Latest Sikh Regulars

With lots of 40mm Peninsualr posts thought I would breka it up with an unpublished post on some Sikhs I did a little while ago. These guys will take me to two full brigades each of 2 regiments each of those of two battalions.

Some of these images are a little dark so apologies guys.

These guys have a darker uniform than some of the other battalions so provide a nice contrast. 

The pinkish turbans are bright but not overly so, happy with that balance for now.

These figures are all Studio iniatures and some of the nicer figures from their early releases, taller and slimmer than Foundry they really need to be in seperate units. 

This lot were spare from Colin Ashtons lovely collection, thanks Colin, hope you like how they came out.

I also had this British officer back at the same time, really useful figure, the frock coat making him generic for any unit.

Another Perry Carlist Wars officer his uniform is non the less ideal for India. I wont need many more command figures now I think.

Ok thats it for these guys, the collection still has a way to go, its not the beginning of the end but perhaps the end of the begining.

40mm French Grenadiers & First Peninsular British

I continue to be enthused by the 40mm Figures and make a little steady progress. I managed to kick off this weeks work with some more French Grenadiers and my first British line, an Officer of the Connaught Rangers.

I plan a small formation of Grenadiers, two groups of 8 with a leader, this takes me to 9 figures and the Leader so I will probably focus on a few more of these over the weekend, see if I can get a formation complete.

The British officer is the first of my redcoats, I have a lot of these some what by accident. I picked up a bunch that were part painted from ebay, the previous owner had done a nice job but I needed to make them match mine so used his painting as a base coat and changed the facing colours so I could have the Connaught Rangers. I will try get a few more of these started once I complete the Grenadiers.

They are all Perry's 40mm and the seperate heads allow me to create a bit of variety in the unit along with different coloured trousers and shako covers, the odd figure in a different pose such as the middle figure at porte and the odd fiure in sleeved waistcoat like the right hand Grenadier will add to that variety so it hopefully doesnt look like a bunch of the same figure.

So with a head start and the wind behind me I have managed to get a fair bit completed, these French Grenadiers now mean I actually have 16 complete, this reaches my goal of two groups of 8 Grenadiers for the French.

The guy with the bayonet at charge seems to be looking at everyone else wondering why he is the odd one out. The different shako and trouser colours seem to have done the trick in making these all look like individuals I feel.

Alos managed to finish the last four 60th rifles. That gives me four units and enough left over for a unit of 95th as well.

This officer is really quite nice, done as 95th partially as I already have one for the 60th and partially as the company of 6oth and the small group of 95th along with the yellow faced British have a strong resemblance to the Sharp forces, the six 95th being the chosen men, the South Essex had yellow facings even though mine will be the 88th Connaught Rangers and in two of the stories Sharpe is supported by Sweet Wiliam and a company of 6oth. Just a bit of fun but nice all the same.

I have also painted the first three British line. The middle figure is Perry and the other two Sash and Sabre. I had my doubts about Sash and Sabre but they are easy to paint, lots of character and came out quite well. I am not convinced they scale well with Perrys mind you which are much slimmer. The British marching centre company figure is much of a muchness with the various heads not actually giving much variety at all. No idea if I can or will mix these in the units, decision for when I have a load more painted I think. Most will be in white trousers with some other colours mixed in.

Before posting I managed to finish a bunch more British Centre Comany troops, a Sash and Sabre Seargent who I really like and 5 Perry Privates who also came out really nice, the slightly off white of the Seargent and one of the privates adds a little mix, more browns and greys mixed in as we go but white will be the pominant colour.

Finally a picture of all 16 French grenadiers stuck to bases ready for basing media to be added. I may get some more painted before having a go at the basing. A few more British then get stuck into the Spanish next.

Nice to see pretty much completed units starting to come out, not a million miles away from enough for a small game.

See you again soon.

Indian Mutiny Sharp Practice Christmas Game

 We usually have a large fun game at the Barn in between Christmas and New year, followed by a late Lunch at the Duke of Wellington Pub.

Chris Flowers asked  Chris Charlton and I to put on the game and we decided it was an ideal opportunity to get his Indian Mutiny collection on table.  So the figures would mainly be Chris Charltons, Marks and a few of my irregulars.

