After over two years of collecting and painting, and painting... and MORE painting! ...I finally finished my Franco-Prussian Wars (FPW) Prussian army.
Doc's Prussian horde - Vorwarts meine Kinder, der Franzosiche ist Kaput!
Its the approximate size representing a Prussian division and I've set it up as three infantry brigades of two regiments (each of two battalions of 24 figures) plus a small jaeger battalion of 12 figures. Only the Guard Bde is a bit short with three battalions plus jaeger. Added to that I've created two artillery batteries of the famous Krupps breech-loaders and a cavalry brigade of three 10-figure regiments. There's a command for each brigade and a separate divisional command - all of which have been covered in previous posts. The figures are on 60x30mm bases @ three figs each for Black Powder rules (although they are also suitable for other rules too). I made the bases a bit deeper as they accommodated the figures better and look better on the table
en masse.
Prussian army made for Black Powder rules
The last unit I had to do was a Prussian allied Hesse Darmstadt regiment. Other than the Bavarian, Saxon and Wurttemburg contingents, many of these allied regiments were almost indistinguishable from the Prussians as they used virtually the same uniforms and equipment. Which was fortunate as I have only Foundry Prussian figures available at the moment!
Hesse Darmstadt Infantry Bde mit Jaeger!
The Foundry FPW range is one of my favourites and one of the better ones of their older figure lines in my opinion. There is also a reasonable amount of poses and figure/uniform types to give it some real variation - often conspicuously lacking in ranges first made over a decade ago.
Hesse Darmstadt Regt, jaeger & line commands
I should also give
Ian Croxall's 'Warflag' site a plug too as he provided the most of the Prussian and the Hesse flag. Warflag has wargaming flags for a large range of era's including one of the few decent collections on the net of those for 19th C conflicts. The range obviously includes Prussians and some of their allies but that for the French 2nd Empire is also excellent and comprehensive too - including command pennants.
Its probably a little over-sized and I nearly mucked it up with the glue
but a bit of paint and the Hesse flag came up a treat!
One of the challenges presented with the Hesse contingent was representing a light infantry battalion. I have seen old pictures of Rhineland contingent light infantry wearing the standard Prussian feldmutze flat cloth cap instead of the classic jaegerhut and as I only had enough figures in the latter for two small battalions, I took some artistic licence and made the Hesse boys up from Prussian cloth cap figures. I converted one of the marching figures to a jaeger bugler with the addition of a plastic arm with bugle and a 'swallows nest' shoulder tab for musicians. The plastic spare bits box is the wargamer's friend - worth its weight in gold!
Hesse Darmstadt Jaeger Command in feldmutze
Other figures that I did a little (or rather a lot!) of conversion work included the cavalry command (detailed in a previous post) and more recently, and infantry brigade command with one mounted officer (formerly an artillery outrider) and a standard bearer with a command pennant. The mounted figure took quite a bit of shaping with the Dremel tool to make tight-fitting officer's jodhpurs and boots from baggy old outriders pants but Meine Herr is now a figure of sartorial splendour - even if the nag he's on is a bit over-loaded with campaign baggage (undt ver ist zat verdammten orderly!)
Line command - the artilleryman got a promotion
- sharpened the point on his pickelhaube too!
The other part of the army I like is the Guard Bde consisting of six battalions of line & one of jaeger - four in greatcoat - which made them a bit easier to paint up. It should be a minimum of eight battalions - nine with jaeger - but I ran out of figures and what the heck - it can be an under-strength brigade (after Gravolette or wherever it was they got flogged by French Chassepots!)
The Guard Brigade
The mounted Guard commander looked a bit lonely by himself and being probably an elder gent, slightly hard of hearing too so I gave him a staff officer who's shouting advice to him.
Eh, what's that young feller - speak up!
Last but not least are the awesome breech-loading Krupps artillery - almost a war-winner for the the Germans all by themselves as they literally blew away the competition! These guns with their peculiar crew seats were actually quite hard to find - I had one but it took me over a year to finally find one that matched (thanks Doug!) In Black Powder one model can represent a battery, so four guns is more than enough for a full division, although I plan to run them in matched pairs. Again, Foundry at their best IMO.
And because I can't resist - more Prussian cavalry - Achtung! Der Kuirass kommt! The command is the other conversion I talked about earlier - very simple, just a bit of Dremel tool action and a heated and shaped plastic cloak and viola! - you have the cav brigade commander!
The Magdeburg regiment of heavies thunder forward on another Tottenritt at the French guns
Well, that's it for my Prussians. Hopefully I'll be able to post some pictures of them in action, as soon as I've finished painting up my FPW French - only about 8 or 9 battalions of infantry and two or three regiments of cav to go!
Nah, just kiddin'! My mate Doug's got the other half of the French good to go so although I do have plenty more to paint up, it should allow us to have a game or two in the not-to-distant future.
Prussian Line in battalion (of 24 figures each) in column with Jaeger skirmish-line
As always, click on the pics to enlarge and feel free to leave a comment - I mightn't post too regularly but I have been known to reply to comments!
Cheers,
Doc
