QLI marking on butt tang

[boltaction]

I have been going through my cabinets cleaning stuff out, and was looking at a Brown Bess India Pattern I have had for a few years. It has QLI F 47 on the buttplate tang, in the British unit assignation style. I did a Google search and hit on a Brown Bess bayonet in the Niagara Museum which also has a QLI on the tang, that one H company, so clearly it was some regiment which spent time around Eastern Canada. They don't have any more information on what it means. I am assuming it is a British regiment which was here during the time of the war of 1812, but I can't find any such record. I was thinking maybe Queen's Light Infantry, except it wasn't a Queen on the throne at that time and there doesn't seem to be such a thing that I can find. Quebec didn't have a Light Infantry at that time that I can find. Most of the Canadian/colonial units at that time were volunteer militias (Lunenburg, Sunbury, etc) and branded their muskets on the wood of the stock.

I wondered about Australian units but don't see one which matches either, and nor would that explain how it got to Canada. I don't find anything in Manarey's Handbook of Identification Marks on Canadian Arms either.

Anyone got any ideas what this might mean?

Thanks!

Ed

Information

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[green]

Once a Regimental gets a name it sticks. There are several Kings Regts extant even though ERII has been here for a long time.
Probably a Queens Regt.

[boltaction]

I did consider that, except in the late 1700-early 1800's the last time there had been an independent Queen in England was maybe Queen Anne? After she died in 1714, there were a series of George's......

Ed

[muffett.2008]

Quebec Light Infantry?

[boltaction]

I considered that but I don't find a record of such a thing. The military units of Quebec and militia tended to have French names, such as the Voltigeurs. It remains a mystery....

Cheers

Ed

[muffett.2008]

QLI was a Canadian Force in 1815, a pic of 1st Company soldier 1839 exists, alamy image J98GFF.

[boltaction]

Interesting! Thanks. I see that photo. Odd that the handbook of the Marks of the Canadian Regiments has no such entry. A deeper search indicates it was a short lived group hastily raised as a Loyalist force in the rebellion of 1837. It seems to have been disbanded reasonably shortly thereafter. It is conceivable they would have been issued Brown Bess muskets but hard to say if they would have been engraved. However, it is a lead.
ed

[Sunray]

"...regiment which spent time around Eastern Canada..." That'd be nearly every line regiment in the British Army at one time or another. There's a list in Fort York in Toronto.
"...wasn't a Queen on the throne at that time..." That has nothing to do with a Regiment's name. The King's wife is still The Queen. She just isn't the Sovereign. The Queen's Own Rifles don't change to the King's Own Rifles when there's a King on the throne.
There is/was a Queen's Regiment Light Infantry. Now the 3rd Batt. The Royal Scots. Brit militia though. Brits had a huge amalgamation of Regiments After W.W. II and into the 1960's. Hordes of regiments literally disappeared.
"...Marks of the Canadian Regiments..." Highly unlikely to be a Canadian Regiment.

[boltaction]

Right.......except, when for instance did the Queen's Own Rifles get their name? When there was a Queen on the throne--Victoria. Had the regiment been formed when say King George the whichever was on the throne, they would have been called the King's Own Rifles, and that name would stick. So, back to the original question--what regiment would have been extant in 1795-1815 which would have had a QLI with the Q relating to a Queen? I do not find a reference to such a regiment. The Edinburgh or Queen's Regiment of Light Infantry was as you say a militia battalion, formed as part of the Royal Scots which is a very old British regiment from the early 1600's. That 3rd militia battalion though as best I can tell was formed around 1887, under Victoria's reign and they would of course have been using Martini's by then.

It may have been a local colonial unit I suppose, although those marks were usually branded on the stock, not the tang, or some local or old marking for a regiment which didn't exist for long. Nice musket regardless; it would be interesting if these old girls could talk!

Ed

[browningautorifle]

Nice musket regardless;

We could stand to see some pics of this "Brown Bess India pattern"...if you could. Last I saw was a cut down that came from King's mountain in Cape Breton. It found it's way with a man that came and settled the area back when Louisburg was a going concern.