Coastal battery 2

Finished printing and assembling my coastal batteries today.
One is scaled to fit 28mm figures, the larger ones 40mm.
Both bases are the same size so that they will fit into the same baseboard position enabling me to fight both battle scales. The assembled pieces have been sealed with pva and I will now undercoat and paint. I will post pictures when completed.
This 3D printing lark is great fun! Reminds me of building model kits as a kid, but the difference is that I can now make my own kit!

Royal-Roussillon trumpeter

African musicians were something of a fashion accessory in armies of the 18th century.
The Prince of Clermont had a trumpeter in his regiment and dressed him in white turban,plume, buff coat with crimson cuffs and silver lace. No expense spared.
For my Royal-Roussillon cavalry regiment I have used some artistic licence with uniform details and created my own black trumpeter. Quite pleased with the result.

Coastal battery

I managed to complete a 40mm scale coastal battery today with my new Prusa printer, which has gone into meltdown since it arrived. Endless possibilities. This fort will be extended, and I may add a small harbour to the model.

Sandershausen - The battle

 

French 2nd line from rear, already taking casualties from Hessian guns

                                              Broglie  and staff

                                              The French advance

                                          French units break to rear

The battle went much as the historical version. The Hessian cavalry advanced from the woods and took a French infantry regiment in the flank, before being driven back by more numerous French cavalry. The French left took very heavy casualties and eventually broke, but the cavalry in the 2nd line charged and repulsed the advancing Hessians. The Hessian wings held but the militia in the centre finally collapsed making the whole line untenable and leading to a general withdrawal after giving the French a bloody nose. An enjoyable 2 hour battle with the Hessians in an almost hopeless situation with many inferior troops and smaller numbers

Sandershausen

Today, Stuart and  myself will fight Sandershausen, which I visited last September. This is a compact little battle with small forces, and it should make for an enjoyable afternoon. The Hessian centre was made up of militia and they had a much smaller force, although the French had to march uphill. Both flanks were covered in dense woodlands, with hazardous descents.
It begs the question why did Isenburg choose to fight?  Was he brave, mad or just bad ? We shall find out.

                                Hessian line at top of the hill, the village of Ellenbach on their left flank

                                               Broglie’s French cavalry in the second Line

       
       The French line from their rear, looking upwards to the Hessians. Ellenbach on the right

Isenburg rallies his Hessians

3D Printing

Well my Prusa 3D printer arrived last night and I am already burning the midnight oil with new projects. The set up was reasonably simple, despite my reservations, and downloading and printing files seems ok. Early days, and exciting possibilities, and in the image below you can see me in the process of printing a small fort shore battery, scaled for 28mm but still ok for 40mm

More naval matters

A bit more work on my ship project this weekend. Finished the second sea baseboard and will make a start on the land boards this week. My Prusa 3D printer should arrive this weekend, which should allow me to print some fortifications and dockyard pieces. A 28mm scale print should still work ok for 40mm. (S&S are small scale 40mm). Stuart is coming this weekend and I am sure he will set me off in yet another direction!
Beginning to enjoy this project, don’t know where it will lead.

General August Von Sporcken

General August Von Sporcken is my latest conversion and addition to the army of Hanover. I based the figure in the painting below, which shows Von Sprocket as elderly and fairly unkempt straggly white hair. I have modelled the figure bare headed to show this feature and have him holding his tricorne with his left hand, sword in his right hand. Von Sporcken can now join his completed regiment on my shelves until called into action

Piemont officer dismouted

I like to convert a piece each week, it usually ends up as my weekend project.
This weekend it was a simple conversion of a standard bearer and S&S horse to produce a French infantry officer of the Piemont regiment, struggling to control his horse which has been startled by gunfire. A nice addition to the regiment

A Military Gentleman

After a morning painting and working on some scenics, I have spent an enjoyable hour browsing John Rays book “A Military Gentleman”. I am sure John will not mind me to showing a photograph of this fine work. No matter how often I look at the images, I always find something new, or the inspiration for a new figure. I have owned the book for some years now, but today is the first time I have every really considered the vast number of individual figures and sculpts that make up the book.
It really is an incredible piece of work and dedication and an absolute must for any enthusiast if you can pick one up.