We decided as there would be circa 10 of us to  if  Chris Charlton and I fancied organising something and we decided it was an ideal opportunity to get Chris's fresh Indian Mutiny collection on table supported by Marks Mutiny Highlanders and a fepsplit th table into two linke games divided by a river. One one side a British force would try to hold a walled village against a horde of Mutineers, whilst on the other a further horde would try to stop the advance of a relief column. Each table would have two British and two Indian players and its own Umpire and pack of cards to keep things moving.

At the last minute a couple of the guys needed to bail so we adjusted the first table to work for just two players.. You can see the table layout without figures below.

To help anyone who might want to pinch this for a game of their own I will put in the tables we had for each command. Firstly then the British defenders of the village.

Major Shorthouse, in the person of Malcolm, commanded a formation of twogroups of 8 company Europeans, 2 Groups of 8 Bhopal Contingent, a unit of Skirmishers, a unit of Volunteer horse and a gun.

Details below:

Richard would command his Mutineer opposition the.

The Khasi (Richard) had 5 Groups of 10 Mutineer rabble, two of Badmashes with big choppers, a skirmish unit and a Rocket unit.

Sir Sydney Ruff-Diamond led the, Rich Harris and John Smith relief column on table two with a unit of skinners horse, one native and one British skirmishers, a gun a foce of 3 groups of 8 Baluchi and 2 groups of 8 Queens Highlanders.

Facing Sir Sydney the famous leader Mustapha Leek had the better Mutineer forces, led by Chris Flowers and Rich Croisdale, with 3 groups of 8 well drilled mutineers, 2 grous of 8 cavalry, a group of skirmishers, a gun, two groups of 12 Badmashes with muskets, another group of 8 Matchlock bodyguard and two groups of 12 Badmashes with big choppers.

As I was umpiring the releif column game I didnt get to see much of the action on the other side. 

Chris Flowers with the irregular forces led by Mustapha Leek in his Elephant Howdah got his forces forward pretty quickly.

It took a couple of moves to get both sides anywhere near fitring ranges, allowign them all to get used the the card play system and how to use the rules and cards available.

On Chris's table Richard was pushing on with his tropps towards the village but taking some pain from the artillery.

Richard H pushed on with the forces under sir Sydney Ruff-Diamond hopign to push through on the right of the mutineer line against their irregular troops whilst Major Blunder (John) Led the Loyal Native troops and was tasked with keepign the better quality mutineers under Ricrad C busy.  A sound plan in theory.

Unfortunately for Chris getting forward quickly simply brought him into range of the Highlanders Enfield rifles whilst he was still outside of raneg with his matchlocks.

Malcolm seemed pretty rleaxed about the hordes of Mutineer rabble streaming towards him, then again he had a gun and their rockets were more than a little bit unreliable.

Wiht the game well pogressed a significant portion of Richards mutineers were still stuck ont he river line trying to get going.

Richard opens u at long range takign advantage of his troops rifles, forunately for Chris the firing is poor and only minimal damage to his main force, however his unit of Badmashes with big choppers takes some serious casualties.

Wiht John holding back with a view to keepign the Mutineers busy Richard C belts forward to occupy the village in the table centre. his troops now in cover its unlikely that John will move him. Everything now deends on the British regulars.

On the other side Riahcard closes with Malcolm but is takign significant casualties and shock at every step. Meanwhile the only casualties caused by his erratic rockets are on his own troops!

Chris Flowers finally gets his bodyguard matchlock men into range and insist on me takign a picture of the best dice throw he has made in months. 5 hits from 6 dice!

Richard Skirmishers take both shock and casualties.  And Chris badmashes with big choppers close with and destroy them.

On the mutineer left Richard C has swept his cavalry around and destroyed Sinners horse then swept on to hit and destroy the Gurkhas skirmishers and threaten the rear of the Baluchi firing line.

Firing at long range needing sixes against troops in hard cover has proved ineffective. Whislt Richard H has still the majority of his highlanders in good order he is not going to be able to break through and rescue the troops holdign the village on the other side of the river so as we approach time to go to the pub for chistmas dinner we declare victory to the Mutineers on this side of the river.

On the other side the Mutineers have taken a serious bashing and Major Shorthouse has comfortably seen them off with the mutineers loosing all of their morale points.

A nice bit of fun and silly bunkum we all went to to the pub for a lovely lunch at the Wellington.

Big thanks to Chris F for hosting, Chris C for umpiring and providing many of the figures and Msrk who couldnt make it but lent me his Mutiny collection anyway.

Happy New Year Everyone.