Horse Carabiniers

Emperor Napoleon I had inherited his Horse Carabiniers regiments from the Ancien Regime. Considered elite soldiers, the troopers would wear (until 1810) a uniform fairly similar to the uniform of the Horse Grenadiers of the Imperial Guard (blue coat and bearskin) and like them would also ride black horses (another sign of the unit being considered an elite one). As a result, the Horse Carabiniers were sometimes mistaken by the enemy for the Horse Grenadiers of the Guard.

After 1810, the two units (both elite troops although the carabiniers were never part of the Imperial Guard during the First French Empire) would become much easier to tell apart as Napoleon decided to adorn his carabiniers with one of the most outlandish military outfits of the Napoleonic times, if not ever: white uniform, gilded cuirass and gilded helmet topped by a big red plume (called chenille, French for caterpillar).

Equipped with this new armour, the carabiniers would become the other armoured cavalry unit of the French army alongside the cuirassiers (another elite unit) on whose cuirass and helmet the carabiniers' were copied. It's to differentiate clearly cuirassiers and carabiniers that it was decided to cover the latter's cuirass with a sheet of brass and give them a helmet of the same colour. 

The Horse Carabiniers were armed with a carbine (some sources say that it was later abandoned altogether) and a long straight sword of the model already in use in other heavy cavalry units such as the cuirassiers or the Horse Grenadiers of the Imperial Guard.

As was already the case with the cuirassiers, the carabinier trumpeters, riding grey horses, would not wear a cuirass (below on the left an ordinary trooper and on the right a trumpeter).

While serving on foot, such as during guard duty, the carabiniers could wear their uniform and helmet but without the cuirass.

Similarly, while performing various duties in and around the barracks or visiting the town, troopers and officers would of course go about in a simple uniform and ordinary bicorne without armour or helmet.

If the carabiniers' uniform was certainly not the most inconspicuous even at a time and in an Empire where snazzy uniforms were not rare, at least it is hard to mistake these troopers for any other unit.