more Opolchenie

The Opolchenie are Russian militia which served in the Russian armies during the Napoleonic Wars and were especially prevalent in 1812.  While mostly engaged in engineering (...digging) field fortifications but some 10,000 were said to be under arms during the battle of Borodino.
With that in mind I made two elements for our game of that huge battle a few years ago.

However I was given some more sprues of what were Warlord Prussian Landwehr (1st Ed) so I decided to add a third more to my militia force.  It would take only a bit of scraping removing all the "Prussian" bits and putty adding to some of the pants for the fuller Russian look and of course the full beards as shown in contemporary illustrations.

D-B Heavies

Dutch-Belgian Napoleonic heavy horse...ironically in lightweight plastic....

While yes, Perry Miniatures do have the Dutch-Belgian Carabiniers in metal, I rather fancied doing them in plastic so upon spotting a Perry French Dragoon box on sale at the local store, I could not resist converting these into a couple of companies for the 1815 Hundred Days campaign.

While many sources suggest the helmet was only worn by the 2nd (Belgian) contingent, I went for full-on regulations mode and gave my 3rd (Dutch) Carabiniers spare French plastic versions modified with addition of the badge plate on the front and plume. The bicorne is the suggested head gear but these helmets could have been worn and are far more handsome!

The existing French valise version has the greatcoat folded on the top which was removed and the greatcoat was added using ‘green stuff’ around the shoulder on most, which was a common D-B trait apparently.  The Perrys, for production sake, attached the cartridge box to the valise, but a minor point to glue to the appropriate location on the torso.

The French Dragoon saddlecloth, sheepskin fur and basic uniform was close to identical to the Dutch-Belgian version so no changes required other than the colours of course. (perhaps the valise should be rounded instead of square but I consider that a minor issue).  Many of the sources do not indicate the fringed epaulettes on the Dutch as the Perrys put on theirs, so the existing shoulder straps are fine.

As the intended use is with a group of fellows doing primarily French and British for Waterloo, I am having fun creating the rarely thought of Dutch-Belgians to add a bit of different color to the affair.

addendum:  Found the following Knotel illustration (famous military uniform author) for the Dutch heavies, in this case the other Dutch regiment often also shown in the bicorne rather than the helmet I have opted.

General Grouchy

I recall one of the players during a playtest of the Battle of Wavre awhile back humorously complaining that his wife must have had told me give him "Oscar's" forces upon looking at the command labels.  No, not grouchy like the Muppets' character ,  nor even a military person of a poor disposition, but the commander of the French Army's right wing during the 100 Days Campaign.

The most famous story of his career is one that he did not march to the sound of the guns of Waterloo but continued, as per the instructions he understood, to pursue the Prussians. The story goes that he was casually eating strawberries as Gerard, his corps commander, demanded that he march to Napoleon.

It is from this event, that I used two of the Perry Generals to image this exchange.

The muddy track of that day is apparent.  The square frame is to include a small die for game purposes. I think the raised fist and snarl of his face gives the right effect to Gerard's anger over Grouchy's decision.  

the other signpost reads "Waterloo" ...of course....

Napoleon's Naval Artillery Regiments

After his disastrous Russian Campaign, Napoleon looked for new sources of manpower for his new armies in Germany in 1813, including the marine artillery contingents bottled up in the various harbours by the Royal Navy.  These proved to be, by most commentaries, to be exceptional fighters and were a large part of his forces during that year's fighting.

Napoleon's Naval Artillery Regiments of the 1813 campaigns.  They would mostly fight in their dark blue greatcoats as the weather was exceptionally poor with almost constant heavy rains marking most of the summer and autumn battles.

Wearing dark blue greatcoats and trousers and black covered shakos with red fringed epaulettes they were often misidentified as Imperial Guardsmen.  Their unique carrot-shaped short red plume I modelled with a bit of epoxy putty (green stuff) on the top of the existing round pompon of spare hussar shako heads

The figures are Victrix guardsmen obtained from a gaming buddy who had glued them up but decided not to paint.  I was able to remove the original heads and replaced them with spare hussar heads. He did a good job in the posing for a convincing firing line.

