American War of Independence - Will McNally's rules - BritishGrenadiers.

These are the two British Grenadier battalions necessary for Brandywine 1777 to be used in the flanking attack around Birmingham hill.

They are the old Airfix figures and finally I had a good excuse to paint these figures instead of converting them to Spanish Grenadiers of Napoleonic era or some other worse idea.

 

These guys have some mistakes due to old age probably. First they are typical Airfix of the 70's which means incomplete figures. In this case the lack of a sword, wings in the shoulders (or at least barely seen) and a bread bag are noteworthy. Also a strange feather on the left side must be painted or erased.

The officer is taken from the American infantry box and a scabbard was added. Also the right side drummer comes from the Austrian 7YW from Revell just for the sake of variety.

 

 

Some of the figures had torsos placed on other legs like the figure standing in the middle of the rear rank.

American War of Independence - Will McNally's rules - British and American Artillery

                         

These are the  previous models already painted.

The Austrian artillerymen that I used for these guns came out nicely but they are not true AWI and somehow they look a bit too classic for that conflict. Some sleeveless or hunting shirts would also be appropriate so may be next time I'll make some conversions.

                         

In the case of the British that is not as noticeable as they had probably a more homogenous and professional look. 

                           

'You see dead people?'

Yes, so do I. 

They are the venerable, unuseful  and piled up laying down Airfix figures used as casualty markers. 

I heated all parts that could stand in the air and cut the head and glued it face to the ground. Some of the more stubborn arms were cut trying to reproduce the awful effects of artillery. 

Before gluing them to the bases it`s better to have in the center of the stand  some 2/3 mm of sand/paint/glue in order to squash the figure into this mix so it can fit better. Remember these figures were firing and waiting and also alive and now they should look like real casualties. 

Like this I think you can alter these figures and use them somehow.

American War of Independence - Will McNally's rules - Hessian Artillery painted.

The Hessian artillery in America consisted apparently of 4 pdr guns of Swedish origin and the Revell artillery is a close match. The figures are in my opinion some of the best ever and in order to have Hessians I just placed a pom-pom in the tricorne and used a paint job that somehow showed lapels in the coats.

The wheels were also glued two milimeters or so apart from the carriage.

- Herr capitan... can we stay here after zee war?

- Hmm... Ok, it's better, we may be ruled in zee future by an Austrian who vill kill us all or by a voman ...

- Ja! Vitch is zee worse?...

The horse holders should be civilians and are conversions from figures holding ramrods and spikes.

You can see the previous post for the carriage making based on the Airfix Napoleonic French artillery.

American War of Independence - Will McNally's rules - Modelling AWIArtillery

The PSR site is a normal way for us to find useful information on our beloved plastic figures. It also help us save some unuseful buyings like in my opinion with AWI artillery. This is the case of the IMEX artillery, the only company that produces plastic boxes on the subject. The IMEX  figures shown in the PSR site are absolute beauties but the problem comes with the artillery pieces themselves. They are small and without the usual side box between barrel and wheel. Besides no limber or news about it in the future.


So the solution came from the old 7YW Austrian box of artillery. Plenty of poses (15!!!), good barrels and carriages, plenty of horses and riders, everything you need to portray AWI artillery. Of course the uniform is Austrian but it can be adapted easily to all beligerants of this war.The rest is some imagination and a few hours of work.

What you loose from not using the IMEX items are the figures who are real AWI figures while these ones are designed (and well) to the 7 YW which happened in the previous decade. So the uniforms are not the exact ones but they can be changed with a proper paint job.

The Airfix and Esci French or British  Napoleonic artillery will also be useful as you will see.

  

The 3pdr is made from Airfix French  guncarriages, Revell barrel and styrene stowage boxes.

The 5.5 inch Howitzer barrel  comes from ESCI on a Revell carriage. I didn't completely plugged the wheels into the axis as the gun would be too narrow.

 The 6 pdr are a marriage between Esci and Revell.

