Napoleonic Army – Page 11 – Steve’s Hobby Blog

The Somersetshires take shape!

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With one eye on the coming 200th anniversary of Waterloo, I am still adding units to my Napoleonic Army. Work is progressing slowly as I am being distracted by the need to finish my new Lion Rampant Retinue for a games day on 31st January and the steady stream of releases from Lucid eye and DeeZee. More of the latter in another post. Back to Napoleonics, though and as you can see from the picture, I have painted the two Mounted Colonels from Victrix as commanding officers for the 1/27 and 1/40 battallions. As both these units had buff facings, the officers would probably had the same, although as ever, it depends which reference that you look at. Some show a dark blue facing on the uniform and from what I have read, some officers customised their uniforms according to their own taste. Still, they look pretty enough for the wargames table, so they will do for me!

The rank and file for the 1/40 are in progress, with the six men representing the two flank company’s almost completed. Here is a picture of them, work in progress, just having been sprayed with matt varnish after coating in army painter strong tone. They now need basing and I will retouch the lighter colours and metallics to enhance the highlights. So it is just the command group to finish and another battalion will be ready for the table! 2014-12-11 09.55.34

Whats on the Workbench 20th November 2014

Much as I am committed to my Lion Rampant retinue, I couldn’t stop work on my Napoleonic Army. I intend to complete the 6th Division as it appeared at Waterloo ( with some artistic licence, of course). Having added another Hanoverian Battalion, I decided to go back to the British. I had already painted the 1/27th Inniskillins, and the 1/4th Kings Own, so the final British battalion in the Division was the 1/40 2nd Sommersetshires. This battalion has buff facings and so is very similar to the 1/27th. Fortunately, when I assembled this unit from the Perry boxed set, I made all of the figures, so in effect I had 12 extra men already finished in buff facings. It is now just a question of adding the command group of 6 and 6 figures to represent the flank companies and another battalion is ready for battle.

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As usual, I will use the Mont St Jean web site for reference when painting, but for the time being, here are a few pictures of the additional models being assembled & made ready! As you will see, the easiest way of making the command group was to order a spare command sprue from the Perry web site. I’ve slightly altered the Officer and used a head from the Victrix set to make him different from the 1/27th officer. I’ve also added in a Sapper from a Victrix metal command set. As a side project, I’ll also paint the mounted Colonels that the Sapper came with as Officers for the Battalions, which will use up the whole pack and reduce my lead mountain reserve slightly! The rest of the command are assembled as usual.

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For the Flank Companys’ I have used a mixture of Perry’s & Victrix parts to make the six required figures. Here’s the Left flank:

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And here is the Right Flank:

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As you can see, the Perrys (grey plastic) and the Victrix (Light Brown plastic), mix very well and there is very little difference in the size of the figures so they are quite compatible. Mixing sets is a very simple way of making conversions and giving variation to the troops in a unit. So it’s just the painting now….

Whats on the Workbench 23 October 2014

2014-10-23 10.19.08 Well I am just about going to scrape in with my objective of finishing a Hanoverian unit by the end of October! As you can see the officers are close to being finished – final highlights need to be applied. The only figure that needs painting now is the Drummer and I will then have my unit of 24 finished. The next stage is to base them and then finally the add the flags. Ah! the flags….

The problem here is that I cant find any reference to flags used by specific regiments of Hanoverian Troops at Waterloo, particularly the Landwehr units. Indeed, it is possible that they did not carry any into battle. But that wont do for a war games unit – my aim is to make a representation of the unit for the war games table and they look prettier carrying flags! As I have already stretched history by giving my unit the flat peaked caps, it wont hurt to use a bit of artistic licence when it comes to the flags, so I think that I am going down the route of using a conjectural Hanoverian Battalion flag and a Blue Kings Colour for the other ensign.

If there are any of the ‘fashion police’ or ‘button counters’ out there twitching at the liberties that I am taking with this unit, dont worry, I’m twitching with you! One of the dilemmas of historical wargaming is deciding whether you are trying to build an entirely accurate scale representation of the units involved in a particular battle or a general representation of the units that were around at that point in history. Of course, the further back in history you go, the more difficult it is to be sure of who wore what and when. Even the modern day infantryman appears to supplement his uniform by purchasing kit from ebay! It always amuses me that we are told exactly what style of armour/helmet/weapons various ancient tribes used when after a battle, the first thing that the winners did was loot the dead of their possessions.

