Iris Audrey Young, 15/04/1929 - 28/01/2018

I'm sad to say that my mother died this morning. She had been bed bound for some time and suffered from Alzheimer's disease. She will be sadly missed by her family and friends.

1897 Grenadiers

First Grenadier battalion finished and glossed and line battalion glossed.

Meanwhile, I've started the cavalry, plus received the Irregular French/Russians - so quite a lot to carry on with.

1897 first unit

Based on the figure of the 35th Royal Sussex uniform in Her Majesty's Army, the first unit is completed. Each man represents one of the eight companies of the battalion/regiment. I have made a couple of changes - helmet should be dark blue but I've done it black, uniform should be scarlet but I've used red - didn't have any scarlet paint. I might go over the bayonets with silver to brighten them up a bit and I'm not sure about the effect of the brass buttons on the tunic.The figures have just been sprayed in matt varnish so far - still haven't got any gloss - but then, that should make for better photos anyway!

The book specifies the names of the units that were 'involved' - mostly non-regulars - but in action I'm not going to be pedantic about the Regimental Colours ... 'toy soldiers.' This lot will be changing regiments for just about every battle.


Work in progress include a Guards regiment. I've still got a few more figures on order.

Just before Christmas my Auntie Bettie died - she left me a small legacy so I'm going to be able to complete buying the figures for this project quite quickly. The first result of this has been an order placed for  French/Russian armies from Irregular Miniatures - I've ordered one of their  Jolly Fun Toy Soldier Battlepacks (can't link directly to the page!) and specified French in kepis with the Russian cavalry as Cossacks! They don't actually have this combination listed but are quite happy to go with customer requests! That order could possibly be in the post today.

So, the first diversion of 2018 is coming along nicely.

General's chariot finished.

Mostly.

Couple of bits need touching up, needs to be varnished (I ran out of varnish, hence posting now) and based.

Not sure how happy I am with it - chariot scheme not as good as I had hoped plus might have overpainted the general!

Warwagons finished

All three - original plus the two new ones - now finished and based.

This just leaves the general's chariot and I'll be free to work on the 1897 project.

Actually, to tell you the truth I've already started on them...

1897 - the sources

The idea of building a Late Victorian army is one I've thought of for a while. Looking at all Ross's blogs helped to keep that thought going and I finally decided to go for it.

Now, I've got quite a few books on the subject, but figures I have all have sun helmets and I wanted home service so I could do a UK v Prussia war. Ross had already convinced me that the way to go would be larger scale toy soldier, 54mm sounded too big and too expensive, so I plumped for 42mm.

Jumping in time - who does the figures? Asked on WD3 and found that Spencer Smith did 42mm 1897 figures! I'd always thought of them as 30mm only! So I went and ordered a load of figures - 24 figures of my initial order duly arrived (nice figures though one head miscast) bought as a Guard regiment and a Line regiment.

At which point I did what I should have done first. Checked sources...

1897 comes from a book 'The Great War in England' by William Le Queux, published in 1894 when Russia and France were the enemies - I'd forgotten that... so forget the Prussians. Must re-read it soon - it's pretty good.

Next, check organisation. 'The British Army' by 'A Lieutenant-Colonel in the British Army', published in 1899.This excellent tome includes such things as a note 'I occurred to the publishers of this work on 'The British Army' that it would be appropriateto bind it in the actual material used for the uniforms of our soldiers in South Africa, etc, known as 'Khaki.' More importantly, it has Knotel colour plates and unit organisations. Which lists a British battalion as having 8 companies, suggesting 8 figure units rather than the 12 figure units I had gone and bought...

Finally, for more uniform details 'Her Majesty's Army' by Walter Richards - from 1888. Must get some of the plates from that on my Pages section!

The French and Russian invaders? Chances are I'll use Irregular Miniatures - French from the Franco-Prussian War, Russians from the Russo-Turkish.

So, that's the plan. So far.

1897 - a new project

Nearly finished the current batch - warwagons painted and varnished, just not based, King's chariot getting there. So, time for a distraction... just bought some 42mm 1898 British from Spencer Smith and intend to start them once the chariot is finished...

I blame Ross.