15mm Medieval German Crossbow, Bow and Foot

While I have been enjoying significant progress on my ECW project, the arrival of a recently placed order with Khurasan meant I had to return to the Medieval Germans to complete that project. I knew that if I didn't, then it would be left hanging indefinitely and I do want to be able to field the Germans at some point over the coming months. 

Strictly speaking, I didn't really need the additional troops as I had already completed the core and most options for the DBMM army list, but more detailed reading meant I had to have these particular options, just in case. All part of the obsessive nature which I am sure many wargamers identify with, and my storage boxes are full of "options" which have never again seen the light of day.

First off, twelve elements of mercenary crossbowmen:

Lovely figures and I really hadn't intended to paint any more crossbowmen after having painted so many for the Spanish and French, but thought the Germans deserved their own contingent:

There are four different poses which is, as usual from Khurasan, perfect for four figure bases:

There is an option in the DBMM army list for some light bowmen. The nice thing about these is that they can stand behind certain other troops and add a +1 to dice rolls. Given that they only cost 2 points an element, in a typical 400 point army list they should provide a useful option:

Not the nicest figures in the Khurasan range I have to say, and perhaps some of their earlier sculpts as there was a fair but of flash, but they are functional enough:

Next, on to the foot. These are more of the same figures which I completed at the end of January, although the latter were based as 'knight-killers' whereas these troops will unfortunately be rated as 'Inferior' if and when they make the table:

I painted the shield designs the same as the earlier knight-killers as most troops were raised from the same cantons:

 

While I was in the clearing-up frame of mind, I also managed to complete two medieval organ guns from Essex miniatures:

I had actually completed the crew a few months earlier and they had been languishing in my 'completed, but yet-to-find-a-home' pile, so it was nice to at last complete the artillery piece they deserve:

Last, but not least, I recently found myself short three early Carthaginian chariots in our 'Biblical' games. I placed an order for three more to bring the total complement to eleven, and completed them last week as a C-in-C, sub-general and ordinary chariot:

 

This little segue reminded me how much I enjoy painting Xyston figures. And how bad I am with lighting when taking pictures:

That's about it for now. The above notwithstanding (a word not used enough, in my opinion), I have a few more German medieval figures to do, before returning to the Royalist ECW regiments.

15mm Spanish Medieval Army Completed

I had originally hoped to have this army completed by the end of August, but effectively finished three weeks into September, so just over three and a half months. I enjoyed painting this army and they have ventured on to the field for a glorious win against some 100 Years War English, so I thought it time to organise a quick parade of the finished project:

The figures are all Khurasan, with the exception of the artillery which is from Essex Miniatures and the camp items which were purchased from Baueda:

I used a mixture of Little Big Men Studio and Pete's Flags designs for the knights pennants and some of the shield designs. Pete gave me his blessing to shrink them down a couple of sizes and even offered to do them for me which was extremely nice of him, but I took them to the local Officeworks and for a couple of dollars gained access to one of their high quality copiers:

I found this to be quite a manageable project, mainly because there were not masses of any one particular troop type, so the variety kept my interest levels up:

In total there are 498 figures, comprised of 105 horses and 393 foot and mounted figures:

Next up will be the last of the English longbowmen which will form the nucleus of that army, and then I'll stick with Medievals until Christmas and try to complete a Teutonic army which I have dragged out of the pile and started assembling, and am quite looking forward to getting stuck into.

15mm Medieval Artillery

 I needed a couple of artillery pieces for my Spanish army, and these models from Essex Miniatures caught my eye:

Even though I only require two for the Spanish list, I have done six as a few will find use in other Medieval projects I have ahead of me:

Essex figures can be an acquired taste and the pointing figure seems to turn up in a few ranges, but their artillery pieces are very nice. I particularly like the siege guns, and the two with the mantlets are probably my favourite with the wood grain nicely sculpted and just pronounced enough for dry-brushing to bring it out:

That's the artillery for this project completed:

Next up will be the last group of Spanish required, which are some lighter javelin-armed troops. I also have sixteen Swiss mercenaries to complete however which, while not strictly Spanish, are an option under the DBMM Spanish lists. I was aiming to complete the entire project by the end of August and, depending how the weekend goes, might get close.

Spanish Line

The last set of units, these nineteen battalions of Spanish line had been awaiting some updated flags and their unit labels for each of the command stand, which I finally managed to complete the weekend before last:

Each battalion consists of twenty-four figures, on a ratio of roughly 1:40. They have just one company of grenadiers however, which is slightly different to my 28mm version of the same army where I painted half the figures of the first battalion of each regiment as grenadiers, but none for any second battalion of the same regiment (where they existed):

This is again due to the order of battle for the Spanish of the 15mm group I game with, and an argument can be lodged for either case particularly as the Spanish, as with the Austrians and Russians, were often in the habit of removing grenadiers from line units to form converged grenadier battalions, of which I have also completed half a dozen in this particular army and photographed on an earlier post.

For the line battalions I tried to use an assortment of differing facing colours to provide some variety, the only slightly disappointing aspect being that the lapels are largely obscured by the cross-belts on the 15mm Essex figures:

That said, I found the Essex figures quite nice to paint, although doing so many of the same pose did become a little monotonous after a while:

The battalions consist of one each from the following regiments: Rey; Reina; Princesa; Principe; Granada; Guadalajara; Ordonnes, Cantabria; Navarra; Valencia; Aragon; Malaga; Leon; America; Zaragoza; Mallorca; Espait; Cordoba and Murcia, some famous names and also some great holiday spots amongst these.

