Even Napoleon I said of them "True, they are paid by our enemies, but they were or should have been bound to the cause of their King. France gave death to their action, and tears to their courage. All devotion is heroic".[citation needed]
1802, Napoleon Bonaparte, First Consul, decreed a general amnesty for all but around a thousand of the Émigrés, with the exception of commanders and those who held ranks in armies hostile to the French Republic.[1]
Raised in Germany in 1792, at Trier, and commanded by marshals de Broglie and de Castries, under the aegis of Louis XVI's brothers, the comte de Provence and duc d'Artois. 10,000 strong, it returned to France beside the army of Brunswick and was dismissed on 24 November 1792, two months after the French victory at Valmy.
Armée de Bourbon
The short-lived Armée de Bourbon was formed by French Émigrés in Madrid and Seville, forming a small standing force of 2000 men, briefly participating in the War of the Pyrenees. Remnants of the force remained in the Spanish Royal Army as the Regiment de Bourbon and other legionary formations until well after 1815, when King Louis XVIII, after the Second Defeat of Napoleon Bonaparte, recalled them from Spanish service.
Engagements: Saint-Étienne-de-Baïgorry (26 April 1794), heavy losses (17 prisoners guillotined); montagnes d’Arquinzun (10 July), heavy losses (30 to 50% of its effective strength); Port-Bidassoa (24 July), heavy losses covering the Spanish retreat (50 captured); Siege of Pamplona (November).
Sent to the front in 1795, then integrated into the Régiment de Bourbon
Légion de Panetier
Creation: 1793
Also known as: Légion de la Reine (d'Espagne) in June 1794
Founder: Comte de Panetier (died January 1794)
Commander: Comte de Panetier, then Général de Santa-Clara
Size: 400; brought up to strength in June 1794 by the companies du Royal-Provence escaping from the Siege of Toulon and the companies du Royal Roussillon
Engagements: Siege of Girona (fell 9 December 1808, 300 captured); Rozas (1808)
Operating within the Spanish army
Still in existence in 1814; formed of foreign soldiers and Gardes Wallonnes, under number 41, then in 1860 became Spain's "53rd infantry regiment", known as El Emigrado.
