IMPERIAL GUARD HONOR GUARDS FIRST EMPIRE: SOLDIERS OF STRASBOURG CARDBOARD FIGURINE GOUACHE PAINTED BY THE WURTZ FAMILY, SECOND THIRD OF THE 19TH CENTURY, AROUND 1815-1848. 31156-17

IMPERIAL GUARD HONOR GUARDS FIRST EMPIRE: STRASBOURG SOLDIERS FIGURINE OF GOUACHE CARDBOARD painted by the WURTZ family, second half of the 19th century, around 1815-1848. 31156-17

Two cavalrymen, H from the base of the stand to eye level 10.5 cm.
Mounted on a wooden stand.

France.
First half of the 19th century.
Good condition.

PROVENANCE:
Former Wurtz-Pees collection, then Saint-Aubin, and private collection.
Mr. Marcel Saint-Aubin, a collector who became an antiquarian in the interwar period. To my knowledge, no biography or article has ever been published about this individual, who is nonetheless known to collectors and frequently cited in the provenance of historical objects of great quality. Therefore, I will open my archives to shed more light on this great connoisseur:
"Mobilized during the First World War along with his brother in the infantry, the latter was killed at Verdun. Both shared the same taste for military memorabilia; both drew and published their drawings in the magazine 'La Giberne' before 1914.
After the war, he settled as an antiquarian. In 1926, he lived at 108 rue de Ménilmontant (Paris 20th), very far from the favored areas of antiquarians. His choice focused on the specialty that had attracted him for a long time: military curiosities. The spark that led him to this specialty came from his first find: an officer's sabre from the Consulate era, his first beautiful sabre; he called it his 'lucky charm' and always kept it.
The profession of antiquarian allowed Saint-Aubin to see and possess these cherished objects for a time. A keen connoisseur, he never made a mistake, and his clients benefited from his expertise. A passionate researcher, everything he discovered in his life was astonishingly varied. Quiet and modest, he had a way and an art that left an indelible memory with the enthusiasts who knew him.
Like most dealers of military items of that time, Marcel Saint-Aubin did not have a store. He received clients in his apartment, where few objects were displayed and they only occupied a temporary space. Usually, like Paul Jean, he would fetch the items he wanted to sell from the neighboring room and would present them most of the time without saying anything, with a slight smile, or if the presented item was truly exceptional, he would simply say in a low voice 'It's top-notch….'
In June 1940, during the occupation, he left for Guingamp. He returned to Paris and resettled at the end of 1951, in the house he had acquired, 16 rue Henri Pape, in the 13th arrondissement, once again very far from the antique dealers' district.
His love for the items he parted with was evident even in the care he took in packaging them. Very skilled with his hands, he perfectly protected even the most modest piece.
Marcel Saint-Aubin died at the age of 83, taking with him the esteem of all who knew him, leaving behind the memory of a man of great moral values."

HISTORICAL BACKGROUND:
The Strasbourg soldiers are cardboard figurines, "flat" soldiers, cut from rigid cardboard. In most cases, these soldiers are drawn and then printed in sheets to multiply their number more easily.
Christian Blondieau, in his work "Little soldiers of lead, tin, paper, cardboard... 1765-1965 - The collector's guide" Editions Le Képi Rouge Paris 1996, specifies for cardboard soldiers:
"[...] unlike paper soldiers intended more for young people, often colored in a clumsy manner, the cardboard soldier is made for adults and guarantees great uniformological precision, which serves as a basis for our modern documentation...
Why do the small soldiers from Alsace stand out? Because they were mostly created by eyewitnesses of the time or their descendants, and are often contemporary to the era they represent.
During the wars of the Revolution and the Empire, the residents of Strasbourg (a garrison town at the time) saw a large number of soldiers with colorful uniforms passing through their streets on their way to fight in Germany.
This influx of troops, which lasted for more than fifteen years, gave some individuals the idea to 'capture' these beautiful soldiers on paper.
Alsatian authors unanimously cite Benjamin Zix (1772-1811) as the genre's precursor. Leading ahead of Léopold Beyer, the German Geisler, or the Austrian Klein, the Alsatian Zix provides a very realistic aspect of the soldier of the time, as he, being a combatant himself, roamed the battlefields more often armed with a pencil than a rifle. He became a military officer draftsman.
From the peace of 1815 to the war of 1914, the Strasbourg artists continued this need to draw and paint from generation to generation [...]."
During the First Empire, Strasbourg had around 30,000 inhabitants, with a permanent garrison between 6,000 and 10,000 soldiers. This city also served as the passage for countless troops of the Revolution and the Grande Armée heading off to campaigns across the Rhine.
Among all these artists of that period, the three most well-known are: Thiébaut Borerst (incorrectly spelled Boersch) (1782-1824), a baker who started drawing around 1800, nephew of the painter Benjamin Zix, whose collection was auctioned in Angers on March 10, 1971, and whose style is likely the most refined known to us. Eugène Nicollet (1802-1872), who painted his soldiers as early as 1817 (at the age of 15) and continued for 55 years; his collection is kept at the Musée de Compiègne, and his style is more naive. Wurtz, to whom we dedicate a specific paragraph. Paul Schmidt, whose every figurine is annotated with the name of the soldier sketched on the back, this collection held at the Musée de l'Armée in Paris has the characteristic of representing the soldiers of the National Guard of Strasbourg, among others.
Other artists also worked in a similar manner: Frédérik Schmidt (born in 1796). Additionally, names like Édouard Kratz (1803-1885), Schmidt the younger (born in 1824), Théodore Carl (born in 1837) are worth mentioning.

WURTZ-PEEZ COLLECTION (German spelling Würtz):
Wurtz began his documentation under the First Empire thanks to his friend J.P Lévêque, a former surgeon of the Grand Army who had compiled significant documentation on Napoleon's armies. He began making his figurines as early as 1825 with the help of his son and later Pees, his father-in-law. The son continued the production, completing the collection with the help of his father-in-law, Mr. Pees, during the Second Republic (1850); some of the figurines we present bear the date 1848 on the back of the cardboard. These figurines are of very high quality. Edward Ryan in his work "Paper Soldiers the illustrated history of printed paper armies of the 18th, 19th & 20th centuries" (Golden Age Editions, London 1995) writes that they are "the most accurate and comprehensive representation of the troops of the First Empire." Each regiment is depicted in all grades and types of uniforms exhaustively, a rarity in the representations of Strasbourg soldiers.
Frédéric Wurtz, the son of Mr. Wurtz, likely supplemented uniforms he hadn't observed himself with other documentary sources. Following the fall of the Second Empire, he refused to remain in Strasbourg under Prussian occupation and moved to Paris on Boulevard de Clichy, where he ran a pharmacy. Upon his death in 1898, the majority of his collection - nearly 16,000 figurines - was donated to the Musée de l'Armée on October 1, 1899, by his widow and his son, a senior medical officer; the figurines were exhibited there in 1938 and have remained there since. The specialist expert Christian Blondieau considers Wurtz's style to be on par with Nicollet and Kratz.