Russian artillery repurposed

My 1808 Finnish war project has been slowing down somewhat recently. I did try out one idea which proved quite good. I have a small force of 1812 Russians already painted. Unfortunately almost none of those figures fit the 1808 setting, as the uniforms changed quite a bit. The artillerymen’s uniforms however, are wrong only when it comes to the shakos. And because the Warlord Games Russian artillery packs come with loose heads, swapping heads on the painted figures turned out to be a simple affair. I also had a few spare Brigade Games Russian infantry to provide the replacement heads with the old style shakos. The heads came off without ruining the paint job too much, and the collars were easily re-painted black with red piping once the new heads were attached. I found that the Brigade heads fit better on the WL bodies than I had expected. The repurposed 1808 style artillery can be seen on the left, the 1812 ones on the right.

Church

I painted up the church from Total Battle Miniatures. As you can see, there are still some areas that need touching-up, such as the underside of the roof where there is some naked resin showing through! I also havent painted the interior, although I dont know if I will ever feel that that is necessary. Anyway, the model is great, and the church is really big for a building in this scale! Obviously, it fits a late ww2 setting very well, but will work for Napoleonics as well. I have another of TBM:s resin buildings (a ruined one) and cant wait to get it painted up as well.

Swedish commander, 1808

Here’s another figure for the Finland 1808 setting. This guy is a slightly converted Foundry Napoleonic Austrian. I only removed a few small details, such as medals, and added others, such as the armband.

The miniature is supposed to look like a Swedish general who commanded the 4th brigade at Oravais in september 1808 (lt. col. Cedergren). He wears the uniform of the fortification (engineers) branch of the Swedish army, model 1802. I am not as pleased with this figure as I was with my other commanders, but I think that is down to the original figure. He and his horse are a bit too chubby. Also, the white on the horse looks a bit strange through the camera. Still, the blue and yellow colors work well, and as long as I dont look too closely, he will do just fine.

The model 1802 uniform as seen in the contemporary illustration by Eben.

Finnish reserve battalion of 1808

I havent done much painting lately, but I managed to finish one more Finnish battalion. This one does not have a flag, which was the case with the reserve (vargering) and so-called rusthållsbataljoner. The latter were formed in the 18th century, when a number of Finnish cavalry regiments were disbanded and converted into infantry. The former cavalry units were added to the existing infantry regiments, in which they formed extra battalions (normally, the regular regiments of the Swedish army consisted of two battalions).

The uniforms are the grey and blue worn by the Nyland and Björneborg regiments. The Åbo regiment wore a slightly darker blue facing color. I have painted them in a darker shade, but if I were to start over, I would do all three regiments in the same blue facing color, as the difference is hardly noticable on the tabletop. The grey-and-blue color scheme is also appropriate for the regiments which had received the new model 1807 uniform (with the same facing color for all regiments).

For these, I also varied the color of the trousers on a couple of figures. I will try and do this on more of my figures in the future, as I know that many regiments of the Swedish army in Finland had very well worn clothes by the summer of 1808.

A game of Chain of Command

We played scenario 4 (if I remember correctly) of the 29 let’s go campaign this evening. I played the German side. I used a motley selection of figures that I felt fit the Normandy setting relatively well. The game opened with me deploying a section in one of the central buildings. At first I thought this was a mistake, they were immediately pounded by a Sherman. But they survived. And this also lured my opponent into deploying his infantry in the bocage in front of the building. This led to them being caught in a crossfire out of which the Americans were not able to escape. One squad was wiped out entirely. In addition the Marder was able to engage and put some some shock on one of the tanks, while the leiG 18 and MMG hurt the American infantry even more. At that point my opponent threw in the towel.

The last game we played I felt that the Germans had no chance whatsoever of winning and was therefore surprised at the outcome this time around. The forces involved were pretty much the same. I think we both made mistakes, but I did roll better dice than I usually do.

Sdkfz 251/10

Another addition to my ww2 Germans. This model is by Blitzkrieg miniatures. I now have one 251/1 and one 251/10 painted up, and I also have one 251/1 unassembled in a box. The ultimate goal would be to have a full platoon’s worth, i e three 251/1s and one 251/10. Time will tell if that ever happens. In any case, my collection of Kursk-themed vehicles is growing.

Late war Brits

Just started some late war British infantry, made by Empress miniatures. Very nicely detailed figures. The camo pattern on the jackets is supposed to be quite toned down, but I think I managed to paint it distinctivley enough for it to be visible. If you look closely…

Swedish/Finnish jägers

These are the first two figures of a small unit of jägers I am painting for my 1808 collection. These are primarily meant to represent the jägers of the Nyland and Björneborg regiments. Perry make a set of Nyland jägers with shakos, but as far as I know, only the Savolax jägers had shakos. All other (Finnish) jägers had hats. The Swedish Värmland jägers had hats that look similar to the Swedish grenadier hats, and Perry do those as well (they did not take part in the war in Finland). So I exchanged the heads of the Nyland jägers for heads with the standard hat.

The jägers are distinguished from the regular line infantry by wearing black belts and a green pompom. Many illustrations show jägers of this time period with yellow pompoms. The regimental jägers were selected from of the regiments only when on campaign, and so the belts were blackened by the troops themselves, in the field. Presumably, the pompom color was also changed on campaign. In other words, it is quite possible that these color changes werent always implemented in practice…

The uniform also works for Swedish regiments who wore the 1807 uniform. At least the Kronoberg regiment wore this uniform when they took part in the landings in Finland in the summer of 1808, if I remember correctly. As you can see in the background, I am working on several different units at the same time. But at least I am getting some painting done…

Boxing my brigades

I have recently organized my napoleonic figures in sturdy cardboard boxes. I have used a magnetic mat in the bottom and as the figures are all magnetized they stick very well to the box. Previously I stored these figures in Feldherr cases, with every single figure in an individual foam slot. Needless to say, that wasnt very practical when setting up a game. With one brigade per box they come all organized and ready to play. These boxes dont take much more space than the Feldherr boxes either, although Feldherr’s foam system can be very good when not travelling in your own car (e.g. flying).