Holiday Napoleonics WIP

I started off the 2016 holiday season with another refight of Quatre Bras, using the same scenario reported on here. The three major differences were:

1.  I brought along to the game extra figures, bases, and blue tack, to make skirmish stands as they were needed,
2. I played the French, rather than the Anglo-Dutch forces, and
3. The French didn't even come close to winning - but the butcher's bill was significantly less than the previous refight. 

During the game it was mentioned, that while the French were coming along in leaps and bounds, the Anglo-Dutch, were looking very much like the poor relations of my V&B forces.

The whole lot - in various stages of refurbishment.

With that in mind, and having some free time due to the holidays, I decided on a mass refurbishment of my British forces. I have been fortunate in acquiring over the years a number of painted and semi painted British figures from a variety of sources, so I figured I should start with these figures, and then if required paint figures from scratch.

Eight artillery stands. Guns are Revell and Airfix 9pdrs, figures are Revell Foot Artillery, and Airfix and Esci Royal Horse Artillery

 The figures are from a variety of manufacturers: Airfix, Revell, Esci, and even some Eagle Games figures.

Artillery and Revell 95th Rifles painted as 60th Foot and based as skirmish stands.

I still have to finish the basing by adding tussock, scatter grass, etc to the stands, and to touch up paint on a number of Airfix figures where the older enamels have flaked. I still have to add an ink wash to many of the stands. I have started to experiment with black and sepia washes.

Brown washed Revell and Airfix Infantry.

In the middle, a very thin red line is formed by Esci British infantry.

Another view of the Revell and Esci infantry stands.

 I still have a couple of stands of Airfix Highlanders to refurbish, and a few more stands of Airfix British infantry - but they (and some more command stands) will have to wait a little longer to finishing.
 

The Esci thin red line. I acquired a large number of nicely painted Esci British infantry, that were primarily made up of the standing and firing pose from the Esci British Infantry set (click here for PSR review). 

After the last game of V&B I really wanted to make sure that I had a pool of skirmish stands available for use. The 60th foot stands are probably of more use for the Peninsula War than Waterloo, but since I had acquired some already painted from Steve H., I figured I should just base them up.

Riflemen of the 60th Foot. Metal British 16th Light Dragoons in the background.

Essentially, if I had a painted British figure, I was going to find a stand to base it on in order to bulk up the number of British forces available for use on the table top.

Airfix figures that had been converted to Riflemen. I suspect the intent was to create a detachment of the 95th Rifles. My intent is to use these skirmish stands as generic Jager stands for Netherland and Prussian forces.

Esci skirmish stands with a couple of Revell figures thrown in to the mix on the center stand.

The other major weakness has been the hodge podge of command stands available for the British. While I do have some of the very nice Strelets British command figures from their Aliied command set  (PSR review here), and the Waterloo Napoleonic Mounted Line Officers set (PSR review here) - I am still in the process of painting those figures. So since I had some other mounted officers available, I decided to use those, even though strictly speaking they are in the wrong uniforms,

LtR (Left to Right): Airfix Highlander Officer, Italeri French Officer (repainted) Airfix British Infantry Officer.

 Another source of officers has been the Italeri French Imperial General Staff set (click here for PSR review). I can't remember if it was Frank or Steve H. who first alerted me to the paint conversion possibilities of this set, but the British and Prussian forces Steve H. gave me both had examples of the figures in use as officers.

LtR: Airfix Highlander, Eagle Games commander, Revell British officer, Italeri French officer (repainted)

 Eagle Games used to sell additional figures for their game 'Napoleon in Europe'(click here for the Board-Game Geek review and here for the PSR review of the figures). I bought a set these some time ago with the intent of using them to supplement my Prussian forces. I have re-horsed the mounted figures with Esci British horses, and have started painting up some of the mounted officers as British command stands.

Eagle Games British General on Esci horse - still a WIP as base needs finishing and sword needs to be painted,

 One very interesting event that did come about from the holiday Napoleonic fest was that I discovered my wife has a talent for painting miniatures. I hate painting Napoleonics - hence my great love of refurnishing older figures - and routinely bitch about it being hard. Katherine commented that it looked fairly straight forward, so I asked if she wanted to try painting some.

Katherine's first painted stand. She wants to add more to to the base before she finishes it.

Katherine said yes, and the next day I had another freshly painted skirmish stand at my disposal. I think she has done a very good job with these! I am currently negotiating with her to see if she wants to paint up some of the Netherlander command stands I need completed!