1813-15 battles in 20mm for AoE and V&F - (part 30) 1st and 2nd Light Brigades of the Netherlands Cavalry Division

 

These two brigades - Ghigny and van Merlen - finishes the Netherlands Cavalry Division after Trip´s Heavy Brigade done some time ago. 

In TC´s exchange I got some 30 nice painted Peninsular British Dragoons with the Tarleton helmet.  Initially, it looked like there were several boxes of painted Hat industry figures but on a closer look I noticed there was only one with the other being conversions from the Airfix British RHA. And they were so well done! My job was to use these as  the 8th Belgian Hussars and 6th Dutch Light Dragoons after repaint, taking the advantage of the Hussar coat of all figures. The shakoes came from the dead Zvezda light infantry you can see lying all over... what a plassacre! 

Here you can see some of the Airfix bodies used by TC to make cavalrymen. The legs are Esci, something I also just did in the previous post. 

The only the shakoes were taken from the Zvezda figures, a risky operation that has to be done carefully with a new blade. Here I behaved like the Cumberland Hussars and got scared of using some Milliput to make the typical bedrolls around the torso which was typical in the Dutch-Belgian cavalry even if not universal. In order to find an excuse for myself I thought about the heavy rain that fell on the previous day of Waterloo and the possobility of the bedrolls being soaking wet and left at the rear position. Even asked AI what was their opinion but nope, the bedrolls were most probably used as they provided some protection at combat. 

The rear pointy shabraque was simply painted on the Hat and Esci horses.

One last conversion was on the 8th Belgian Hussar cornet which got a Hat Colpack as it should. MSJ website shows the colpack without cords or sac but it looks better with both.

Next: the 36th Belgian Jaeger (Detmers brigade) 

1813-15 battles in 20mm for AoE and V&F - (part 29) British Light Dragoons

 

These are two more brigades of Light Dragoons (LD) for Waterloo exclusively with LD regiments, the 3rd and 4th Cavalry Brigades. From the recent exchange with TC I got a box of lovely KGL dragoons (12 figures). In order to make the total of 32 LD cavalrymen I used a trick I was planning a long time ago and that was to use the horses and figures of the Esci and Italeri Scots Greys. These, due to my usual eagerness, ended up being something like 7/8 boxes over the years, even after using several of them for the Union Brigade and converted Peninsular Dragoons.  So something had to be done with them and the Esci/Italeri figures would be the base but coupled with French shakoes. 

Here you can see the lot:

- the front Brigade (4th Brigade of General Vandeleur) is represented by the 11th LD regiment and has Esci/Italeri Scots Grey torsos with shakoes from Italeri late French infantry (from those repeated countless heads you get from extra drummers, eagle-bearers and officers). The shako was cut from the peak and the original head remained. Superglue made the joint but as the joint is quite big it seems to be well fixed and the final varnish does the rest. 

- the rear Brigade (3rd Brigade of General Dornberg, accused of being one of the culprits of Ligny defeat, after arresting a British scout who was bringing intelligence) is represented by the 23rd LD regiment with 12 Hat figures and 4 Esci/Italeri conversions. 

These are the Hat figures in all its glory. The shabraque on all of these guy's horses is the officer´s shabraque but even so they are nice figures. 

As I told you my true British LD ended in the above 12 Hat figures and a few conversions had to be made in order to finish that brigade. The Scots Grey of Esci and Italeri were pinned to the full head of the late French by Italeri with some reasonable results as the detail of the uniform is very soft and the cut in British cavalry uniform is virtually the same in most of the different types of British troopers. 

The 4th Brigade only has the Italeri shako glued to the head of the Esci figures but it works reasonably well. 

The 4th Brigade before painting. The face kept on being British with new French brains. After all, all of them are descendents of William I, so no big deal, at least from my Peninsular point of view.  

Some of the Esci/Italeri torsos don´t have the carbine and these were added from the spares. The problem with this particular conversion is the absense of epaulettes which were simply painted. In the end these are cheap conversions made from leftovers which allows for two more brigades. And  this is one of the advantages over 28mm figures as the small problems like epaulettes simply painted or uniform cut differences are barely seen in 20mm size but gigantic in 28mm. 

Next: More Waterloo with Vietnam and SCW stash sending me menacing looks

1813-15 battles in 20mm for AoE and V&F - (part 28) The conversions on Airfix French artillery already painted

 

The lot from the last post is already painted. It consists of converted Airfix French artillery mostly with new wheels and new limbers.

The half bodies of french artillery on top of italeri Cuirassiers legs came out OK even if the Airfix horses are on the small side. The exception is the one to your left coming from the British set but I had no more left since I made a large batch of British artillery a few post ago. 

