I spent most of this week painting a half dozen gunners for my artillery arm. They are by RSM, the gun is a bit of a lovely monster by Suren that has been in my collection for a few years now, and looking for a role. I think it just became part of my seige train. Looking at the size of the beast, I'd guess it's an eighteen-pounder - I think if I get another few, that will see me right to be able to set up a heavy battery for some hard pounding as well as a ricochet battery to keep the enemies' heads down!
Looking at the scene being enacted, it seems to me that one of the men is sponging the piece out whilst the others train it on a new target under the beady eye of their officer. I have been painting a test figure as an ouvrier to help the gunners build their battery positions. If he works out well, then there will be more added; I expect fellows like him to be useful in future seiges.
I've finally succumbed to the temptation that began with seeing some of the figures on Jim Purkys' excellent blog. I have gone on a small spending spree on the Tradition website and bought a few command figures which I'll be taking a little time over as I paint in the next few weeks as little rewards for me as I start to gear up again to full painting speed.
Considering that at the moment my Prussian Army is no more than IR 13 (with FR35 in production), a Squadron of Dragoons and some assorted von Kleist Freikorps, it is a little like having Napoleon leading the 33rd Light Infantry but, so be it.
I'm painting Seydlitz next, using the Willie Cuirassier Officer figure. Yummy!
10 comments:
Hi Greg,
Nice to see you painting again - superb looking figures. Just need you set up your fort again for a shot (no pun intended) with that cannon.
Ian
Nicely done!
Thanks for sharing,
Ed v. H-F
I wonder if the Ouvriers d'Artillerie were indeed pionners / labour unskilled manpower as generally suggested (e.g. in Funcken): infantrymen were available for such tasks.
One characteristic of the Artillery was it *huge* train -so that pontoons and pontooneers were, in France, attached to the Artillery, the only Arm with the required teams, vehicles and skills.
So maybe the Ouvriers were specialists of Train maintenance -cartbuilders, carpenters, farriers, saddlers; perhaps also blackpowder specialists, builders of caseshots... Indeed it was the case for the 'ouvriers' attached to infantry and cavalry regiments (with tailors and 'armuriers')...
Jean-Louis
Nicely painted! (and one can't fault the book acting as a "backdrop") :-)
Thank-you Gentlemen,
Ian, I do have a hankering to get out my fort again and have a little rial battle, to be sure. I am assembling some Hinchcliffe garrison artillery that is turning out to be rather fiddly. I am tempted to turn to Eureka Pirate Ship guns to supplement them before I get to frustrated!
Jean-Louis - you are probably right; I shall have to imagine that my Ouvriers have been drafted into the seige-lines for their mechanical abilities.
Fitz and Ed - thanks for your kind compliments on the figures; it's always a pleasure to get some feedback; I often work in something of a vacuum.
Best regards,
Greg
Hi Greg,
Glad to see you're painting again. Your artillery battery and Frederick figures are lovely. I too am tempted to add some Tradition/Stadden figures, although I fear they would absolutely tower over my Revell Plastics, which are about 30-31mm tall. They work with the RSMs. . . just. I hear that the Traditions are quite a bit taller than the RSM figures. Anyway, looking forward to more of your work in the coming weeks.
Best Regards,
Stokes
P.S.
I answered your OOB question over at my blog.
I do like the figures for the artillery and hhave always tried to make each of my batteries tell a tale. I especially like yours in the process of swabbing out.
Great Miniatures, I like them
Tradition (Stadden also has a nice range of 25mm figures that should work with the RSM figures). Most people overlook this range as the 30mm range gets all the attention.
I had one of those figure - Stadden officer with spontoon, but I gave it to one of our group members, Jim Harms, who is very tall and was looking for figure to represent himself in one of his Prussian regiments.
Nice artillery
-- Allan
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