South Cheshire Militaire

A quick run down the road to Crewe for the local modelling show, there is very little wargaming there, but it has a useful range of traders and there always seems to be some bargains to pick up.

Just like last year there was a collector selling off parts of his collection, but I didn't find quite so much to tempt me this year. I also found a rumage box with some assembled 1/76 kits for a £1. So £50-60 quid lighter I returned home with the following unplanned purchases:

• Unknown maker AEC A/C Mk1
• Unknown maker Horsch kfz 70
• Cromwell Renault AMC35
• Cromwell Sdkfz 250/1
• Cromwell Stower 40
• Edai Krupp Protze
• Edai Sdkfz 7 flak
• Esci Nebelwerfer
• Fujimi Jagdtiger
• Fujimi Sdkfz 222
• Matchbox Panther
• Matchbox Sdkfz 10
• Milicast 105mm SP PzKfw 39H(f)
• Milicast 75mm SP PzKfw 39H(f)
• Milicast Grosser Funk PzKpfw 38H(f)
• Milicast PzKpfw 35R (f) 4.7cm SP
• Milicast Sdkfz 222 turret
• Milicast Sdkfz 250/1
• Milicast SdKfz 263 ACV
• Milicast SU76 (3 variants)
• Red Star STZ-5

Plus the Airfix Bristol Beaufighter I do need for this summers big game and some French roundels for my MS406.

Black Guards

Another part of my February output, the Schwartzgarde, a mercenary regiment recruited by the Duchy of Pommaine, a state to the south of my imagi-nation of Frundsberg.

The figures are all Revell SYW Prussian Grenadiers

SYW Bavarian Cavalry

Bavaria Cavalry was particularly weak and ineffective in the Seven Years War, they weren't even part of the Auxiliary Corps provided to Austria or the Reicharmee.

But I had to include some cavalry, so here are the Taxis Kuirassiers (left) and Hohenzollern Dragoons (right)


That finishes the Bavarians and here is the entire force, including generals and casualties

Seemed an ambitious target back in January, but it all went smoothly.

Slight diversion - Conwy

With the short burst of sunshine yesterday we took off into Wales to do a bit of walking and fit Conwy castle into the itinerary. it's still one of my favorite castles and I still remember visiting it for the first time on a holiday to Rhyll, to many years ago really.

Just behind my head is Conwy mountain which we climbed before lunch, then the castle making sure we climbed every turret. The afternoon was a spent with another short climb, this time up Great Orme head.

Finished off the day at Deeside Defenders playing the Shevardino game from WI using Black Powder.

Phew!

SYW Bavarian Artillery

OK, now cracking on with the rest of the Bavarians, here's the artillery. Two batteries, one heavy and one light, unfortunately only enough limbers for one.

All figures are Revell SYW Austrian Artillery except the Heavy Guns, which are Esci Napoleonic French Artillery. I need more heavy guns, so I hope the Hat 1805 artillery set in bicornes is similar in size.

SYW Austrian Army

Following on from my Prussian Army, here is my old Austrian army, both were planned at the same time and the only significant difference is that the Austrians have more light troops (Grenzers). All the army is made up of Revell figures except the hussars, which are Airfix.

The whole army

Right wing cavalry, two units each of hussars, cuirassiers and dragoons. The cuirassiers are simple paint conversions of the dragoon figures with any prominent lapels cut off first.

The infantry centre with Grenz out in front two line of infantry and a couple of grenadier battalions following up. The Grenz are just grenadier figures with their bearskins cut down.

Left wing cavalry, identical to the right.

Some artillery, including a homemade caisson.

Now back to the rest of the Bavarians.

SYW Bavarian Infantry finished

OK, so 120 infantry figures finished in 3 weeks, it's not as good as my performance as a student when 50 figures a week was my average, but the basing is definitely better. First off the Leib regiment, I concentrated all the Grenadiers in one unit to give a better effect. Next the Kurprinz in Bayern regiment, backed up by the Graf von Preysing regiment. Then Freiherr von Morawitzky and Graf von Minucci's regiments. The whole force, all regiments were part of the Bavarian Auxiliary Corps that operated with the Austrians And, of course, I've already started on the artillery, cavalry and staff.

SYW Prussian Army

The Bavarians currently in progress are the first Revell SYW figures I've painted in quite a while, so here is my first SYW army, the Prussians.

The whole army


Left wing cavalry, two units each of hussars, cuirassiers and dragoons


The infantry, eight infantry and two grenadier regiments, plus Freikorps and Jaegers


The right wing cavalry, some suffering from a particularly strong florescent pink.

Some of the artillery including a home made caisson

Squinty eyes

Yes, it's got to that stage, painting the lace on the hats. I just struggle to focus on the black surface no matter how much light I add to the subject and magnification doesn't seem to help either.

However there has been a lot of progress over the last two weeks as can be seen from my work in progress.

Hopefully the infantry will be finished by the weekend and then the cavalry, etc. during next week.

Vapanartak

Sunday morning was an early start leaving at 6:45 to get to York arriving at 9:00 to finish setting up the game. Given the date we had opted for Mortimers Cross 3rd February 1461 as we were virtually on the 550th anniversary.

It's quite a small battle and Steve and I played it through twice on the day changing sides and in both cases the result was a historically correct Yorkist win (just as well given our location).

The view from the Lancastrian lines of the openning dispositions.

The Lancastrian left flank crumbling during the second game

All the terrain and figures were from Bob, our umpire's collection, the rules were Poleaxed, and the setup used the Poleaxed Source book all for which were available on the Lance & Longbow stand just out of sight.

My other photo's are not that good and Andy (Count Belisarius)has a much better selection over on his blog.

Overall a good day out, I was rather disappointed in the table sale as I didn't have time to spend queueing to get to see what was on offer, but in general I approve of the idea, but I think the space was rather limited. I think they really needed a similar sized room to that used at Carronade.

Purchasing was quite moderate with a couple of Airfix Bedford QLT/QLD's, a box of the Plastic Soldier Late Germans, some Javis Autumn flock (can't find it in any of the local model shops?) and a copy of the Wargamers Annual 2011 (rather over-priced, but these iniative have to be supported)

Lunch was combined with a quick drink with the Northern contingent of the Society of Gentlemen Gamers and I came away with a German Sturmboot 42 to paint up for the game

SYW Bavarian uniform references

My Seven Years War Bavarians are now well underway, but yesterday took a step back as I found some extra details on the uniforms that I had missed. Therefore I had to restart some figures.

My main paper references are Funcken's the Lace Wars, Mollo's SYW uniforms and the Pengel booklet on SYW German/Swedish Cavalry.

I had combined this with the data on Kronosaf SYW project section on the Bavarian Army and the Miniatures.de site also has a section on the Bavarian Army of the SYW. Hunting through the TMP message boards also turned up the uniform for Bavarian generals (TMP link)

What had I missed was the Leuthen Journal has some very useful Knotel plates including a Dragoon drummer in reversed coat colours, the supply train drivers and especially a Hussar (link).

OOB for the Bavarian Army in the war of the Austrian Succession 1744 (Nafziger pdf)