24th Bengal Native Infantry

I was looking forward to getting this unit back from the basing department, Its the first one with white summer uniform trousers, add to that the white cap covers and white facings and its a really bright looking unit.

The 24th fought in Bolton's first brigade with Harry Smiths Division at Mudki and Hicks brigade at Ferozeshah and Aliwal, fighting alongside the Queens 31st foot and 47th BNI both of which I have painted so that's another historical brigade completed. Brigades did alter slightly so the 47th was in a different brigade after Mudlki.

As usual I have used a mix of manufacturers with Iron Duke Indian Mutiny alongside both the Foundry mutiny and Sikh Wars ranges led by a Perry Carlist Wars officer. Personally I think they all fit nicely and add a bit of variety to the unit which looks very mobile.

As usual the basing department has done a nice job and brightened things up with a little bunch of flowers on one base.

I am really not  a fan of painting white, its boring and difficult to get right, however I may need to convince myself to add a bit more in for the next BNI unit as I do like how they look once complete.

So this takes me to 5 Bengal Native Infantry units, alongside 3 Queens battalions finished, one more BNI battalion and thats the first 3 brigades completed so good progress.

Added to the other units completed we are on track for a pretty decent sized game when we are finally allowed to meet up again.

Thanks for reading all, see you again soon, stay safe.

New Toys

Look what the postman brought!

Had a couple of days in Northumberland (more on that later) to break the monotony and returned to a bunch of gear for the Sikh Wars project.

The first box was Sikh Cavalry picked up from Roo on the Lead Adventure Forum. He sold me a bunch of un-needed cavalry and kindly let me pick out the ones I needed.

Enough here to give me at least three units which will finish off the Sikh cavalry completely.

Also in the post was a bunch of mainly Sikh regulars from chum Colin, most of these will actually be surplus to requirements so I have agreed to sell them on ebay and donate the proceeds to Marie Curie Cancer Care, keep an eye out for them if you are interested.

Amongst tht figures from Colin was these guys, I think they are the Old Glory Sikh Gurkhas, musket armed rather than the Foundry ones which have rifles, muskets do seem more likely. I am very tempted to pull out the best 6 for a skirmish screen and perhaps paint red as Purbia infantry. Either way most of these will get used.

Lastly was a box of goodies from Empress which I had been looking forward to, a number of bits and peices but mostly gear to help me finish off the baggage train.

This bullock cart is just lovely, the bullocks are fantastic sculpts, 2 different beasts and seperate heads so you can make them up into four entirely different ones if you get a number of them, useful for the bigger gun limbers that use this same model.

The ammunition camel train. now the camels are bit skinny and spindly for me (the only criticsim I have of pretty much anything in this range) that said really well sclupted and crew are fantastic, mixed in with my three other baggage camels these will look brill. Once I have these done the baggae train will have 7 camels, one elephant, one bullock cart, a couple of bearers and half a dozen donkeys and mules. I was very tempted by the baggage elephant too but those long poles done in resin look too prone to snapping for me, possibly one to come back to.

Four irregular horses for the Irregular cavalry recently donated by chum Chris and to be eventually used as Skinners horse I hope. Again cracking beasts and very dynamic. The horses are far bigger than the old Foundry ones so are being kept in seperate units. The horses are the one par tof the Foundry ranges that really dont mix anymore.

The Afghan mercenary command is one of my favourites from the whole range, very characterful. Looking at these I am reminded of the interview with the Perry twins. They were asked if they looked at the market before sculpting a range to see if there was a gap, they admitted they did but were only really put off if Paul Hicks had already done a range. You can see why, these are just brilliant.

On the subject of Perry's the Empress sculpts fit perfectly between the old Foundry and newer Perry ranges so mix really well. This pack of sepoys will mix with my Foundry figures once the chap in the skull cap gets a head swap or greenstuffed.

Lastly is a pack of 8 Bengal Light Cavalry, the chap with the turban will again have a head swap, I will however be very careful as the head is wonderful and I want to re-use. Possibly as an Officer of Skinners. These guys complete my purchases for the Indian Cavalry for this project. I have the first two of this unit already painted a while ao and soem of the horses already started so may look at these sooner rather than later.

So another step closer to megolamania or just to finishing the project, lookinG forward to gettinG stuck into these. Hopefully you will see some of them trickle through soon.

