To not build up the hundreds, if not thousands, of miniatures long backlogs that other club members have, I decided to give myself a rule to follow: You can only buy new miniatures when everything you have is painted, based, and ready for battle. Not very realistic, I know. And of course I haven't been able to hold myself to it. So to feel better about myself, I amended it somewhat:
The Black Watch, 42nd Regiment of Foot
Devil's Own, 88th Regiment of Foot
Guerilleros
Royal Americans, 5/60th Regiment of Foot
We are planning on running two separate campaigns, one in Russia and one on the Peninsula. Both set in 1812, and of course I'd like to field a force that would at least be plausible historically. Order of BattleThe battle of Salamanca was one of Wellingtons greatest victories, were he broke his usual style of being defensive in battle to defeat 40,000 men in 40 minutes. Using the Order of Battle (available at Wikipedia) I tried to see if my force could be fielded from a single source. Sadly the 88th and 42nd are organized in different divisions, and the only division with Highlanders in kilts is the 1st. The 74th, a Highlander regiment, were a part of the 3rd Division together with the 88th, but it didn't wear Highland dress on the Peninsula. And anyway I'm not very keen on repainting the kilts I've toiled over. Neither the 1st nor the 3rd had any riflemen from the 95th! But they did have riflemen from the 5/60th (5th Battalion, 60th Regiment), the Royal Americans. Reading Oman's "Wellington's Army" about how Nosey quite early distributed the 5th battalion of the Royal Americans among his brigades, to help them get enough skirmishers to counter the massive green cloud of French Voltigeurs, I got the impression that the 5/60th are some of the unsung (or lesser sung?) heroes of the Peninsular War. They also had a much spiffier uniform, having red facings. Just a quick little paint job and I had converted my riflemen. Historically it looks like they should have had grey or dark blue trousers, but they were issued dark green ones after the war. And I'd say a company could have been issued new (dark green) pants after having worn out their previous pairs, so I left the pants as they were. I really like the 88th, such an iconic regiment. The roughest and toughest of the Fighting 3rd. ReinforcementsMy first battle with my assembled force helped me decide how to expand the force. I wanted Light Company skirmishers, only having the (expensive pointswise) riflemen to screen my forces with felt a bit odd. I also realized that skirmishers ideally have a lot of officers attached so you can split them up during the battle. After a quick headswap, the Perry plastic Flank Company infantrymen that I over-eagerly assembled for the 100 days are ready for the Peninsular War. These I complemented with 6 skirmishing figures from Front Rank. A $15 coupon from Warlord also tricked me into getting their box of Chosen Men. Painting all this together with some of the unfinished Perry Rifle command figures gets me:
MegalomaniaBefore going into Napoleonics I must say I was a bit confused seeing Jonas and Shirty's behavior. They were buying so many little plastic (and metal) men. But I was intrigued, and then Jonas gave me a first taste. Now when planning were to take my force from here megalomania has struck, I've decided to set my Napoleonics goal to be assembling the Fighting 3rd. The Highlanders I have can simply be some added flavor. I wonder if the thoughts and feelings I'm having are the same as Nosey & Boney two hundred years ago. Then Warlord has a sale on sprues and I order 80 Portuguese Line Infantry to allow me to field two line battalions of Manley Power's brigade together with some Caçadores. -Zach
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