With everything put together and painted these sets look nice and are somewhat unique. 

The backpacks of the drivers were erased with fire applied gently as the backpacks are not very big on these figures. Then the crossed belts are simply painted. The whips are made each from two pieces of plastic. 

The limbers itselves don´t have the detail of say the Zvezda limbers but are reasonable for me. 

The Airfix crews are very lively, something that happened in all their artillery sets from Napoleonics, ACW, WW1 up to WW2. The figure holding the ram is fabulous and one of the most elegant figures ever made. 

Next: British light cavalry

1813-15 battles in 20mm for AoE and V&F - (part 27) The Airfix French artillery with some improvements

When I was a boy - maybe 8 or 9 yo, almost 50 years ago - I found with awe in downtown Coimbra a shop window crammed with Airfix boxes while strolling with my mother. Suddenly, in the Toy Shop street all other shops had the same thing: lots of Airfix kits in the shop windows! There also I understood that the mosquito that bit me didn´t bit other kids, as they would pass on the same shop windows and didn´t even look at those boxes that were for me the closest thing to paradise that I have ever seen. Quickly the deal with my mother was to take two at a time, after all a sole army needed someone to fight with. I´m not sure but I think the French artillery and some British infantry were the first. Or was it the French infantry against the British Guards band? Or both ACW sets of infantry? Frankly I can´t remember right as all free time and money became for ever connected with buying those magic small boxes. Of course I started to go with my grandmother to downtown too and had a particular interest in picking my father that worked nearby. In fact my father became my main assistant as he was also very fond of modelling even if he prefered cars, trains and peaceful stuff. So one model for him and two or three for me would be our deal each time we were passing on Adelino Veiga street. 

The French artillery set is beautifully designed but with many errors, which for me in those days were completely indifferent. Later on, I found in the Funcken books and in the Millitary Modelling magazines (also bought in downtown Coimbra) that the limbers were very wrong in toy like style, the gun tubes too large and the wheels too small. Even so these guns went to defend the Alamo or to attack it, went to the Napoleonic Spanish army while others I have no idea were they went. Some were converted like this others stayed like the originals. Recently I got a number of them from the exchange made with TC and decided to have a go at reusing them but with some changes. 

The wheels of the guns were discarded but reused for the limbers. For that I copied the measures of my own Hat industries limbers, built new ones from plastic card and tubing and stuck the wheels in the axle as the wheels of the Airfix guns  are the same size as the wheels of the Hat limber.  

The horses used are also from the Airfix set plus a few others from here and there. Next to the horses you can see the blue artillerymen which will be cut in half in order to produce drivers. The horses are in 1/76th scale while figures are 1/72nd but everything came from the same factory so I just hope they get along. 

The guns themselves got new and larger wheels from the Esci Russian Crimean artillery, a trick I learned from Will McNally of the super famous Fire at Will blog. 

 

The horses got new stowage made from GreenStuff and the figures torsos were pinned to Italeri Prussian Cuirassiers legs as knee tall cavalry boots are necessary. In the meantime, not shown here, the backpacks and epaulettes were melted with fire and some whips were glued to the right hand of the drivers. Also the ropes tying the limber to the horse got some heat for better hold and looks. 

They are ready to be painted.

Next: this lot painted. 

1813-15 battles in 20mm for AoE and V&F - (part 26) The British Heavy Cavalry at Waterloo

 

The British Heavy Cavalry was considered by Napoleon some of the best cavalry of Europe but the worst led. In fact the British cavalry at Waterloo was a mix of breathtaking bravery but also a disastrous lack of control. This led to its defeat in the 18 June 1815 by the French lancers and cuirassiers with the loss of many men and many officers including General Ponsonby (commander of the Union Brigade), Hamilton (commander of the Scots Greys) and Packe (commander of the Blues). Even so the initial charges destroyed a good part of the French D´Érlon corps and eventually being considered a factor of the final success of both British and Prussians.

To the left you can see the Household Brigade and to the right, the Union Brigade. 

I didn´t paint the cornet´s horses in grey (exceptuating the Scots Grey which are already all mounted in grey horses) as the British had already officially abandoned grey horses even if it is known that the rule was only partially followed. 

1st and 2nd Life Guards at the front and the Royal Horse Guards (The Blues) to the rear. All figures are Revell. 

The King´s Dragoon Guards and 2nd Dragoons (Hat miniatures). 

The Scots Greys (Italeri and Esci). 

Having only one box of British Dragoons from Hat I sorted out the 6th Inniskilling by mixing Scots Greys from Esci with Italeri French Dragoons. 