More Afghans - Muslim Hill Tribes for Sikh Wars

The Basing Department  is back in full swing and I picked up a number of units this weekend. The first being these Afghans to be used as Muslim Tribal Irregulars in the Punjab.

One base of blade armed warriors the others with muskets and jezails.

There is an eclectic mix of manufacturers here, with Perry, Foundry and Studio metals alongside Wargames Atlantic plastics. Generally I think they work.

The kneeling plastic warrior looks tiny in this shot, I cant decide if that is camera angle or reality as some other folks have mentioned this figure seeming too small.

The Perry sculpts are my favourites by far but taken as a whole I think these guys actually look quite good.

Some of the Plastics come out much better than others, but as fillers they are ok, weirdly the bases seem larger than other figures hence one dangling off the back here which is annoying me a little bit.

The Studio figures are slightly wooden for my taste, they are however lovely simple figures to paint and again mix in well enough with the others to add a level of variety.

With Perry's plastic Afghans coming soon it will be interesting to see how they mix in and add another level of variety to this mixing pot of ranges.

First Camel Gun based

I had this idea when thinking how best to use the empress Jingle donated by chum Chris, I decided that these guys were having to man-handle the gun due to the demise of their transport and gun mount, I like the look of this little vignette, pretty much as I imagined it.

I should however apologise for the quality of the pictures, the bright summer sun seems to be washing out a lot of my pictures at present. Some of the later pictures in the series were taken by Sam my daughters Fiancee to see if we could get any better.

The camel was also donated by chums Richard and Andy of Legendary wargames, a spare from their superb Sudan collecction,  https://legendarywargames.com/

The gun model itself is a bit of fun from the Empress Jazz Age Imperialism range and a lovely Paul Hicks sculpt, the Camel a Perry's Sudan model.

Just for a change I did the basing myself on this one.

Its my first use of the tall grass I bought a bit back and I quite like how it has worked, may use some more on other bases.

Chris reckons I need to add a wound to the camel and some blood coming from its mouth, to add so drama to the scene I guess. I am un-decided.

I am pretty happy with how this one turned out even if the photos dont all do it justice. With that in mind I asked the Photography department (Daughters Fiancee) to try a few shots so here they are followed by a last one from my mobile.

This last one taken on my phone is actually amongst the bets of the lot bizarely. Must sort the photography out really.

More Zanbureks to follow at some point, cheers!

Zamburak Camel Guns Work in Progress

For some time I have been wondering how best to approach Indian Camel Guns or Zamburaks. The Sikhs used literally thousands of these in the larger battles, often supporting the irregular cavalry.

Wargames Foundry do a lovely one in their old Indian Mutiny range but I just couldnt see it working being fired over the camels head whilst moving and there is only the one model. A quick google shows they were likely used in a different way.

 

Westfalia Miniatures  (I think) do a nice Persian camel gun which gave me some ideas, I then came across a bunch of Afghans for sale on ebay that came with 6 seated camels and I thought ah ha I can try my hand at converting these.

Chum Chris Charlton helped me source some guns and with the addition of some crew we were off.

First three Zamburaks are below and I am pretty happy with how these have developed.

This first one has a large Trent Miniatures Jezail with two Foundry gunners, the Officer is from the Old mutiny range but looks suitably "Sikh" alongside a gunner from the Sikh Wars range.

This next one is crewed by two Afghan gunners and uses the Blood and Plunder pirate swivel gun, I have images of both swivel guns and large Jezails being used so happy with both options.

This third one has 2 Empress Afghan gunners manhandling their Jezail over the camels neck, clearly slightly inept, with the Foundry Afghan chieftain exhorting them on.

I do like how slightly comical these two look, the Pathan version of Laurel and Hardy.

A better view of the swivel gun, photographic evidence shows these either as all bronze or all iron affairs. My next one might be iron.

Another rear shot of the one with the Jezail mounted, if anything they just look slightly too high to be used by the gunners, I am not too phased by that though, overall suitably happy.

I haven't glued the crews on for basing yet, mainly because I have 3 more camels and some more crew to paint and I want to be sure I have the right crew with the right gun from a visual perspective but I don't think these are far off at all.

So pretty pleased with how these have come out, I dont yet know what stats to give them for the battlefield, maybe the range of rifles (Rather than guns or muskets) and no canister option?  They need to be slightly useful rather than devastating, whilst the Sikhs had lots of these the accounts dont really mention them causing large numbers of casualties.

A little something different and I hope you like them, more to follow. Cheers.