You can just hear the conversation now. ‘Oi Ulrich, there’s no way you’re wearing that Saxon Helmet, you’re a Viking, so put it down, besides, you’ll make us look silly when Osprey come to take our picture…..’

It seems I digress, but you see the problem. Regardless, this weekends task is to finish painting the drummer, re highlight the officers and then get the whole lot based up and another Hanoverian unit can join my growing British Napoleonic Army!

Whats on the Workbench 9th October – Neanderthals & Hanoverians!

2014-10-09 09.37.11 A strange mix of subjects on my workbench at the moment! I’ve just about finished painting 18 rank & file Hanoverian Landwehr. As you can see from the picture, they’re all based and ready for the table. There are of course 6 figures missing – the officers, ensigns & sergeants. They are undercoated and ready to paint, so they should keep me busy for the next few painting sessions. I will then have a nice unit of 24 figures representing the Munden Landwehr battalion. As far as finishing the figures went, once I had painted them with Army painter Strong tone, I gave them 24 hours to dry and then sprayed them with Army painter Anti shine. I tend to use a light coat and if the figures are still a bit shiny in places then I use vallejo matt varnish, just brushed on, to finish off.

The next job is to go back over the lighter colours to make them stand out. So I repaint the white straps, yellow hat bands and any metallics. The bayonets get a coat of silver to make them stand out on the battlefield! It sounds like a long process but it doesn’t take too long. The idea is just to highlight these colours, so if you miss a bit then it just looks as though the area has been shaded.

Basing is then completed. Again, I have gone for a quick basing finish. The first task was to mount each 4 figures on a 40mm square renedra base. I then used Vallejo sandy paste to blend the figure bases into the renedra base to get an even surface. When this was dry, I painted this Vallejo chocolate brown to gice a dark base on which to work. I prefer a brown edge to my bases rather than green or black, which are also favoured by painters. Next up, I coated the bases in PVA and covered with a forest brown scatter. This in turn, had patches of Javis green scatter added and then I detailed the bases with smaller patches of Expo flowered field static grass. The final touch was to add some Noch summer grass tufts and of course my ‘trademark’ flowers – in this case, Noch white flower clumps.

In the picture you will also see that I have painted a female admirer waving the Hanoverians off to battle! It’s a bit of a nod to the Warlord box art and she will of course take her place in little Bingham, the town on my war games table. Without getting too commercial, all of the items that I use are available in the Arcane Scenery shop and if anyone out there reading this needs some help, call us and I will be happy to talk through the materials & techniques used.

2014-10-09 09.46.44 The other project that has leap-frogged up the painting queue is pack two of the Lucid Eye Neanderthals. Arcane Scenery are now stocking the Lucid Eye Range and of course the Neanderthals go really well with some of the Ice Age DeeZee miniatures that we produce. The Mammoths, Cave Bears & Smilodons for starters! So I’m working on getting a little band of Neanderthals ready for a Hunting party. One is just about finished, except the basing, the other two are just awaiting the fur pelts to be highlighted & the detail picked out. The techinique that I have used for these is slightly different from my usual style. Rather than using ‘dip’ to shade, I am shading and highlighting using inks, dry brushing and mixing lighter & lighter shades of the base colours. It’s a bit more time consuming for me but gives a nice result, particularly when the figures are so well sculpted. Here’s the progress so far. I’ll spend a bit more time in my next blog detailing the colours used.

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Whats on the Workbench 25/9 & Deezee Miniatures

2014-09-25 11.06.22 Progress on the Hanoverian battalion continues, albeit at a snails pace. I had started to paint a batch of 18 figures but progress was too slow and so I decided to finish six off just to get to see how they would look. The picture shows the first six block painted according to the colour scheme from the Mont St Jean site ( see last weeks blog for link). The next stage will be to paint them with army painter quick shade – I’ll use the strong tone or black shade. This will give me the shading to bring out the detail, particularly the faces and trousers. It will also give a clear outline to the equipment and lacing, making them stand out. Once the quick shade has dried, I’ll highlight the figures by repainting the lighter colours, particularly the webbing & lace and I’ll highlight the metals with either silver or gold as appropriate. This will really make the Buttons & bayonets stand out on the battlefield. Of course the most important finishing touch will be the bases! I just need to think about the colour of the flowers that I will use….. Hopefully by next week I will have at least these six finished. One final thought on painting these models. With hindsight, I should have painted the three individual pieces that make a figure separately. It would have made painting the detail much easier, so I will give this a try when I paint the next 18 figures.

