Italian Battalion Rifleman, 1799-1800

On 18 August the Conscription Act was passed, with an initial contingent of 18,000 men drawn from 5 classes (1777 – 1781) and a reserve of 60,000 to be raised with 5 annual contingents of 12,000. Within each class, the last born were enrolled first, in descending order of date of birth; only children of a living father or a widowed mother, those who already had a brother in the army and those who married after the publication of the law were listed last in their class with the same birth order and would be the last to be possibly called. Finally, there was provision for exemption from conscription for various categories: the discharged; the married who had contracted marriage before the publication of the law; widowers with children; and finally the ministers of the state religion (Catholic), promoted at least to the first of the major orders. A special legal title, the third, then dealt with the “requisition”, i.e. the effective leverage of the number of men necessary to complete the army.