Imperial and Royal Uhlans


Together with the Dragoons and Hussars, the Imperial and Royal Uhlans, made up the cavalry of the Austro-Hungarian Army from 1867 to 1918, both in the Common Army and in the Austrian Landwehr, where they were known as the Imperial-Royal Landwehr Uhlans.
The Austrian monarchy, weakened by the losing the war against Prussia in 1866, had to effectively guarantee the autonomy of Kingdom of Hungary in the so-called Compromise of 15 March 1867. As a result, the Hungarian half of the Empire immediately began to establish its own army, the Royal Hungarian Landwehr.
Following the signing of the Compromise, the Austrian half of the Empire also started to build an army, the Imperial-Royal Landwehr. The two new Landwehr forces thus existed alongside the Common Army, the imperial army of the whole Empire. In effect this meant that Austria-Hungary had three separate armies at the same time.

Organisation

The Common Army has 11 Uhlan regiments and the Austria Landwehr 6 regiments. By tradition the majority of Uhlans were recruited from the Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria. The regiments were also stationed there, with few exceptions.