Changing the subject completely, I mentioned in a previous blog that I was working my way through the Deezee range. Well, next on the workbench is a couple of Jaguars! One of them is not yet in production but we are edging ever closer to sorting this out! All being well, we will change the pack on the Jaguars so that you will get two different animals rather than two the same. The bear cubs should be in production by next week and we will have a couple of brand new packs of dogs! Here’s the Jaguars, just undercoated. I will be trying to paint them both as Black Jaguars, the sort that appeared in Apocalypto. On the face of it, that is the simpler option as opposed to the spotted type of Jaguar. However, painting & shading black is quite difficult – I’ll show you how I get on when they are finished. 2014-09-25 11.07.26

Warlord Hanoverian Infantry

After a short break from Napoleonics, I decided to get back on track with my British contingent. However, the German influence remains! Having finished the Prussian infantry for the time being, I am moving onto Hanoverians! The plan is to complete the British 6th Infantry Division as they appeared at Waterloo. Which means that I need to paint 4 battalions of Hanoverian Landwehr to make the 4th Hanoverian Brigade that was one half of the division. The Other half was made up of 3 British Battalions, the 4th Kings Own, 27th Inniskillings, and the 40th Sommersets. ( There was a forth battalion, the 81st, but they were left in Brussels).

I already have completed the 4th, 27th and Verden Landwehr and so need to paint three more Landwehr battalions, the Luneberg, Munden and Osterode, a total of 72 figures. I’ve decided to use the Warlord Games Hanoverian boxed set and use the flat peaked field caps for two of the battalions, the other will be in Stovepipe shakos for a bit of difference.

2014-08-28 11.04.46 The Warlord figures are nice and straight forward to put together and have very little flash to worry about. A bit of cleaning with a file & a scrape with a knife and they are ready for undercoating. Here’s the first batch of 5 ready to be sprayed.

I’m going to use army painter grey spray for the undercoat. This will save time painting the trousers & blanket rolls and the grey takes the red for the jackets better than the other way around. I wont base them at this stage, the small bases that they are on will be good enough to hold whilst painting although I know that the ‘professionals’ would mount them on temporary bases. I am going to be batch painting a large amount again, so I’m happy to work with them as they are. It will also allow me to base them as fours on larger 40mm square bases once they are completed. As always, for my painting guide, I use the Mont st Jean site, which gives a nice clear picture of how to paint my figures. LandwehrHanovre

The reference material supplied with the warlord set is also very good as well. The point is made in the leaflet that not too many hard facts survive regarding the exact details of the Landwehr uniform but from the research that I have done, I wont be too far out following these colours. I suspect having the battalion in field caps is a stretch, regarding accuracy, but as I have said , it will make for a bit of difference on the battlefield and help to differentiate the battalions. As for flags, there is even less information, so I’ll use a bit of licence when solving this problem! One final thought, The Hanoverian Landwehr didn’t have flank companies but the warlord include figures with flank epaulets. Technically, I need to remove these but I suspect that I’ll just paint them when the time comes….

Batch Painting Prussians – Part Two of Two

In the last entry I had just finished block painting 22 Prussian line infantry. The next stage in completing them is to apply Army painter quick shade, or as it is known, dip. Quick shade has a mixed reputation. To some painters it is the Devils brew, a cheat, and should be avoided at all costs. To others it is a magic product that has revolutionized painting wargames figures. My view is somewhere in between. If you are painting large numbers of figures for the wargames table it is probably the best way to go. If you are entering a painting competition, dont go near it! I do not dip my figures in the tin & flick the excess down the garden as the instructions recommend – this sounds like a disaster waiting to happen if I was involved – I’m sure that my figure would end up at the bottom of the garden and the quick shade would inevitably end up on something that it shouldn’t! 2014-03-30 15.02.29