The Hessian 4 pdr are the original Revell models without the two connections at the end of the carriage which were typical of the Austrian Flying artillery of the 7YW.

The limbers for the 3/4 pdr are Airfix carriages turned upside down and glued to the horse. The pintle was cut from the part that enters the unecessary wheel.

This time wheels were necessary. The 6 pdr limbers  are again made from Airfix parts that all of us over 30 YO will recognize.

Don't forget to search the Web for good information. Can't remember the site of this page, as I Google for images sometimes and loose track of their origin, but you can see (Left  to Right) the French 4 pdr; the American 6 pdr; the British 6 pdr and the 3 pdr. Also some limbers at the bottom right. 

American war of Independence - Will McNally's rules - Hessian Infantry Regiment Von Donop

Once again a full Revell unit that fits nicely into the Hessians that fought for England in the AWI.

Brigade commander Von Stirn. Apparently he was around 60 YO by 1777 and probably not as a handsome figure like this one from Revell and probably a bit more on the 'round' shape.

Several of the poses you can see above were changed. Some of the kneeling and and standing fire figures had their torsos and legs interchanged for the sake of variety. The right  hand of the middle figure came from the 'dead' figures from Airfix I'll post next. The flag bearers had their nice but small flags taken out and replaced by plastic shafts and printed flags.

Von Donop site once again provided the necessary information.

American War of Independence - Will McNally's Rules - 2nd Pennsylvania Regiment

One more American Regiment for Brandywine. This time it's the 2nd Pennsylvania. The figures are the leftovers of the Italeri box I used for the 2nd Maryland.

This box offers four different firing figures, two standing and two kneeling. The figure standing to the left had the hat flying from the head as if being shot or blown away by the wind. The hat was taken out, the head severed by the middle and the head cover glued in its proper place.

One of the kneeling figures has a big stone protecting the firer. I disguised that stone with many other around otherwise they would look a bit silly standing alone.

The figure to the right is probably a survivor of the 9/11 with a very nasty wound in the arm and another in the head. Probably it was designed with Yorktown in mind with rejubilant Americans knowing about Cornwallys surrender.

Once again Tarleton Quarter blog gave most of the information for painting these figures.

Now let's move again to some more Hessians.

American War of Independence - Will McNally's Rules - Pennsylvania Militia

 

A few days ago I saw 'The Patriot' once more. And once more I got sad for being the more commercially available movie to inspire AWI buffs. It's filled with mistakes and even with the South African comedian Trevor Noah joking and saying a lot of truths about British colonialism (and Portuguese if you also want), the XVIII century englisman didn't deserve to be treated like Nazis. That 'Tavington' (the historical Tarleton) is incredibly mistreated and the whole political aspects of the movie should have been heavily criticized. In fact the British were some of the few to show respects for the Indians with the Proclamation act of 1763 something the future Americans were quick to ignore and started one of the most shameful pages in history with the destruction of the Indians. That would be a hell of a story for Hollywood!!

 

Then the details are also awful with British with yellow or blue cuffs with Green flags and so forth. Also no Grenadiers anywhere. And there are some great reenactemnent group in the US that would be eager to help for sure.

But the Camden battle scene is well achieved and you can see  some milita well portrayed. So militia for Brandywine followed. These figures  represent  one of the two brigades of Pennsylvania  militia present on that battle. Seven stands total to represent James Irvine Brigade.

Almost all figures got a new hat, otherwise you would have plenty of bold men and plenty of caps all over that Revell offers. Many of them are with the popular hunting shirt while others have some part of their old uniform for having been conscripts in the Continental line.

 

Some of the figures got transformed so they can look as if they are panicking an idea I took from the excellent 28mm Perry  used in 'Tarleton Quarters' blog, probably the best one if you want to see AWI figures. In fact you have an almost encyclopedia of uniforms there and also many of the Brandywine units.

- Stay in the line! Look at this oldie by your side facing the enemy!
- That's 'cause his legs can't move no more. I'm leavin'.