Westphalian 2nd Cuirassiers

the element of the 2nd Westphalian Cuirassiers 

The 2nd Westphalian Cuirassiers created in 1810 followed the Grande Armee into the depths of Russia during Napoleon’s ill-fated 1812 campaign from which few survived and the unit was never reestablished.  While historically limited to only one campaign, however the unit has an interesting uniform which I could make out of some spare plastic bits from a larger trade I made recently.  Among the trade items was plastic Perry models still on the one sprue but missing some bits.  A look into my parts-bin replaced some of the missing arms and equipment, etc.  The helmets are really the only difference from the French version and minor at that;  so I could easily remove the French horsehair and greenstuff the appropriate woollen comb of the Westphalians.  The only other major difference having the saddle cloth in the regimental orange. (for the French it was dark blue)

For the rivet counters: The 1st Westphalian Cuirassiers wore white but had only a frontal cuirass but no back plate.  And no, I will not want to try to scrape away the back to make that particular unit. One unit of Westphalian cuirassiers is plenty, thank you.

a wargamer's aside:
What was the worst order in military history?
In First Place:
" Lord Raglan wishes the Light Brigade to advance rapidly to the front...."
and in Second Place:
"Hello, MegloMiniatures? I would like to purchase 182 packs of...."

WW1 Balloons

The game "Canvas Eagles" is very popular at the local wargames club - The Trumpeter Tabletop Gaming Society - in Burnaby/Vancouver BC Canada, using 1:72 scale plastic model WW1 planes.

For one of the organizers of the gaming, DaveMc., I have made some 'ground' terrain for him in the past - to make the game a little more attractive you see - and while I think the games fun but always lacking a bit of variety.

So when I saw the the remnants of the nephew's birthday candy pinnate left on the ground, I offered to help clean up, pocketing a couple of the plastic egg shaped containers that once had held candy but now were garbage..... but to a wargamer such as I and what I saw as a clever modelling scheme.....

Balloon busting fun!   The balloons are on temporary stands for the photo shoot but you can see my 3D terrain for my plane's base. 

I cutout prices of card to match the curve of the egg as the fins, glued pieces of thin cord around the model to hide the seam and to give the model some "texture".  The fins were then given cords of 'green stuff' modelling epoxy; after which, the whole was painted a metallic color.

awaiting the paint....

The two plastic eggs were attached to telescoping antennas from an old defective Ikea lamp to give the ability for the balloons to be a different altitudes.

Green painters tape, easily removed, covered the metal antennas from misplaced primer and paint.

These will certainly not win any modelling awards of course but it would be fun
to see DaveMc get them into the action someday.

Edit:
here is a picture of them in action

As a aside the illustrator/writer of Canvas Eagles, Eric Hotz, (of HotzMats) is a member and often participates.  Don't know if balloon attacks are in the rules but many of the players have used the rules for years and I am sure they will come up with some method.

Historic Battle of Tegula (Zulu Wars)

Editoral note: originally written in September 2015 (!) this post was overlooked but the project still holds interest for me. As I have had nothing to post for awhile I thought I should fill in the gap....

Have no idea why my interest in the Zulu Wars but probably because I watched Zulu and Zulu Dawn movies in my early days and kept those images in my head.

Thus any magazine article about the Zulu and warfare involving that South African tribe strokes my interest.  An old wargame magazine description by Ian Knight [ Miniature Wargames  No.25 ] of the engagement between the colonists of Durban, Natal and the Zulu in 1838 had me thinking. (oh, oh, here we go off onto another "project" !! )

The abbreviated history goes something like this:

A Voortrekker deputation to Port Natal to ask the English Settlement for assistance against the Zulus was met with success. In 1838 John Cane and Robert Biggar with 14 other English settlers, 30 Hottentots and over 3000 native levies went as an expeditionary force in support to the Voortrekkers Commandos of Uys and Potgieter. (who were attacked a day before and were soundly defeated) After crossing the Tugela River the Expenditionary force came across the Zulu military kraal (camp) Ndondakusuka at the foot of the mountain but the lack of full resistance soon indicated that this was a trap and as dawn slowly appeared some 10,000 Zulu warriors appeared on the scene and fierce fighting ensued. The line of retreat across the river was cut off and the expeditionary force was surrounded. Thus on the 17th April 1838 ended the battle of Tugela,  Few of the expeditionary force escaped from this battle.

