Senegalese Tirailleurs

Common card · No. 250321

The Senegalese Tirailleurs (French: Tirailleurs Sénégalais) were a corps of colonial infantry in the French Army. They were initially recruited from Saint-Louis, Senegal, the initial colonial capital city of French West Africa and subsequently throughout Western, Central and Eastern Africa (the main sub-Saharan regions of the French colonial empire). The noun tirailleur, which translates variously as 'skirmisher', 'rifleman', or 'sharpshooter', was a designation given by the French Army to indigenous infantry recruited in the various colonies and overseas possessions of the French Empire during the 19th and 20th centuries. Despite recruitment not being limited to Senegal, and including regiments from French Soudan (contemporary Mali), these infantry units took on the adjective sénégalais since that was where the first black African Tirailleur regiment had been formed. The first Senegalese Tirailleurs were formed in 1857 and by the 1930s, men from territories like Chad and Gabon also comprised...

Read on Wikipedia · Image Unknown authorUnknown author, Public domain