The Stutterheim brigade at Wagram for AOE/V&F in 20mm

 

The Stutterheim brigade at Wagram was constituted by the 2nd Jägers, the 5th Chevau-Légers and an artillery battery. During the battle the brigade was involved in the fighting around Aderklaa, defending the place, then loosing it and later recapturing it.  

I placed some of the Jägers with the old Raupenhelm of 1805 which, I think (or hope), that was still used by some units. The skirmish bases are not intended for brigade size wargames with most of the line infantry in Age Of Eagles having the SK mark showing skirmishing ability. The problem, at least for me, comes when a brigade only has infantry made of Jägers, not being very logical to show these troops in rectangular bases with 6 figures or even less. So I like to use these smaller stands that can be spread a bit all over. Another advantage is using them in smaller scale actions using other rules. 

The majority of the Jägers were changed to have the newer Corsican hat. The figures used were Esci British and Russian figures without shako. The trumpet came from the Esci Prussian and the third figure from the left is Italeri with my last Hat Corsican hat from their Austrian Landwehr box.

The brim of the hats were made from small pieces of card glued on the head. Then on top a piece of Belgian shako (without the top part) was glued. All Jägers, including the ones with the Raupenhelm, got a backpack. The rifles were also cut down to show the Jägerstutzen short rifle 1795 model and the Jägerkarabiner 1807 model. 

Klenau´s Chevau-Léger Regiment is made from the Revell British Life Guards, less the plume, on top of Airfix Hussar horses, due to the rear pointy shabraque. 

The more I paint these old types of plastic figures the more I get convinced that the figure designers of Revell, Airfix, Esci (and Italeri to an extent) were thinking to provide the basic types of equipment used in the Napoleonic wars and then trusting in its soft plastic for the conversion of whatever necessary by modellers and wargamers. In fact they had their hands full was they were making figures for all possible periods of history and thuis choice seems totally logical. Then StreletsR and Hat changed all this by making everything you need. In fact the British Life Guards can be turned easily into Austrian Dragoons or Chevau-Légers simply by changing the horse, cutting the plume and ignoring a bag under the canteen. Almost all horse´s legs in the air were glued to the base in order to provide a sturdier stand. 

                                 

Karl Wilhelm von Stutterheim was considered one of the best Austrian commanders of the 1809 war but he killed himself in 1811 at the age of 41 due to an unknown scandal while writing a book on that famous campaign. 

Next: French Cuirassiers

Austrian Uhlan Archduke Charles Regiment and Sommariva Cuirassier regiment for AOE/V&F in 20mm

 

The Austrian bug continues to bite. Painting Austrian cavalry is a very relaxing thing as the uniforms are not complicated and some beautiful units can be formed. 

The cuirassiers on the back row came straight from the Hat box but really challenging were the conversions made on the Mars box of Austrian Uhlans.

Even so the Hat Austrian cuirassiers had to have some changes as there are only figures holding a sword. One of them got his right arm bent in order to old a flag; another one became an officer with enlarged crest and different painted cuirass; the last change was the cornet who lost his sword, had its arm bent in order to hold a cornet. 

Heavily engaged on the 2nd day of Wagram, the Sommariva regiment participated in the frontal clashes against Davout´s III corps. 

The Mars Uhlans are more troublesome. With only four poses these figures are (L/R) an officer, two lancers holding high his lance or his sword and another one falling from his injured horse. There is a separate sprue with rifles, muskets, sword but only 3 lances. Like this you would have only 3 lancers, 3 swordsmen with others being officers and wounded Uhlans. 

Some changes had to be made then. One of the officers became a cornet...

... and nine others got plastic broom bristles for the lances and paper pennants after some changes on the arms. The falling horses had its front legs cut from the base and glued in a more natural position together with its mounted figure who had its right arm taken from the reigns and got a lance The Archduke Charles Uhlan regiment was not at Wagram but participated in the actions of Aspern-Essling a few months before. 

Next: 1809 Austrian Chevau-légers and Jägers

More 1809 Austrian infantry (IR 10 and Grenadier Battalion Brezjinsky) for AOE/V&F in 20mm

 

The Austrian infantry is in fact never fully made. You need hundreds of stands for Wagram, (in AOE terms - even at 1 stand/360 figures you need 223 bases of line infantry) and I´m around a bit more than half of the total. Together with this IR 10, made of Esci and Italeri figures, I painted one more Grenadier Battalion and an artillery stand. 

Two of the infantry battalions are Austrian figures but the third battalion got a different treatment. The torsos on the 2nd and 3rd ranks are French "line" from Esci with Austrian heads taken from kneeling figures. There are simply too many in both Esci and Italeri boxes and making three ranks, two of them standing, doesn´t help.  Backpacks were placed in all figures that didn´t have them. The French uniform in both brands have short coat tails and suit an Austrian unit very well if appropriately painted.

Like this they don´t stand that bad and you can reduce the number of headless figures. A good number of kneeling Esci and Italeri Austrians was still kept as I intend to couple them with Hat or Strelets Austrians.