I prefer to liberally brush it on my figures and leave it to dry for about 24 hours. This helps me to control how much ‘dip’ is being used and where it is going! The point is that once applied it not only shades your figure but also protects it with a coat of varnish. There is one other issue with tins of Quick shade. It has a tendency to form a skin on the product as time passes. So long as you carefully remove this skin and give it a good stir, you can continue to use the dip. I also add a bit of white spirit to the tin before use and I am meticulous in wiping the top of the tin to try and get the best seal after use. That said, for an expensive product, I think that the tin could be of better design and quality. As you can see from the picture, the quick shade does what it says on the tin & shades the creases and gives definition to the figure. Dont be put off by the high gloss finish. The next stage in the process is to spray the figures with a good Matt varnish or anti shine. I stick with Army painter for this job. It’s not necessarily the best Matt spray available but it is designed to work with the quick shade & I get good results with it most of the time. Matt varnish can be temperamental so ALWAYS shake the can well, and spray in light coats from about 18 inches. Also if you can, spray in a well ventilated area with consistent temperature. It all helps to get a good finish. 2014-03-31 17.47.00

The next picture shows the figures once they have been coated with matt varnish. There is one other quick trick that will help bring your figures to life and that is to repaint some of the lighter colours to add highlights & clarify them. I usually redo some of the white ( particularly the webbing), the yellow facings and I also retouch the steel bayonets with silver and the brass items with gold. it doesn’t take too long but it does add something the the figures. The figures are now based on 40mm renedra bases in fours and the bases painted Vallejo Chocolate brown 872.

The final stage is the basing. I use a range of finishes on my figures but for the Prussians I have gone for a very quick & simple solution. Using watered down PVA, I coat the bases & then cover with a forest brown scatter. Once this has dried, I put on random patches of ‘grass’ using Javis fine scatter – again stuck with PVA. To finish and to add detail, I then use tufts of grass from either the Army Painter range or the Gaugemaster/Noch variety. I prefer the latter as they come in distinct clumps and are easier to use. The final detail is to add some flowers! In this case, yellow really contrasts against the dark prussian blue and adds the final touch! Hey presto, 22 Prussians ready for battle. 2014-03-31 20.55.02

Batch Painting Prussians! Part one of two

The entry is a bit of a backwards step…. To be honest I had part written it sometime ago but not had time to finish it before I actually had finished my Prussian brigade. However, I haven’t done a great deal of painting over the last week so I thought that I would add this back in to the blog to show in detail the process I used to speed the painting of my Prussian contingent.

I usually paint my models in batches of about 6 figures at a time. It seems to take a long time to finish a battalion of troops this way but at least I had the reassurance of watching the battalion grow in numbers. However, I decided to have a go at a much bigger batch to see if I could speed up the process. I’ve heard a lot about speed painting but it’s not something that I’d ever tried. Besides, painting is supposed to be a relaxing pursuit, so I didn’t want the pressure of painting against the clock. Of course, if I could be disciplined to have a go at a full battalion in one go, it might help to grow my collection and if course reduce my painting back log.

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So here’s how I got on. I hope that the following will contain some useful ideas for other modellers. I ‘ve also tried to take pictures at nearly every stage so you can see my progress. Before I start any painting project, I usually spend a bit of time researching the subject. I’ll cover this as a general topic in a future blog entry as I think it might be useful and thought provoking. I have found that often, the references can give different colour schemes, particularly when it comes to the detail. The most consistent source that I use, and the best that I have found for a painting reference is the mont st jean site. Here is the link:

http://centjours.mont-saint-jean.com/liens.php

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Before starting to paint a batch of figures it makes sense to paint at least one test figure, if nothing else to establish what paints that you will use and the best sequence for painting. As I had already painted a battalion of Prussians, I was already prepared and I knew exactly which colours I would use. To help me through the process, I lined the colours up in sequence on my work station. This keeps things organised and helps to mark my progress as I work through the colours. You can see the paints used in the first picture. Picture two shows the figures assembled and undercoated and with the first colour, vallejo 815 Flesh painted on for hands & faces. I tend to stick exclusively to Vallejo paints. I find them to be about the best around for painting miniatures so all the references to paint numbers are for Vallejo. The next picture shows the figures with 950 black applied to the hats, boots and cartridge cases.

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I’ve also shown the brush that I am using an Expo sable sized 1 brush. I find this ideal for block painting figures of this size and only use a smaller brush when it comes to painting the fine details.