And here they are. This mix made me thought once again on how clever the old plastics designers were. Esci, for instance by providing a box of Scots Greys allows for conversions for other Dragoon units if you use for instance the heads of the Esci French Cuirassiers (or Italeri Dragoons as above). The plastic reigns were added later as the Esci horses are incomplete even if beautifully sculpted. 

Next: more British cavalry 

1813-15 battles in 20mm for AoE and V&F - (part 25) The Dutch Militia and high command at Waterloo

 

The Dutch militia is an important part of Wellington´s infantry (13%) on the 100 days campaign not only due to its numbers abut also because they didn´t behave that bad, at least as expected from militia, sometimes retreating but also placed in exposed positions against the Grand Batterie, as it was the case of Bylandt´s brigade. 

William, Prince of Orange, and its ADC are Waterloo1815 figures. He was wering this flamboyant uniform of Hussar influence at the 100 days. 

Obviously Waterloo1815 got the inspiration for the figure from this famous painting, were his horse, Wexy, is white. The white horse was usual in wartime paintings were it stood out in the middle of the black smoke of a battlefield. In fact this was not true in this, and many other cases. 

 Wexy can still be see at the Royal Stables at Hague, were he was preserved after being taxidermied. Chestnut was his obvious colour. 

General Perponcher (2nd Dutch division) was in its 40s, so just a bit of white hair was painted. The figure is an Italeri Prussian. with its left side medal cut out. 

General Chassé (3rd Dutch division) is another Italeri figure, this time British in its birth. Chassé was in its 50s and a bit more white hair was added. I like these kind of details even if they are not significant in wargame terms but gives you the feel that you are doing the right things. 

The Dutch Militia here is Hat from the mixed box with Belgians. Only the officer and drummer are Italeri as the Hat box carries none of these. Also the flank companies have some Hat British light infantry due to the shoulder wings. I was about to use the officer and drummer from Hat´s Napoleonic British Command but Italeri places a lot of these figures in a box and you end up with too many of them which can be used here. Besides the officer of the Militia used the French influenced shako while the Hat British command only have the Belgian/Portuguese and the stovepipe shako. 

Next: British cavalry for Waterloo

1813-15 battles in 20mm for AoE and V&F - (part 24) Les Géants

 

These were the "big Guys on big horses", the Grenadiers à Cheval de la Garde were the last unit of the French Guard still to be done. This is one more conversion this time using the horses and bodies of Italeri Dragoons and the heads of the very old Airfix Foot Grenadiers (the officer has a Zvezda head). 

In fact both French Horse Grenadiers and Dragoons shared the same uniform cut, which, even better, barely changed all along the Napoleonic wars. 

The good thing about the Airfix Grenadier heads are the big heads they have (compared with the bodies) and so they blend quite well with the much bigger Italeri bodies. 

The officer with Zvezda head had to have a plume and this why no Airfix figure was used here. 

Unfortunately you only need 4 stands for Waterloo AoE as these guys are a nice sight with their black horses and imposing figures. 

Next: More Dutch

1813-15 battles in 20mm for AoE and V&F - (part 23) Chevaux-Légers lanciers of the line

 

The Line lancer´s brigades were a structural part of each French Corps and were used at Waterloo in the famous counter attacks against the British heavies, the Union and the Household Brigades, which were completely shattered in a few minutes. Here the lances proved much superior in combat against the sword. 

From front to rear you have the 2nd regiment (representing Gobrecht Brigade), 4th regiment (Wathiez), and 6th regiment (Colbert).  

In order to make these three brigades I never thought about the ones available in the market, Hat and Waterloo1815, as I have too much stuff in the stash which I could convert. Initially, I thought about Polish lancers from Esci with heads from the Italeri Carabineers. But then, after looking carefully at the Italeri Carabineers I found them a good base for the final result without any need for the Esci Lancers, making the job easier.  

What you need to do is:

- to shave the top part of the boots;

- shave the front part of the cuirass (still not done here in the right side figure);

- cut the swords, twist with heat the arms in order to receive the lance;

- shave the shabraque cloth and only leave the sheepskin to be shown.

Don´t forget to leave two figures with the epaulettes for the elite company. 

Only the horses of the officers came from the Esci lancers as you need the pointy rear shabraque. 

The flags were not used by these regiments and left at the depot but they always look great in Napoleonic units. 

The 2nd lancers had cornets with the blue dolman which was kept from previous campaigns. The figure to the right is firing his mousqueton and keeps his lance in a small leather bucket on the right stirrup and by a leather sling over the shoulder. 

Another good reason for using the Italeri carabineers as the basis for the Line Lancers is the almost invisible cuirass, particularly at the back. 

The 4th lancers had cornets with the later green uniforms.

The 6th lancers had the famous officers with red trousers and an even more spetacular Czapka on his cornets. 

Next: Maybe the British heavy cavalry at Waterloo