The kneeling figures have to be used due to their numbers in old boxes. In fact I`m not sure if the Austrian infantry kneeled  even when in square like the British did with its first rank. 

The Esci figure biting its cartridge was converted into a drummer and is now smoking its pipe. 

This one, originally a Prussian sprue, came by mistake inside a box of Wurttemberg artillery as both are blue. The coat was cut here and there and painted as Austrian.

Next: more Austrian cavalry. 

The Granary of Essling for AOE/V&F in 20mm

 

The Granary of Essling is one of the essentials of the battle of Aspern-Essling, the other being the church of Aspern. This was a long time project that I wanted to get my hands on somehow. I thought about ordering one in 3d resin and 15mm but the easy shape of the building convinced me to scratchbuild it.

Even if Aspern-Essling was an Austrian victory the French Grenadiers of Lannes managed to keep the Granary up to the end of the battle after constant attacks by the reserve Austrian Grenadiers of Rosenberg on the 2nd day. 

The true building should be 50cm long in 1/72nd scale but this one is 16cm X 11cm. Only the height, 15cm, is close to the real 19cm. Card was used for the outer walls and roof. The windows are external and the small dormers are made in BlueBoard with card roofs.

The inside of the building was strenghtened with plywood which also serves to represent the 1 meter thickness of the walls that even resisted to cannon fire. 

The roof has this simple approach with the painting job -hopefully- doing the rest. 

The small side entrance is again in BlueBoard. This material is great for you to avoid lots of calculations as its a very easy material to work.

The roof fits nicely on the walls with the help of some plywood. 

The painting was simple: black priming; ochre walls with sand drybrush.The roof got dark grey on top of the black, followed by lighter greys for the the tiles with a brick red color at the end. 

A few pieces of card gave some details for the doors.

The front painting was copied from recent photos but in a slightly simplistic way. 

More details for the openings.

The back part of the building. The corners were made with many dozens of small card rectangles. A bit boring but the result is much better than simply painting them.

Archduke Charles is also an old desire of mine. Initially I thought about going Franznap which produces an amazing metal model of the man with one of the Nr. 15 regiment Zach  flags in its hands, something portrayed in many period paintings. In the end I opted for the cheaper and faster solution which was to convert the Austrian Italeri officer on horse and placing a Prussian head on top. 

The other models are also Italeri. The one with the telescope is a converted French officer from the staff box; the Hungarian officer is a conversion mixing the mounted Austrian officer with Hungarian legs (clearly a very conservative person keeping its old Raupenhelm as the Hungarian were the first to receive the shako around 1809) and the foot staff officer is Prussian with French head. 

The mounted generals are Esci and Italeri bodies from the Scots Grey boxes with  Prussian heads. 

The plume, coat tails and sashes are made from GreenStuff. The result is nice and the great thing about the numerous boxes of Napoleonic 1/72nd scale figure is the conversion possibility of having even the ones not made by the main brands. 

The Bissingen Grenadier battalion was also added and painted in the colors of the Nr 50 IR. The only figure to be converted was the flagbearer which began its life as a marching Grenadier before being promoted to a concentrated fire attraction.  

Next: more Napoleonics

The Wurttembergers at Wagram and Borodino for AOE/V&F in 20mm

 

I collected a small Wurttemberg force from Hat during the Covid days. I think my first seriously painted Napoleonics were some Esci Austrians painted as Wurttembergers maybe 40 years ago. Then these went to a friend´s house when Hat released their own boxes. 

These are the three boxes of Hat Wurttembergers: one box of cavalry with 12 figures; one box of artillery with 4 guns (only 3 are necessary) and one box of infantry with 100 figures. After looking for the OB of the Wurttemberg contingent during the Wagram battle (they were near Vienna, guarding comunication lines and thus they didn´t participate in the battle) I divided them into three brigades of infantry (one of them of Jägers), one cavalry brigade and three batteries of artillery. At Borodino the contingent was much smaller but still included men from all three arms. 

The blue figures are Bavarian leftovers from StreletsR turned into Wurttembergers as 8 figures were still missing.

A good thing about this army is that the Wurttembergers fought in two lines, even if they also knew how to do it in three lines. This saves at least 40 figures as I place 6 figures in three lines for most of the Napoleonic armies.

Th 2nd and 4th IR were used to provide figures for the two line infantry brigades. Besides the few Bavarians turned into Wurttembergers, two of the four officers became flag bearers with the left hand heated up in order to hold the flag.

The StreletsR Bavarian figures had a 1mm slice of the Raupenhelm cut out and a bit of GreenStuff was used for the tip of the crest.

The Bavarian artillery figures are the best of the three Hat boxes together with a nice gun divided into several parts. 

The horse artillery limber is scratch built: Irregular Miniatures wheels; wood parts from EverGreen plastic card, converted figures from Revell, Esci and StreletsR and horses from Valiant IF8 infantry cart given to me by the great Colin Rumford from Rapid Fire! fame (together with some other 200 sprues!).

