Unfortunately I have not been able to find much unit history on these, other than they were another unit that were converted from Dragoons, the 6th Lancers from the 29th Dragoon Regiment.

This is a great action figure of a Dragoon firing his pistol.

Napoleon had trouble finding horses to mount his Dragoons especially before the successful campaign in 1809 against Austria.

Many of the Dragoons were therfore converted to Foot Dragoons.

“The assignement was sensible, but troopers caught up in the shuffle remembered that veteran dragoons, who hadn’t walked farther in years than the distance from their barracks to the nearest bar, ended up in the dismounted units, while their mounts were assigned to raw recruits. The results were rough on everybody: hospitals filled up with spavined veterans, recruits got saddle sores. Also, J.A. Oyon wrote gleefully, matters turned ugly when mounted and dismounted elements of several regiments bivouaced together. The limping veterans crowded over to check on their old horses and found them neglected, sore-backed, and lame. Blood flowed freely, if only from rookies’ noses.”

From: http://napoleonistyka.atspace.com/French_Cavalry.html

“There was no shortage of French cavalrymen who were eager to demonstrate their bravery and martial prowess in combat. During the bloody battle of Heilsberg in 1807 a colonel with his saber “dripping with blood” asked Marshal Murat to review his regiment. The colonel assured him that “you will see that that there is no soldier whose saber is not like mine.” (ibid)

“Another colonel had received 56 sabre cuts and recovered! It was not a rare sight to see a light cavalryman in a forefront of a hack-and-slash melee, gripping his reins with his teeth,
a pistol in one hand and saber in the other.” (ibid)