Picture three shows the troops with their jackets painted Dark Prussian Blue, Vallejo 70899. So far, painting has been fairly quick as I am painting reasonably large areas on the figures. Now comes the first of the fiddly bits, painting the Muskets, hair and leather straps on the blankets. I tend to do these all together as I use Flat brown (984)for the musket stocks, Leather Brown for the strapping (871) and both these and a variety of browns for the hair – Light brown (929), yellow Ochre(913) & Chocolate brown (872). You could use the different browns to paint a wood grain effect on the musket stocks if you wish, but it’s not a style that I like – plain brown is just fine! The detail on the muskets is finished with 864 steel for the barrels & bayonets & 801

2014-03-04 20.04.09 , brass for the bands on the barrel, stock, sword handle, scabbard end & badge on the cartridge box. Next up, I carefully paint in the webbing, Bread sack and detail on the back pack, as well as the sword knot. You could use Vallejo white 951 but I prefer to use the off white 820. At this stage the figures are nearly fully painted. So far, it has taken me about 8 hours of painting, or to be more realistic 4 evening sessions of two hours. Any longer & my back seizes up!

The next picture shows the figures with the facings painted Yellow 953, the shoulder straps & sword knot red, 957, and the buttons picked out in steel. The yellow facings are to represent the Silesian regiment and the colour of the shoulder straps & sword knot indicates the battalion & company respectively. The purists out there will want to paint different colours on the starps & knots but I am too lazy and the red gives a nice contrast to the yellow facings! The final bit of painting before using Army Painter dip is to use Neutral grey, 992 to touch up the trousers and Blanket rolls and to correct any obvious errors. At this stage they dont look too bad but the block painting leaves the figures looking a bit flat. I could go back

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& shade and highlight the figures but this is an exercise in getting a batch of figures ready for battle, not a painting competition!

In the next article, I’ll show you how the Army painter quick shade helps to bring the figures to life and my quick basing technique.

It’s too darned hot!

I’m not really complaining about the weather, honest! I’ve been away on holiday to Crete and it was a lot hotter there! Of course the difference was that I didn’t have to go to work and the only time I spent on my hobby was to do some holiday reading. As well as reading the latest Bernard Cornwell historical novel (‘Pagan Lord’), and for a complete change, the latest Lee Child thriller ( ‘Never Go Back’), I also managed to fit in Alessandro Barberos’ book, ‘The Battle – A History of the Battle of Waterloo’. It’s every bit of a page turner as the the other two and just as exciting! As with all good history books it combines the facts with the narrative of the Battle, told from the perspective of those that were there. If you haven’t read this book , then I’m happy to recommend that you add it to your holiday reading list!

Prussian Command So over the last three weeks or so, progress on my projects have been slow to say the least. The hot weather brings other distractions and it doesn’t help that the paint was drying faster on the pallete than on the figures that I was painting. But work on the Prussians has progressed. I’ve finished an Officer & a sergeant and I also now have my Brigade Commanders completed. So I do have a Prussian brigade of Infantry that I can field in my next battle. Of course the brigade isn’t finished… I could do with completing the Jaeger as skirmishers that come with the set. I’ve started to assemble them but I have had problems with the arm holding the rifle on these figures. It seems that the rifle is a weak point and the rifle butt has snapped off on a couple of my figures. So I have decided to do a couple of minor conversions & replace the broken rifle arm with a musket arm from the Victrix British set. This does mean a bit of filing & filling with green stuff – the shoulder wings need removing, as does the piping on the cuffs and I’ve remodelled the cuff to match the other one. Apart from being a fidley job , it’s not too difficult. I don’t think that the musket rather than a rifle is too much of a problem, I am sure that there were jaegers with both. So that’s about it for this weeks blog – I’m off for a cold drink of something…..

Jaeger conversion

What’s on the Work Bench 26th June 2014

Landwehr With Muskets at trail

A couple of projects are moving towards completion. First of all the Prussian Brigade is slowly getting there. I have been painting another 10 Prussian Landwehr to complete the second Landwehr Battalion. These are Warlord Games metal Prussians running with Muskets at the trail. It means that I have a bit of variety with my troops and I hope that when these are mixed with the casualty figures already painted, there will be a bit of a story being told, with the officer ordering the advance in the face of enemy fire. I know that some wargamers like to have their models in similar poses and certainly for the sake of quickness, this helps when painting. I prefer some of my models to look a bit different, so I’m quite happy to mix it up a bit!

Landwehr Advance!

So, although I have painted 94 Prussian Infantry & Landwehr figures, the brigade is still not quite there! I have sent for a separate Prussian Infantry command sprue from the Perry’s – this will allow me to complete the 2nd battalion of the infantry. I also have a couple of Prussian Generals from Foundry to paint to make up the Brigade command. At this point, the Brigade will be ready to take to the wargames table but of course there is always more to add but at least I have the main rank & file done!