In terms of the flags and given that many of the actual regiments only consisted of only one battalion, I could have provided some of the regiments with both the Coronela and Ordenanza standards, but was ultimately limited by the number of flag bearers in the Essex command packs, and also by our basing convention which allows only three figures to a base for Spanish line. In the end I distributed them between the units on a roughly 50/50 basis, again to give a little more variety.

Now that they are completed, I might try to haul the entire army out for a group photo before they get stored away, then to no doubt be dispatched piecemeal for various games in the future.

Spanish 15mm Army

Even though the bulk of it was completed two years or so ago, I have only in the past month put the finishing touches on this Spanish 15mm Napoleonic army to the point where I can now consider it complete.

It is probably self-indulgent but, as I probably won't get the chance to assemble it again in its entirety, I thought I would set it up for a a few group photos, if nothing else than to remind me what I actually had actually managed to assemble.

Firstly, a view of the army from the front:

And another view of the same from the flank:

The figures are all Essex Miniatures 15mm, apart from the staff figures which are from Warmodelling who have an excellent range of Spanish personality figures covering most of the Peninsular war.

Here is a shot of the Warmodelling General Jose Pascual de Zayas figure in front of some light cavalry, who was one of the most ably performed of the Spanish Generals and performed so creditably at Albuera (primarily because he had taken the time to put his troops through several weeks' worth of manoeuvres prior to the battle):

All of the flags are GMB, with the exception of those of the Spanish Guard and Swiss which I again purchased from Adolfo Ramos in Spain:

The flag of the Guardias Royale in particular is amongst my favourite Napoleonic flags as it is quite distinctive:

Twelve regiments of cavalry in all, including five of the yellow-coated dragoons seen here from the back, with a unit of guerrillas at their rear (which I am not sure I would be completely comfortable with):

Here they are again from the front, with two hussar regiments and a line of artillery spread before them:

I managed fourteen artillery pieces in all, with the number of figures representing how many pieces there are in each battery, with either three or four crew figures on each base:

I attempted to add a bit of variety to the limbers by including a few ox-drawn pieces, to represent the difficulty the Spanish had in finding decent horseflesh. Notwithstanding that, the Spanish artillery was one of their best-performing arms:

Also included are six units of light infantry to provide the army with a decent skirmish screen, seen here spread across the front:

And with the also very able General Don Pedro Caro y Sureda, 3rd Marquis de Romana, and his staff visible in the background:

The one nice surprise I found when putting together both this and its larger 28mm couterpart was how much colour and variety is to be found in a Spanish Napoleonic army, particularly that of the earlier part of the war before the rather more drab British supplies found their way through as replacements. Some of that may be seen in the following overhead shot, which includes elements of the line, converged grenadier battalions, the Swiss, the Guard, an Irish battalion, along with some hussars, dragoons and heavy calavlry:

In case anyone is interested (and to help my own failing memory), the final numbers for the army is as follows:

23 line battalions of 24 figures each
3 Guard battalions of 25 figures each
6 composite Grenadier battalions of 12 figures each
8 provincial militia battalions of 15 figures each
1 urban militia battalion of 20 figures
4 light battalions of 20 figures each
2 light battalions of 16 figures each
1 band of guerrillas of 20 figures
14 artillery pieces with 48 crew
12 limbers with 20 figures and 50 horses and oxen
5 dragoon regiments of 16 figures each
3 heavy cavalry regiments of 16 figures each
4 light and hussar regiments of 16 figures each
25 mounted and 9 foot staff figures

This gives a total of 1,265 figures along with 267 horses.

Probably more than I will ever need, but hopefully enough variation to cover most scenarios:

Now to complete my 28mm Portuguese project, which I am optimistic enough to believe might be achieved before the end of the year.

Spanish Provincial Militia

Over the past couple of weeks I have finally managed to put the finishing touches on the Provincial Militia and Line for my Spanish 15mm army. The figures themselves had actually been completed over a year ago and a few units have seen action on the table, but the line and militia have been awaiting their flags and the labels for their bases, indicating their unit designations.

I put together eight units of Provincial militia, which are essentially the Essex Spanish line figures painted with the red facings and brass buttons of the 1805 militia uniform issue:

This is in contrast to the Urban Militia units which were more mixed in appearance, and for which I used a mixture of browns to represent more hastily acquired clothing as opposed to a regulation uniform.

The militia were present in a number of engagements where it has to be said they performed poorly. At Talavera anywhere up to four battalions were said to have fled at the sound of their own gunfire as the front ranks engaged a few skirmishing French cavalry, much to the bemusement of the British (and annoyance when they were found to have apparently looted the baggage train after their departure). It has to be questioned whether this is really very surprising as they were poorly trained, led and supplied, and it is probably a sign of their fortitude that they were there in the first place.

In the rules our group games with they are classed an 'E' and we have to be extremely careful where we place them, which is normally to the rear where they act as a morale bonus in providing rear support:

The paper strength for Spanish militia units does appear to indicate a number of attached grenadier companies.  Nafziger however appears to dispute this so we have not included them in our order of battle for the Spanish. That said, I threw a few in and painted a couple of figures in blue overcoats, for the sake of variety:

That's the militia completed, and I have finalised nineteen battalions of the line which I also hope to photograph for the sake of posterity over the next few days.