United Irishmen

It is the Spring of 1813 and the Irish Legion are marching to join a newly forming division in Southern Germany.

As they're a bit early for their rendezvous, Colonel Lawless decides to put them through their paces.

The Emperor and the rest of the division arrive. 

The figures are:

Der Kreigspielers Napoleoniques:

Set #19: Young Guard Voltigeurs, engaging, x 21;
Set #20: Young Guard Command, marching officer x 1, and eagle bearer x 1; and

Hinton Hunt:

FN 6: (French Infantry of the Line, 1812-15) Drummer (Recast and Converted), x 1

I think I'm going to have to call this the Traffic Light Division.

Have a great weekend everyone

WM

Easter Rising

 ... on to the completed list, that is, but not quite there yet.

Just the packs, muskets and a few other odds and ends to go. They'll definitely be finished by next weekend. This is not before time, as I have some other very special things that I'm desperate to get started on.

Happy Easter

WM

Irlande en Ligne

Just a quick post to show where I am with the Irish Legion.

This is not as far as I'd wished, but the centre company chasseurs are all done, plus a carabiner and a voltigeur. Although when I started these I was dimly aware that painting Der Kriegspielers is generally a bit harder than painting Hinton Hunts (its been a few years since I painted any), I definitely underestimated how much harder. The detail, where it exists at all, is absolutely miniscule.

Never mind. Only ten more to go.

Happy New Year everyone.

WM

A Lawless Man

The Irish Legion are slowly taking shape, so to hurry them on a bit I decided to press on and paint their commander, Colonel William Lawless.

Lawless was a professor of anatomy in Dublin and prominent Untited Irishmen. Forced to flee to France following the failure of the Irish Rebellion of 1798, he quickly came to the notice of Napoleon and gained a captaincy in the newly forming Irish Legion. He was a brave and capable officer and was appointed to command the regiment in 1813. After serving with credit at the Battle of Bautzen, poor Lawless lost a leg during the action at Lowenberg. The whole regiment was effectively destroyed just a few days later after it was trapped and cut to pieces by artillery fire. Lawless survived the wars but he died in Paris in 1824 at the comparatively young age of 52.

How it started.

My Lawless started out as a recast Hinton Hunt WN 15: Grand Duchy of Warsaw Fusilier Officer marching. I wanted to have a go at converting him because I really fancied a mounted colonel with a bicorne.

He needed a fair amount of leg surgery and whatnot to make him sit nicely on a horse, but he managed it in the end. I find these sorts of conversions a lot easier these days as I finally invested in a decent, variable-power soldering iron. I run this at about 30W, which heats the figure metal up quite quickly, ensuring rapid results and a good bond for the solder. Lawless got a new left leg, an epaulette on his right shoulder and a good straight scabbard for his sword using this method.

How it finished.

He towers a bit over his tiny wee DK soldiers, but I'm quite chuffed with him nonetheless.

Have a great weekend everyone

WM

Irish Update

The Irish Legion are going to be a fairly heavy-duty painting job, I fear, so to spur myself on I've completed most of the command group. I also have a mounted officer for them on the go but he's not quite ready for his photo shoot.

The Irish Legion seems to have had several flag designs over the course of its existence, but I think that this was the best one:

The officer and eagle bearer are Der Kriegspielers, with the officer being the DK version of a Hinton Hunt FN 74: Young Guard Officer, marching.

The drummer is a conversion of recast Hinton Hunt FN 6: (French Infantry of the Line, 1812-15) Drummer, charging. To convert him I soldered on a replacement DK 19 head and filed down his trouser bottoms to make it look like he's wearing gaters. I think he looks quite nifty.

Next up ought to be the rest of the Chasseurs. I thought I'd tackle them first as they're just a wee bit trickier than the carabiniers and voltigeurs.

Yours, as ever.

WM

Éirinn go Brách

I'm supposed to be catching up on my backlog of generals at the moment, but while I was aboout it I rediscovered the unopened Der Krieigspielers blister pack that I bought about nine years ago. The figures therein were 20mm Napoleoniques set #19: Young Guard Voltigeurs, engaging.

I remember being very excited about getting my mits on them, but was less than pleased when they arrived. As you can see below, Duke Siefried's idea of the YGV was to convert a Hinton Hunt FN 82: French Light Infantry Voltigeur, charging by sticking a YGV head onto it and then bending its legs in a really weird way.

I'd more or less decided they were a write off, but when I got them out to have another look at them I discovered that they're really rather maleable and all they needed was a firm thumb press to get them to stand up properly.

The obvious thing to do would've been to paint them as regular French light infantry, but I decided to go for something a bit more exotic. Presented below are my test carabinier, chasseur and voltigeur of the 1e Bataillon de La Légion Irlandaise, painted more or less as they're reputed to have appeared between about 1809 and 1812.

Why the Irish? There are lots of reasons, but I think the clincher was this picture of the Legion's 2nd Battalion by the late Richard Tennant, sent to me several years ago by Richard himself:

These exquisite soldiers live in the States these days with my good friend David C. I don't think I could ever match them, but I thought it'd be a fun way to round off the close-order infantry of my Phase 2 French Army.

More to come over the next few weeks.

WM

Edit [30/10/2023]

Following David's comment below, herewith are all the French Guard infantry according to the Der Kriegspielers/Custom Cast Napoleoniques catalogue of 1976:

This is a screenshot from the catalogue which was very kindly published by Chuck Gibke here: Custom Cast Catalog (1976) (vintagewargamingfigures.info)