To distinguish the supporting Port Natal native troops, they were given white cloth head bands.  These "Hottentots" and some 400 of the natives were trained and armed with muskets, while the rest were armed as native warriors, some of which were Zulu expatriates.  This made the selection of figures easy and I simply added a green-stuff headband to those Natal allies. It was said that the natives would wind yards of cloth around their heads so the resulting headwear resembled a turban! This certainly helped in my modelling efforts as it is quite easy to apply too much green stuff to the small 15mm chaps.



 As with all my wargaming with the Zulu I use a heavily infused DBA style rules  (...thus far....) , so each force is of 12 elements - the Zulu look more numerous as I use double sized stands for them.  As I have yet to play this scenario I may indeed have them twice as large to equalize the effect from the Natal musket armed troops.   Because of the disproportional effect of firepower in the battles of this era, the Natal 'army' has 5 of its 12 elements as "rifle" armed, with the warriors equal to those of the Zulu.
The deployment is conjecture of course but does follow the DBA mandates.  The kraal starts with one additional defending element.  I may make the mountain smaller and closer to the Zulu side with the Natal army closer to the centre of the table.  In light of the historical battle, perhaps tell the Port Natal player that the idea is to save the army and not fight the Zulu....but the Zulu won't know this of course!
Not really pleased with the look of the table/basing and may change all this in the future but this small project is an interesting one for me.

Murat

Will Murat ride again?  One of my tabletop figures is modelled after the famous Napoleonic commander which I created out of miscellaneous plastics and green stuff and which I am fairly proud.  However, as my wife loves to point out, he stays in a box much of the time.
 Then why the effort?  Indeed.

 I have too many interests and too many to do and already have too many miniatures to play with.  So why more?

Well, just as I finish typing these musings, she comes to me with the story of finding an old cook book, a treasure she once desired, by collecting cereal box tops!  She sighs as she states that she has never used any of the recipes and hasn't looked at it for years. It is stored along with the many others, mostly unused.  Enlightenment?  Nah. Probably totally unrelated.
---------------------------

My Murat at the height of his game.

The Story of it's creation at:link

Spagetti lances and twig fences

I received my Perry order to complete my Russian contingent. Can't do that without getting some Cossacks, of course. They have lances. Perry supply very nice metal ones however, as we all have encountered,  they have a tendency to get themselves twisted.  I have never liked the wobbly look so have always used straight hard wire.  But I have never thrown away all those lead lances of the past.

While glancing at old wargamer glossies, I came across a photo of game with real twig 'wicker' fences and, well, lightbulb!

So the next day, when doing some 'gluing' of cavalry onto horses using green stuff which is nicely sticky when new and fills in gaps in the seat.  However as usual I overestimated the amount needed.  Rather than to waste, I thought to use some to attach and support stakes on a stick.  After I cut off the lance tips of the newly purposeful malleable metal rods so they can be thread through.

early test:

old metal lances and spears with the tips cut off.  a rather quick and haphazard try but the idea could work....

we shall see how this proceeds in a future effort.

Russian Napoleonic Opolchenie

The Battle of Borodino is one of the rare engagements which it is noted that the Russian Militia was armed and formed into combat units.   Around 15,000 were at the battle but most were employed in engineering tasks or in transportation duties.  Some were said to be added to the thinned ranks of the regulars, however, some 7,000 were stated to be formed in the left rear of the Russian position.  Probably militarily useless but....

Some while ago I traded some miscellaneous stuff for different miscellaneous stuff.  In this case for an extra box of Warlord Prussian Landwehr.  Having completed my collection of Prussians for the Waterloo Campaign I did not need anymore but could they work for the Opolchenie?
I am dubious about their combat role but willing to give the Russians at least two of the militia elements. It will take some carving....and modelling...but yeah, if one is not too picky about the details.

With reference guides only offering a vague idea, I had a concept of baggy pants and big beards. The following photos show the vicious scrape marks and filings employed to remove any offending "Prussian" bits.  However I did leave the maltese cross on the caps of course (which was copied by the Prussian Landwehr)

 I had fun using some 'brown stuff' to make the beards - absolutely required to make the boys into the Russian Militia! Can't do much about the Warlord oversized hands however.....

and the final painted version

my Opolchenie in formation.  I speed paint for most of my collections these days and so try to get over four done an hour. I don't do much touch up so please excuse the lack of finish. The "two feet away" rule, you understand.