My casting machine is back !!!

Oh joy of joys, my old faithful casting has been repaired and delivered today, after some 2 months, but what seems like an eternity. She is nearly 30 years old, Fine Art Casting Machinery, none of your new fancy hydraulic, digital equipment, a good old fashioned weights based centrifugal casting machine. They certainly don't make them like this any more, but she gave me 30 years service before needing a new motor and controller this year, probably because of damp in my garage.

She has been casting like a dream, she has obviously missed me and has given me some of the best casts in a long time. So lots of 18th century diversifications and new projects this weekend.
I have cast a couple of Austrian 20mm figures which Graham C gave me in PVA 3d print. They look lovely, and I cannot wait to paint them. Could be the start of a whole new scale. I have cast some 40mm dollies to allow me to convert some firing, loading and kneeling figures. And finally I converted a couple of old Willy style figures to play around with so I will hopefully also paint them. It will also give me the chance to complete a couple of regiments of 40mm figures which I had ran out of, including Grenadiers de France and some btn guns.  ...... Roll on the weekend, who cares if it rains !!

20 Seconds of Fame

My other big project at the moment apart from recruiting more toy soldiers is to help real ones.
I am chair of a group of trustees who are planning to take over the local hospital which closed in 2018.
We hope our first tenant will be Erskine, the Scottish veterans charity, who hope to set up a veterans activity centre in our complex. (They already run a successful one near Glasgow, this will be the first in the north.) Many Wargames shows, including the Waterloo refight last year donate to Erskine, so this will be a great cause, and of course, one of the activities will be wargaming and military modelling. Plenty room for a big table !
Also on our group is Maj Gen Seymour Monro, ex co of the Queens own Highlanders and a serving collogue of well known Wargamer and author CSG who served in the same regiment... it is a small world as they say!
Yesterday a 20 minute TV Interview was condensed into 20 seconds.
Oh well,  back to 40mm soldiers today

Ferdinand of Brunswick

Finished Ferdinand of Brunswick yesterday to lead my Hanoverian contingent.
In portraits he always seems partial to pie, and a tad rotund, so I gave himsome added girth, as seems so typical of the officer class at this period.

Here, Ferdinand inspects IR2a Von Sporken, now fully recruited with a separate converged grenadier contingent.

Lt General Prince Johann Casimir Ysenburg

                                           Lt General Prince Johann Casimir Ysenburg

I have been interested in Ysenburg, since I stumbled across the memorial (Denkmal) to the battle of Sanderhausen while staying at Kassel last September. Sanderhausen was hard to find, and the denkmal was tucked at the side of a wood, next to a busy road.

                                   
                                     The site of the Denkmal. The battlefield is across the road

                        The Denkmal with Prince Ysenburg or Isenburg engraved on the plate.

                                                               A map of the battle

I have done some research on Ysenburg, and I have become slightly obsessed with the character. He is not singled out in Kronoscaf and there are few contemporary paintings of him, but I feel that he did reasonably well with his small force, mainly militia, at Sanderhausen and fought well, inflicting heavy casualties on the French before withdrawing.
He fought bravely at Bergen and was killed. To quote an extract from Sir Charles Hotham-Thompsons book, Operations of the Allied Army under the Duke of Brunswick 1757-62,
"just as he was going to lead his grenadiers to the assault he said with great composure:"Come my friends, whoever has courage let them follow me." He was immediately hit by a musket ball in the chest and died instantly.

To mark this moment, I have converted my own version of Ysenburg, in the uniform of his own regiment, as a general officer. The figure shows him at the moment of his charge, rallying his troops, and it will be a nice addition to the collection.