ALY MORRISON'S "BUTTERFLY" ADVENTURES IN THE WORLD OF WARGAMES AND TOY SOLDIERS

Tuesday 10 August 2021

Crimean War… New toys.

 Greetings…


I decided to treat myself and have some toys painted for me…

As I have been steadily reorganising and rebasing my Crimean War collection I thought I would get young Mark Hargreaves at Over Open Sights to paint the Heavy Brigade.

He agreed with me that this would be a jolly jape…

The Heavy Brigade and the Light Brigade are both a bit problematic when it comes to fitting them to my basing principles for this projects….

I have been using my now fairly usual system of 1 stand for a tiny unit,2 stands for a small,3 for a medium and 4 for a large… 

Even though there really isn’t quite enough men to justify it, I have decided to make the Heavies a four stand unit… It’s more about what looks good rather than what is totally accurate… I will probably do the same for the Lights.

The problem is trying to fit five different regiments into a twelve man unit…It doesn’t divide well.

Fortunately most of the brigade look very similar so we went for…

The Scots Greys… for the command.

The Inniskilling’s… nice yellow facings.

The 1st Dragoons… blue facings.

And the 5th Dragoon Guards… dark green facings.

Here they are in all their glory…




I must say I am extremely pleased with these… Mark has done a splendid job with them…

There are some additional photos on the Open Over Sights Blog…

http://over-open-sights.blogspot.com/

There are some details of their famous charge here…

https://victorianweb.org/history/crimea/paget/heavy.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Balaclava

https://www.nam.ac.uk/explore/battle-balaklava


The miniatures are by Great War Miniatures…

https://www.northstarfigures.com/list.php?man=20&cat=175&page=1

The bases are from War Bases…

https://warbases.co.uk/product-category/bases/premier-bases-metric/


All the best   Aly







43 comments:

  1. They are lovely and that background makes a superb job of making the units ‘zing’!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. These guys certainly zing…
      Mark has done a splendid job with the Reds…

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
  2. A splendid looking unit of cavalry and the basing is particularly effective.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you Peter…
      The bases were my only input…

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
  3. Wonderfully painted Aly, I had a right close up look at ‘em and they’re really nice. I’d be a bit scared to play with them to be honest.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. They are indeed lovely…
      I can’t wait to see what they look like on the table…

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
  4. Replies
    1. They certainly are Phil…
      I am sure the Russians will be a bit nervous…

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
  5. These look very nice...I think I possibly already saw them on Marks own blog a couple of weeks ago. The brigade concept seems to work...our mate Mark S is always banging on about how small the British contingent in the Crimean War was. (Along with how uselessly incompetent they all were and how superior everything French was....which is almost certainly all true but not a welcome intrusion into our British folk memory fantasy of heroism and triumph over the dastardly Russian Bear!)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Although the British soldiers were certainly brave…the command appear to have been mostly buffoons,I also get the feeling that they considered themselves to be in competition with their allies as opposed to fully working with them.
      The lower levels of the British command structure however seem to have had a fair amount of respect for their fellow ‘foreign’ soldiers.
      The French certainly seemed to have a more competent higher command.
      Of course the British were far more glorious… Even when pointlessly charging down a valley lined with enemy artillery 😁

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
  6. Those are excellent and look forward to seeing them in action:)

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  7. Small but perfectly formed heavy brigade…..don’t you just need a few more ?

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    Replies
    1. It’s a real shame that there was only one regiment of Scots Greys …😁

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
    2. Aly I now have a question for you unrelated. Having recently purchased some late Romans I find I need to strip a few. I know you have done a lot with your shiny figures. They are metal gripping beast possibly acrylic but I think the faces and hands may be enamel a couple with heavy gloss vanish. Any thoughts and advice welcome 🙂

      Delete
    3. I’ve been using Dettol…
      I soak the figures in a slightly diluted mix.. it’s slow but it’s not some flesh eating chemical…
      When the figures have been in their bath for about a week..I did say it was slow.. the paint will be coming off… I find you need to clean/scrub them while they are in the Dettol if you run them under hot water they go a bit sticky.
      I tend to strip things well before I intend to paint them…
      I know some people use bleach.. I’ve not tried that but it seems to be effective.

      Delete
  8. When I see things like this I regret passing on my Crimean War collection, then I think of painting Russians...☹️

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I think I have plenty Russians…at the moment .
      It’s the braid on the British thar gives me the fear…

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
  9. Absolutely perfect. Good choice on how to represent the various units in the brigade. The painting is really first class. Hope they fight as well for you on the table as they look in the photos! Cheers!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I think that the mix has worked really well…and Mark has done them proud.

      Knowing my luck they will probably run off… or go one a mad charge down the nearest valley… it was all the rage 😁

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
  10. Yep, some fantastic looking cavalry there! Love the scarlet coats.

    Best Regards,

    Stokes

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. They are lovely Stokes…
      Scarlet coats… so British 😁

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
  11. Gorgeous looking heavy brigade!
    Best Iain

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  12. Very nice Aly. Mark has painted some lovely miniatures there for your collection. Look forward to when you start gaming with your collection.

    Cheers,
    Helen

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. They are rather lovely…Helen.
      It will be a while yet… I can only cope with so much rebasing at any one time.

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
  13. Absolutely lovely - saw these taking form on Mark's blog. Will enjoy seeing them face the enemy in due course.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It was great to see them come together on Marks blog…

      It will be good to get the toys on the table… eventually 😁

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
  14. Looking very nice. I think you made the right decision regarding only using four of the regiments instead of five, I think the latter would have become a bit of a hodge-podge.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. They certainly have the look of a unit…
      I’m not sure how I will deal with theLight Brigade…
      My initial thought is just to use The 17th Lancers and the 11th Hussars.

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
  15. Excellent beardage there!
    Plenty of character in an iconic unit.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Clearly they were warrior hipsters…😁

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
  16. These chaps have all turned out rather well, have they not? You MUST have some Light Dragoons in with the Light Brigade, Aly! The Lancers and Hussars on their own would look splendid...lots of colour...but not to have Light Dragoons would do them disservice.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Oh! I suppose you are right…😁
      I will work something out… unless you have some ideas yourself.

      All the best. Aly

      Delete
    2. Aly, I reckon three Lancers, three Light dragoons, three hussars as 8th Hussars, and three hussars as 11th Hussars.

      Delete
    3. Well that sounds like a plan to me…😁

      Delete
  17. Looking great! I'm looking forward to seeing the full army :-)

    Best wishes,
    Jan

    ReplyDelete