To paraphrase the song by Lloyd Price ( it was released in 1959 so I’ll forgive you if you dont know it….) you need Personality in your army to really make it interesting! Which is just one reason why we are such fans of Trent Miniatures here at Arcane scenery. As well as producing the usual range of Rank and File troops for the Napoleonic Period, Trent have gone to great lengths to ensure that there are figures representing some of the lesser known characters of the time. If you are building an army you will of course want Generals and Leaders and whilst most manufacturers will produce generic officers, not many of them stray beyond the ‘Big Names’ Napoleon, Ney, Wellington, Picton etc
Trent Miniatures produce quite a collection of Characters from the Revolutionary period and from quite separate theatres. So if you are looking for something a bit different, have a look through the Trent Range. If it’s British Characters, how about Sir John Moore, Sir David Dundass, Stapleton Cotton or even the Grand old Duke of York himself!
The Grand Old Duke of York!
The Irish have plenty of choice too. There’s Joseph Holt, Michel Dwyer, Robert Emmet and the main man, Wolf Tone:
General Wolf Tone
The French Revolution also had a counter revolution by Royalists in the Vendee and Britanny. The leaders included de la Rochejaquelin, de la Tremouille, d’Eblee, Marquis deLescure, Francois Charette & Jaques Cathelineau, all available as personality packs from Trent.
A gathering of Chouans!
The picture above shows Chouans with the flags of (from right to left) Brittany, The Prince de Talmont (Antoine Phillipe de la Tremouille), and the standard of Charette (Francois Athanase charette de la Contrie). The flags are produced by Flag Dude, should you wish to obtain them.
The French have their own Generals to sort out the rebels across the Empire. You can choose from General Brune, General Humbert, Joachim Murat and yes, there is a Napoleon as he was as First Consul.
General Brune is just one of the French Generals available
Other personalities include Tousaint L’Overture from Haiti, Andreas Hofer Hofer, fighting in the Tyrol; Pasquale Paoli, rebeling on Corsica and even Tecumseh, the Shawnee leader who fought from the American war of Independence through to the 1812 War in the USA.
The Hofer gang taking cover in the tyrol
Back to the European theatre, there are a couple of Polish Generals to collect, General Antoni Kosinki and General Jan Henryk Dabrowski.
The joy of all of these models is that the personalities tell their own story. A quick search on Wikipedia will reveal details of the careers of these characters and help to bring to life the detail of the Revolutionary wars. This is often a good way to discover the background to a particular conflict.
Many wargamers have to deal with the dreaded collectors bug that strikes from time to time! These characters wont help cure this affliction but they are nice to collect and paint simply to add to your collection. I cant ever see myself painting a Polish Napoleonic army but I am tempted to have a go at painting Kosinki or Dabrowski as a display figure for my cabinet. I find that sometimes a break from churning out units and armies to just paint one character figures is a good way of getting your painting mojo back, if ever you are feeling a bit jaded at the thought of yet another battalion of redcoats or blue coats!
Pascale Paoli would make an interesting Guerrilla leader on the Peninsular.
To view the full Trent Miniatures collection, follow this link:
TRENT MINIATURES
At the time of writing, they are all available post free from Arcane scenery – if you are not familiar with the range, you may just be surprised at how many useful items they have!