Sarissa Dark Age Church

As a break from painting figures, I thought that I would make a start on a church for ‘Little Bingham’, the fictious village that occupies my wargames table when it is not in use! I have a test piece from Sarissa, the Dark Age Church, and I thought that this would make a nice addition if painted up. So, to start, I just sprayed the walls of the Church with a Textured spray bought from B&Q. I first masked off the door, but otherwise just carefully sprayed over the MDF. I was quite pleased to see that despite the thickness of the spray, some of the MDF etching & detail still was visible even the fine detail around the windows.

Church window detail

I then just painted the roof tiles with a dark grey Vallejo paint. Again, the detail of the tiles are still visible. So the next step is to weather the the walls & roof with a quick dry brush & add some Ivy & moss. Hopefully, it will be finished for the next workbench!

Battle Report – Waterloo 2014

The Allies deployment -Hougoumont in the foreground.

As we were approaching the 199th anniversary of the battle of Waterloo I thought that it would be fun to fight a large battle in the style of Waterloo. The plan was to put as many of our troops on the table and fight a scenario that paid homage to the battle rather than attempt to recreate it exactly. To this end The British and her Allies would be defending a line that ran from a small village ( ‘Papelotte’) on the left, along a road to a walled farm house on the far right (‘Hougoumont’), with another farm house (‘La Haie Sainte’) at a cross roads in the middle of the board. Just behind the road was a line of hills that would allow the British to place defensive artillery – not quite accurate but a nod in the direction of the reverse slopes that gave the British infantry cover during the battle!

The French troops were massed on the opposite side of the table and whilst they outnumbered the Allies significantly to start with, had no cover or defensive position. Their mission was simply to drive the British from the field before the Prussians arrived. The simple mechanic that we used to simulate this was that on turn 3 the Prussians would enter the table form the right on a dice throw of 6, turn 4, a throw of 5 and so on.

The rules that we used were the Black Powder Rules, without too much in the way of ‘extras’ from the recent supplements. I very much like the original rules and find that there are too many extras in the supplements that can both distort and over complicate the original rules set. That said, we do have a few of our own ‘house’ modifications and even with a large 12 foot by 6 foot table, still prefer to use shortened movement & ranges, basing everything on 66% of the original distances.

Mercer observes the French advance!

Our troops were a bit of a mixed bag, as we were short on the British side, so close scrutiny of the pictures may revel that the Allies consisted of a few Bavarian & Austrian troops! And so with the troops deployed, the battle got underway with the British advancing in line to take position just in front of the road. The 95th Rifles dashed forwards to garrison La Haie Sainte and form a skirmish line whilst the KGL rifles moved into the woods in front of Hougoumont.

In reply, the French moved to attack the village of Papelotte, set up the Grand Battery, and they advanced towards the British Right Flank. Hougoumont was largely ignored, although there was a sharp exchange of fire between the skirmishers in the Woods in front of the house.

Turns two and three saw the French batter away at the defenders in Papelotte but to little effect. To relieve pressure on this sector, the British advanced past the road to attack the advancing French Columns, stopping them with a fearsome volley! ( or as the French General would say , some dead jammy dice rolling…how many 6’s!) To add to the French woes, the Grand Battery was having trouble deploying effectively – a blunder sending them in the wrong direction. Add to this, the Centre also refused to move and so despite fierce fighting around La Haie Saint, the British right wing was holding it’s own, with the garrison in the farm house stubbornly holding on.

Fighting around La Haie Sainte

The French right wing attacking Papelotte

Turn 4 saw the British inflicting heavy casualties on the French left flank. The French Guard were soaking up the punishment but finding it difficult to make further progress. Faced with the Cold-stream Guards and taking heavy fire from both the Howitzer and the rocket battery on the hills, the French were beginning to waver. To add to their woes, the skirmish around Hougoumont had been won by the KGL and they were now advancing from the Chateau and threatening to out flank the French. The French centre still stubbornly refused to support the Guard and was becoming entangled with the small garrison at La Haie Saint.

At Papelotte, the Prussians were yet to arrive and the French were gradually making progress. However, the odds were that the Prussians would soon make an appearance and so rather than being able to exploit their stronger position, the French were forced to make provision for the threat to their flank.