Backing the Russian regulars and, well, showing their backs.  The fur packs were scraped smooth to give them Russian leather backpacks together with added extra sacks and such to hide the sameness of the only three poses provided by Warlord Miniatures plastics.   Hopefully those readers having those in their collections will not have recognized them!

Close up of their determination to defend the Motherland for the upcoming Battle of Borodino battle.

"Flintloque" type-ish Napoleonic skirmish game

A long time ago a local distributor brought in Alternative Armies 'Flintloque' fantasy Napoleonic-based figures which are very loosely scaled at about 35mm or so.
They are full of outrageous character and so I took the less fantasy (no Toads or Dogs for me) and trimmed the orc tusks and elf ears so they are now roughly human in design and organized them into recognizable historical unit - or as close as possible.

British Light Infantry 

Neapolitan 8th Line Regiment.  The standard finial is a 6mm horse!  The huge out of scale proportions are part of the charm of these big boys.....  The mules are from another undetermined source.  I considered them too large for 28mm but appropriately sized for this.  I added a plastic barrel to one and a lot of 'green stuff' to the other using soft wire to bind the bags in a very haphazard way.  

They have been stored away for some time (read: years!) but a couple of months ago I brought out the remaining few units and completed the collections, now numbering 200 or so.  Yesterday was the test of the new and very simple rules developed over some time (read: minutes!) I used as much random selection of table position, unit selection, scenario task and to keep it as even as possible because the usual Monday Night guys like to whine about everything!

Spanish infantry in late war dress being moved.

Other than a couple of minor changes, the rules I made up which are all of 2 pages long (!) were generally accepted and thought to do the trick for a fun convention game.

Later in the game, the Spanish are running...OK, then,....advancing, to gain their side of the table to complete their scenario task.

The miscellaneous figures I collected have become the guerrillas, enemy to French and British alike!

As an example of the play, playing cards selected poker style by each player dictates who has first action during a phase.  Doug's Handy Card System has the player select one of the cards dealt to him with Diamonds bettering Hearts bettering Clubs bettering Spades with ace high.  With the better card each player in turn can perform an action - shoot, reload, move etc.  The shooting is a hit with a good die and flip a card.  Face card = killed.  No wounds. Hand to hand combat is similar.  Points are given for the random scenario objective a player was given and for any kills he achieved.  That's about it actually.

The Chasseurs-Tirailleurs of the Young Guard continue to dig in the graveyard for the gold....

I am hoping for more players next time which should make the action even more wooly.....

Medieval Irish for DBA

My new part-time job as a charter bus driver is quite the time-eater with lots of time away from the house and more importantly the painting table!
Having downtime between delivery and pickup during the day, sometimes I can get a bit of basic painting in while sitting in the cramped seats of the bus.  With only poor natural lighting and poor positioning hunched over as I am, no great detail can be done as you can imagine;  and for my version of the Irish with their rather plain dress and, well knowing that many poor brush strokes can be covered up by a heavy wash of paint, I set about doing this army of 15mm for my DBA collection.

lots of painting gaffs but really I couldn't see a lot of the details sitting on a bus.  Even with my reading glasses on.  Sigh.

These are converted Corvus Belli Numidians - which were needed for the bare Irish legs - on which I added "green stuff" cloaks

Corvus Belli Irish Kerns from their old HYW range. The first strip has been given a wash stain already.

The completed army. Yeah, well it's DBA ain't it!

Close up of the spearmen

Close up of the General as a light horse element

Murat during the Battle of Heilsberg, 1807

A famous incident during the Polish campaign of 1807 was the inspiration to create my own Murat figure.
Aubier of the 20th Chasseurs a Cheval relates how Murat had his horse killed by a cannonball and gave him his, with the Marechal leaving one of his red morocco boots still in the stirrup.  With this and the beautiful paintings within the Hourtoulle book "From Eylau to Friedland" I set to creating from leftover plastic bits.

I referenced this painting for my Murat who, while hatless in the event captured by the painting below , without feathers and plumage is quite unthinkable.

