Friday, June 11, 2010

French 5th Hussars command

Once I had the figure done I decided to finish the command stand for the 5th Hussars.  I made the third figure into a brigadier in full dress uniform, with shako. 


I will do a separate stand of hussars in colpack for the elite squadron.  I had sliced his hand off and glued on the eagle standard until I realised that the 5th never carried their eagle with them on campaign (I believe only two hussar regiments disobeyed orders and did so).  So I had to then glue the slightly shortened hand with sword back on. Doh!  Thank goodness you don't really notice it (and no, that's not a signal for pedants to pick the fault out!) 


 The only other obvious mistake with the command stand is the trumpeter's sabretache which is blue.  Although the regiment's were red, I have conflicting information that the trumpeter's were blue, so that's what I've gone with.  To be frank, there was so much unregulated differences in the uniform that its almost 'anything goes', particularly with officers and trumpeters who were more often dressed according to the commanding officer's whim (and the officer's purse - i.e. what they could afford).


I'm quite pleased with the way these figures turned out and will look forward to doing the rest of the regiment once the uni essays are out of the way.  I deliberately didn't use any Army Painter tone, unstead relying on washes and experimenting with Rotring inks (the blue in the uniform and the brown horses) which give a really deep tone, easily dilute and generally handle as  well as any commercial paint wash.


The base is one of the plastic ones included with the box with a magnetic strip cut to fit (adds a bit more weight as well).  I plan to do the rest of the regiment in campaign uniform, the only debate is how many I'll do as the 5th out of the two boxes as I want to have a couple spare for casualty figures.  I'm toying with the idea of having one with his leg trapped under his horse but it'll take quite a bit of slicing and dicing to convert. 

Food for thought anyway.

Hope you enjoyed the photos, remember to click on them to get an enlargement.

Cheers,
           Doc

16 comments:

  1. Doc:

    They look great. I will remember not to include the eagle - guess I can use them on infantry units. Your sabertaches came out great! I was hoping someone would make transfers for these. I want to paint my first box up as either the 9th or 8th - maybe both. I like the colors of both units. . Dean

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  2. these figures are very very nice the horses awesome

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  3. Really love these guys - great stand.

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  4. Yep, very skillfully done. Can't wait to see the entire regiment.

    Best Regards,

    Stokes Schwartz

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  5. Thanks guys - can't wait to paint the rest up too but I have a dragoon command to do as well and, more importantly, uni work to get out of the way first, so it may be a week or two before the next post.

    On the practical side I really need to do more casualty markers including some for cavalry. If I do the four boxes of plastic cav right I should have at least four horses/figures I can convert to casualty markers but it'll take a fair amount of modeling work to do it properly.

    So, a lot of competing priorities AND uni work. Ooh boy.

    Cheers,
    Doc

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  6. Hi
    Another great painting job... I love your big figures but all my figures are 1/72!
    The guy at left is the colonel? It wears a white plume in the shako!
    Regards
    Rafa

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  7. wow excuse all the grammatical mistakes!

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  8. Gracias Rafa - mui bien amigo - your English is much better than my Spanish!

    To answer your question the guy on the left in shako is a brigadier or French cavalry rank NCO. All rankers including NCO's in the 5th wore a white plume according to my ancient but accurate Historex guide.

    Cheers,
    Doc

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  9. Bloody lovely Doc and they stand the real test of fine painting when you click on the picture and get a close up.

    Noel.

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  10. I am doing my Hussars up now and just made the Eagle bearer, like you did, with no particular regiment in mind which ones carried their eagles on campaign? Just so I get it right...

    Cheers.

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  11. Razor - the hussars regiments that continued to carry their eagles in defiance of orders were the 4th & the 9th. I believe all regiments carried them on campaign for the Hundred Days (1815).

    Cheers,
    Doc

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  12. Ok thanks, that helps tons! Great work by the way! I hope to work on my command stand for the 4th when I have time between painting 15's...

    Cheers,
    Eric

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  13. Also by chance could/would you take me off of moderated posting? It kinda is not good for my posts not to show up for 24hrs or so... I do not know if you have seen my blog but here it is, I have linked your blog from mine so that people can get to yours, perhaps you could do the same? just a thought...

    Cheers,

    Eric

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  14. Eric - not a problem - only have moderation on my older postings - it was 14 days but I've now made it a month which should solve the problem. Sorry, the link to your blog didn't come through - I'll get it off your blog address, no objection to linking it to mine.

    Cheers,
    Doc

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  15. Wow some really nice figures, I have a box and will buy another, but so many figures so little time, love your painting, well done.

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