If you want to avoid this trouble you can go to Franznap but prepare to open your wallet. The good thing about Franznap is that you will get first class figures, probably the best around. 

The Jägers form the 3rd brigade. The individual figures are for another set of rules were they can be used as this is not the case of Age of Eagles (AOE) or Valour&Fortitude (V&F) which are brigade level games. 

The cavalry is represented by the König Chasseurs à Cheval regiment. I couldn´t find any information about a flag for these troopers but I added  a pink one to go along with the facing colors. 

Next: The Essling granary and more Austrians.

Rapid Fire! in 20mm. Filling gaps in WW2 (part 7)

 

This batch of models plugs some holes in the OBs of several WW2 periods and armies. Retroaranda is a nice Spanish 3d on-line shop that I found while searching for the Vercors Gotha Go 242. They are still using PLA for their prints but dividing these kits into many parts which helps reducing lines and excess plastic. Besides, the kits arrive with all parts clean which makes them easy to build. There are also three kits from First to Fight, namely the funny little cutter KM12, a large 150mm sFH18 and the artillery crew. 

My Ariete division was very short of command vehicles and this lovely SPA Dovunque 35 radio vehicle comes in that sense. 

The kit has no exterior radio system and this one has to be scratch built. This  photo saved me from making too many mistakes on the roof of this radio vehicle. 

On the background of this photo you can see the two biggest inventions of the last decades,  cyanoacrylate and liquid plastic glue, far ahead from Covid19 vaccine and AI. What would be of us all without them? 

Some tracks, stairs and EverGreen plastics were used to improve the model. 

The Ford V3000 radio vehicle was built from 1941-on and will be helpful particularly for the Eastern Front. Only some stowage was added on the roof. The model also brings another antenna for the travelling position. 

This is another Japanese Type 89 Go. The other one I have is from MiniGeneral, made from a different file and slighly bigger. 

This artillery group - one 155mm sFH18  and a 105mm leFH16 -  is the one necessary for the bombardment of Saint-Nizier-du-Moucherotte, 13-15 June 1944 as part of the artillery of the 157th reserve infantry division. I already had several of these artillery pieces but in different colors and environments so a late war summer style group was necessary for the Vercors.

The artillery group who bombarded the Maquis position at St-Nizier made it from a distance of over 5 km and up to an height of over 1000 meters in relation to Grenoble. These stills are taken from the 2nd part of Le Maquis du Vercors- Juin 1944, La Bataille de St-Nizier. 

For the full video see 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aTRyf8seItk

and don´t forget part 1 and 3. 

In this still from the 2nd part of series you can see the St-Nizier heights in relation to the Grenoble valley.

And this is  the today sports park from were the German artillery bombed the Maquis. 

In this other screenshot of the 2nd part of the YouTube Le Maquis du Vercors- Juin 1944, La Bataille de St-Nizier you can see the placement of this artillery group who bombarded the Maquis position at St-Nizier from a distance of over 5 km and up to an height of over 1000 meters in relation to Grenoble and this is the one I´m portraying in RF! terms.  

I don´t have any information on the usage of these Gebirgshaubitze 40 105mm howitzers by the 157 RID as the division had several battalions of Gebirgsjäger. Even so I built these two that can be used elsewhere. 

The crew is FtF with heads from Airfix Afrika korps. There is also one Simon Soldier figure (the one with Zeltbahn) and a Revell conversion that previously was arming a grenade and now is pulling the gun string. 

Other crew for the guns came from FtF and all of them can be used from the artillery box. The seated figures need to bend the legs with heat in order to fit the narrow places on the Feldkanone 16. 

There are some figures with 20/37mm shells for AA guns that were converted to carry the big 150mm shells. That is easy as the FtF plastic is quite easy to carve. 

First to Fight offers the MK12 in 3d printed resin. I don´t know if this one will ever be used in a wargame but the magazine that comes along with the model has some nice stories (recently they are already in english side by side with polish) that can be used as the basis of several wargames. The figures are Revell and Hat WW1 Germans as the Polish sailors had the WW1 Stahlhelm for land combat and even the armored body of the German Stormtroopers, not used here. 

Finally for something wrong. What I asked was one more LVT-A4 in order to have a pair of them to support the Marine landings in the late war period. The designer by seeing the "4" on the vehicle´s name thought that the turret of the M8 75mm HMC fitted the late LVT-4 when in fact the very different LVT-2 was its basis. The "4" just means the 4th way to place guns on the LVT-2 Amtrac. So I got something wrong that needed to be used somewhere. The idea for this conversion came from the following photo: 

One of the few different models from the LVT-4 basic was an ambulance model deprived from its guns and painted with (lots) of red crosses. The canvas cover in the model was made from hardened tissue paper with cyanoacrylate in order to cover the big hole of the turret. This photo sometimes looks a bit fake as the smaller red crosses look strange but I read that "Sphinx" shows in two forms around the Walcheren period, one armed and another - this one - already without its guns. Probably the same vehicle used in two different ways. 

Next: More Napoleonics