The Prussians have arrived!

Sure enough, on turn 5, the Prussians began to filter onto the battlefield putting the French in front of Papelotte in dire trouble. To add to the French worries, the Guard brigade attacking the British Right flank had begun to crack and was falling back…

By Turn 6, the inevitable happened, and the French position became untenable. The Prussians drove into the flank, breaking the French Brigade attacking Papelotte and flanking the next French Brigade that was being held by the British Left.

Around La Haie Sainte, The French Guard Brigade had broken, and despite attempts to support it with the cavalry and troops from the French centre, it was now in retreat. The French had become entangled around the farm house and despite their best attempts could not shake the Rifle Companies defending it.

The ineffectiveness of the Grand Battery was overshadowed by the British Howitzer fire and amazingly, the Rocket battery, which scored 4 direct hits, causing mayhem!

Although the French had largely ignored Hougoumont, this time La Haie Saint had been their undoing, tying up too many troops and causing congestion in their lines. Strangely, the Cavalry on either side had been fairly ineffective. The British Cavalry had managed one charge but although they had caught a French Infantry battalion in the flank, they failed to do any significant damage. The French cavalry had also done very little. When called upon, they had failed their orders and refused to charge, lurking behind the infantry…

British Rocket Battery!

The star on the British side was the Rocket battery. With 4 direct hits, including a double hit on an advancing French Guard unit they had undoubtedly been the most effective artillery unit on the board! So a most enjoyable game (especially for the British!) – no doubt that the French will be back again!

Many thanks to Pete & Quentin for being such good sports and for doing the hard work in setting it all up!

The Heroic Stand of The Inniskilling, 27th Regiment of Foot

Inniskilling memorial at Waterloo

In last weeks post, I gave a brief description of La Haie Sainte Farm House and my observations from the battlefield visit to Waterloo. This week, I thought the I would take a look at a different part of the battle. When we were planning to visit Waterloo, it seemed appropriate that we would take some of our figures to the actual battlefield. I had been inspired by the stoic bravery of the 27th Regiment of Foot, the Inniskillings, during the battle and had painted one of my Battalions to represent them. It just seemed right to take them to the Battlefield.

The Inniskillings had been held in reserve during the battle until around 3.00pm when they were ordered up to defend the crossroads. Following the loss of La Haie Sainte, they were ordered to form square. This wasn’t so much a response to any imminent cavalry threat but such a formation would allow them to deliver fire to the side towards the Brussels road as well as to the front, over the ridge towards the french advance.

The densely packed ranks of such a formation made a tempting target for both the French Guns and the many French skirmishers – a target that they could hardly miss. As a result, the battalion, commanded by Captain John Hare, suffered terrible casualties, losing 66% of it’s men and officers. Of the Nineteen officers with the Battalion, sixteen were killed or wounded, leaving many of the Companies to be commanded by Sergeants. The memorial reads:

Inniskillings on memorial

In Memory of the heroic stand by the 27th (Inniskilling) Regiment of Foot at the Battle of Waterloo on 18th June 1815 when, of the 747 Officers and men of the regiment who joined the battle, 493 were killed or wounded. A noble record of endurance. Of them, the Duke of Wellington said, ‘Ah, they saved the centre of my line’. Erected by their successors, The Royal Irish Rangers (27th Inniskillings, 83rd,87th) 18 June 1990.

My act of remembrance was to take the regiment that I had painted to the battlefield – here they are on the memorial once again, facing out across Waterloo.

The models are Perry miniatures from the plastic box set. I have painted them with Buff facings and with buff cross straps. I am not sure if this is entirely correct. Some pictures show the troops with the standard white belts, others with buff. I have also painted the officer with buff trousers or coveralls. I suspect that this is incorrect as the Officers would have worn Grey trousers as was standard for campaign duty. However, I had seen a picture showing an Ensign in buff trousers and according to a reference in C.E. Franklins British Napoleonic Uniforms, the Officers wore Buff breeches – however, I think that this is the dress uniform rather than campaign. That all said, Officers were responsible for their own uniforms and given the haste with which the British Army moved out to Waterloo, may be this officer stayed in his dress uniform… Regardless, I just wanted the unit to look a bit different on the gaming table. Finally, here is a close up of the models actually on the Battlefield of Waterloo, roughly in the position that the real Troops would have made their Stand.

Inniskillings 2014

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Category Archives: Napoleonic Army