Saturday 1 April 2017

At The Sign of the White Horse

As promised, I present the Field Battalion Bremen's command group and their ever-so-slightly speculative flag.

The flag design is based an illustration in an article by Ottfried Neubecker in Die Fahnen und Standarten der Armee des Koenigreichs Hannover, which was published in several parts in the Zeitschrift für Heereskunde (Berlin) in 1934, A flag of this form, according to Neubecker, was carried by at least some of the field battalions, although it is unclear whether they were actually carried before 1816.

Neubecker also doesn't specify any of the colours on the flag, so what I have presented here is an educated guess based on other Hanoverian flags and heraldry.


The figure is a Der Kriegspieler British line or guard infantry regimental colour bearer from the set # 150: British Line/Guard Infantry 1815, Command Group.

The first task was to rub off the original British regimental colour markings using a steel burnishing tool from a ceramic arts set. I then inscribed the roundels using another steel ceramic arts tool. The roundels are a little larger than they ought to be as I wanted to give myself a little space to work with and to help fill up the huge expanse of white on the rest of the flag.

The officer is from the same set #150. I've pictured him next to an original unpainted example to show how I've modified him.  That right arm was so horribly modeled that I simply had to do something about it.

One of the interesting things about this figure is that it is not based on the Hinton Hunt British infantry officers, but on the British Royal Artillery officer instead. Whoever made him evidently forgot to remove his sword hilt from his left hip!

I could have used British light infantry officers for this battalion, but went for the line infantry variants as it seems fairly clear that the Bremen battalion's officers wore Belgic shakos. There's a very good illustration of one (albeit in his original light infantry green) in the Anne S. K. Brown Military Collection, here.




The rest of the battalion is past the halfway mark and should be ready to put on show by next weekend.

Wir sehen uns dann!

WM


20 comments :

  1. Keep it coming - a 'Spieler' post always makes my day.

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    1. I'm insanely busy both professionally and domestically at the moment, Rob, so the wee men are essential destressers. There is no end in sight of either of the above, so more wee men are sure to follow.

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  2. The vibrancy of the red/scarlet is stunning, as is the flag.

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    1. I´ll second Lee´s comment. I see waht you mean about the officers arm in the original Position..as you say, it Looked horrible.

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    2. The Duke's...er.."adaptations" were usually quite good, but not this one. However, apart from the arm I rather liked him for his open lapels. The HH charging British office is all buttoned up and not quite as nice!

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  3. Very nice indeed.

    Tony S

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  4. What you need is a long wargaming holiday in blighty, mate. The good news for your blog followers is that when you retire, you can manufacture artificial stressors, so that the superb wee men keep coming. I have just acquired a Hanoverian colour bearer with a similar colour bearing the legend "Quo fas et gloria ducunt" He has green facings. Does that make him Bremen and Verden?

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    1. I think the Luneberg and Verden Field Battalions were the only ones with green facings, Archduke. My Bremen lads are said to have had blue or black. It's a bit confusing, not least because the "Bremen and Verden" Battalion of 1813 was renamed the Field Battalion Bremen in 1814, while the old von Bennigsen Battalion was renamed the Field Battalion Verden!

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  5. Another lovely addition to your collection! The various Hanoverian battalions are fascinating part of Wellington's Anglo-Allied army. It's good to see some attention paid to them in miniature.

    Best Regards,

    Stokes

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    1. My sentiments exactly, Stokes. I was on the cusp of starting a SYW Anglo-Hanoverian army just at the moment when I was seduced by those Hinton Hunts. I think I need to do at least one more battalion, or maybe even two....alright, six, but no more.

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  6. Beautiful Matt. Your stuff is the pinbacle of old
    style painting. Though, of course black as a base coat is not old style at all😉
    We look forward too tge rest of the battalion and then a few more!

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    1. The base coat is white, LG. A black base coat would be blasphemous.

      The effort I put into them is directly related to my stress levels, so the better they get the closer I am to a heart attack.

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  7. Once again I am impressed at your work.

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    1. Thank you, Matt. I've wanted a thin red line, even if it is a "Jarmin" one, since I was knee high to a grasshopper. I had zillions of Airfix British, but never painted more than half a dozen extremely badly. They were the thin cream line, that lot.

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    2. Oops Matt, I should have remembered that you were an exponent of classic white-up 😨. It shows that the steadiness of your black lining skills is exceptional.

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    3. The white undercoat is pretty pointless when you're painting Prussians, LG! I think I stick to it out of tradition more than anything else - although it also makes it easier to see what you're doing while the main colours are going on. Truth be told is that I use a black-then-colour technique on parts of each figure wherever it suits me (those gloves, for example!), but there's still a white coat underneath it all. Bright colours are much brighter when painted over white, or at least they are when using Humbrols!

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  8. Never have been able to master the art of painting on black coated figures. I'm a fan of thin coats of paint, so a white undercoating is essential! Beautifully done as always Matt.

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