the Zouaves restructured into three regiments of the regular French Army. They were now made up entirely of Frenchmen. Henceforth Algerians and Moroccans would be assigned to units of the Tirailleurs Algeriens, or Turcos, as they were popularly known, and would wear their own distinctive light blue version of the Zouave uniform. In 1855 the Emperor created a fourth Zouave regiment from the best soldiers of the other three, and assigned it to his Imperial Guard. Each unit of Zouaves was distinguished by the color of the false pocket, or tombeau, on the front of the blue jacket: red for the 1st, white for the 2nd and blue for 3rd Zouaves. The Zouaves of the Imperial Guard sported yellow rather than red trim on their uniforms, and their tassels were likewise yellow rather than the blue of the other units.
To the left above, a Zouave of the Imperial Guard, 1860. From the Musee de l'Armee, Paris.
The Crimean War of 1854-55 confirmed the fighting reputation of the French Zouaves, and their exploits were widely publicized in European and North American journals. At the battle of the Alma on September 20, 1854, Zouaves scaled a precipitous ridge and captured the Russian position, impressing even their stolid British allies with their rapid light infantry tactics and prowess with the bayonet. In the engagement at Inkermann on November 5, the 3rd Zouaves lost heavily in a hand to hand grapple with their Russian assailants, and Zouaves also served at Balaclava, where the English Light Brigade made its famous charge. But it was in the protracted and costly siege of the fortress city of Sebastopol that the colorful warriors won immortal renown. On June 7, 1855, more than 500 Zouaves fell taking the earthwork known as Mamelon Vert at the point of the bayonet. Three months later, on September 8, Marshal MacMahon personally led soldiers of the 1st Zouaves in a charge that overran the Malakoff, a strongpoint that was the linchpin of the Russian defenses.
Left, Zouaves seize the Malakoff at Sebastopol, in "L'Assaut du Zouave" by Horace Vernet.
In 1859 Zouaves played a gallant part as France and Piedmont/Sardinia warred with Austria for control of northern Italy. In the bloody battle of Magenta on June 4, the Zouaves of the Imperial Guard earned 10 crosses of the Legion of Honor and 50 Military Medals. Among the recipients of the latter award was Madame Rossini, the regiment's female provisioner, or cantiniere; the first woman to be decorated with the Medaille Militaire. After the fight, the Emperor placed his own Legion of Honor on the gilt eagle and colors of the 2nd Zouaves, as testimony to their valor. In the June 24, 1859 battle of Solferino, the decisive engagement of the Italian campaign, Zouaves spearheaded an assault that pierced the Austrian lines and turned the fight in favor of France and her Italian allies.
To the right, return of the French Zouaves from the Italian campaign, 1859. By Edouard Detaille
From 1860 to 1867 Zouaves saw a variety of service, much of it under rugged conditions and against merciless opponents in Africa and Mexico. While America was distracted by Civil War, France sought to shore up the puppet government of Emperor Maximilian in a losing battle against the Mexican forces of Benito Juarez. Little quarter was asked or given, and combats like the assault on Puebla furthered the Zouaves' reputation as ferocious shock troops.
Left, the last stand of the 3rd Zouaves at Worth, August 6, 1870
The Franco-Prussian War of 1870-71 was a dark page in French history, and ended with the destruction of the Second Empire. Zouave battalions were bloodied in the battles of Worth, Mars La Tour, Gravelotte, and in the siege of Paris.
But even after the surrender and abdication of Napoleon III, Zouaves continued to battle in the ranks of the Republican armies. A detachment of Papal Zouaves was dispatched by Pius IX to aid France in the conflict, and suffered heavy losses in the clash at Loigny on December 2, 1870. Despite the disastrous result of the war, the Zouaves took solace in the fact that they had been both respected and feared by their German adversaries.
But the colorful Zouave uniforms did not long survive the next major European conflict. The bloodbath of the First World War sounded the death-knell of 19th century military finery, with all its notions of swashbuckling bravado and glory. In the summer and autumn of 1914 some Zouave battalions lost as many as 800 men in a single charge -- gaudy formations futilely hurling themselves into German artillery and machine gun fire. By mid-1915 the dark blue-and-red uniforms of the French infantry had been replaced with more practical horizon blue, the red kepi giving way to a steel helmet. The colonial troops, including the Zouaves, were issued somber hues of mustard brown, as camouflage not color, became the standard dress of armies throughout the world. With that final page in their illustrious record, the Zouave uniform passed into the pages of history.
Les ZousZous, confronting machine guns with chivalry, fade into history in 1914.
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Company A, 5th Regiment, New York State Volunteers Duryee Zouaves, Inc.