A great image of Murat riding off on the trooper's horse. And I just happen to have only one horse left to use! Perfect!



Like Hollywood, I combined the two paintings for a "based on the true history" along with the two beautiful paintings.  The following photos show my efforts to create the famous napoleonic cavalry leader.

note the bootless socked left foot. The other side still has the original boot of the hussar officer's leg. The details are from the first painting with the addition of his hat.

With the view as per the second painting but with the troopers horse - his now killed - he is armed with a switch rather than a sword as he is in the Girbal painting

The horse is a Perry troopers, the legs that of an officer, the torso of a trumpeter with the lace and details removed and the arms of a heavy dragoon with the sword removed. The switch will be one of those thin plastic ties used to attach price tags on clothing and glued onto the gloved hand

The front sashes and medallions still need to be added. The initial plumage to the infantry bicorne will be accentuated with more feathers later. The left leg has it's boot scraped off.  

The final version

The final version.  Murat with his flowing locks of hair.

My own Saxon Zastrow cuirassiers

While I could have just purchased Eureka's nice version(s) of this famous Napoleonic era heavy horse regiment,  I did not for several reasons.  Foremost that only need three. Hardly worth the expensive shipping them half way across the world.  Also they are metal; thus heavy. I like light. And most importantly I still had three left over French cuirassier horses which just ached to be employed in such a fashion.  I thought I would enjoy the challenge to create my own.

Inspiration came from a plate in the Blandford's  "Uniforms of 1812" by Philip Haythornewaite

I started with the horses, cutting down excessive rolls and protruding saddle accoutrements.  I took some of the numerous extra hussar legs the Perrys provide, glued those to the horses and added other extra torsos I had - usually trumpeters - cutting off the right arm and adding an extra heavy cavalry arm to provide the necessary straight sword.  The left arm holds the reins and I added an enlarged cuff to the hussar arm hiding the lace work and giving the illusion of the heavy gloves worn.  As the torsos were to be covered with green stuff (GS) for the cloak these did not need be accurate and all the lace and belts of these hussar bodies were not worried about.  I used the torso to get the bulk of the figure done and proportional.

The helmets were French dragoon types, one the Perry types had the horsehair just at the very end, so easy to cut off.  With the peak modified by a scraping, I could add the GS comb. Really happy about the sameness of these.  I waited a bit then used an old toothbrush to impress upon the putty to provide that 'woollen' texture. In the following photo, the middle figure shows this to good effect.

The roughly trimmed sheepskin of the French saddle was covered by a "roll" bundle.

With the glue and plastic basis of the figures set, I started with the main use of the GS.  I did start with a template for the cloak after several design tries, but these turned out to be very rough as the GS can be sticky and stretchy ruining any true consistency.  I admire the pros for that.

The main part of the cloak was first and so wrapped it around the figure trying to hide most of the bits of the French saddle which are incorrect for the Saxons and way down the hussar leg as not to show anything but the bottom of the boot.

After that had cured the next day (I am trying to learn patience....probably most sculptors will tell you that is the main trick!)  I added the cape, again with a template in mind and try to get the shape, sort of, but pinching and trimming with the differing shape of the sword arms to get around.

After the adding the lower cloak step

same figure with addition of the upper cape

I will glue on the plumes and probably add a scabbard under the cloak to finish them.  With my usual heavy,  very heavy,  coats of paint,  hopefully the imperfections will be reduced and they will look OK.  I will ignore the fact that all the other cavalry are not in THEIR cloaks.  But while I 'needed' this regiment for the accuracy of deployment for the Borodino game,  the Saxon Zastrow regiment, albeit in a lesser amount, did contribute in the very wet and cold 1813 campaign, which is really the focus of this collection.

.......Fast forward to the finished product

I wanted to explain the use of the capes, but I think I may have gone a bit too heavy with the rain soddened ground!

Leading the French Cuirassiers into battle

   Certainly after this, I am in awe of the talent with the likes of the Perrys, Hicks, Murch, Owen and all the others we know to supply us with very nicely done miniatures.  I don't sculpt all that often so I claim lack of experience but perhaps I will finally get through painting the lead pile and start doing some sculpts for fun.