HELMET Soldiers

Recently I had the opportunity to visit "The Master", Mike Blake and great pleasure it was too. Most of us in this hobby contact our fellow enthusiasts via phone or Internet and this trip and the good old face-to-face communication that took place was truly inspirational, I thoroughly enjoyed myself and learned a great deal. Thanks Mike.

So, full of new enthusiasm I returned with a plan to paint up some Napoleonics for a Summer Wargame in the garden with our Boy before he returns to university. I was determined to complete some outstanding projects and at the same time start some new ones. Prior to seeing Mike I had always converted two figures and then painted them, then two more conversions, followed by the painting then so on. Now I am determined to prepare or convert all the figures in the unit and then paint them in one long painting exercise, although I still only paint them two at a time. This seems to speed things up and encourage me to finish what I have begun.

Most of the pictures here are of Italeri models, Mamelukes and British Light Dragoons, but first off a couple of British Hussars, from the 15th Light Dragoons, they are straight up and down HELMET kits, and are the first two of a squadron strength unit, Our squadrons comprise an officer, trumpeter and 16 men. I painted the officer and trumpeter of the Light Dragoons shown in the next two pictures over a year ago and they have been leading a phantom squadron ever since. Happily this sad state of affairs has been rectified and they now have the satisfaction of knowing that their shouted orders and tootling trumpet calls are now heard by 32 little plastic ears and responded to by 16 plastic men and horses. I really like these figures and have done very little to them, merely cutting of the right hands of some and re-fixing (pinning and glueing) at different angles to add variety.

Some of the Mamelukes have had the same treatment, and I have added firearms and blunderbusses to a few. The officer has had his held pistol removed and replaced with a HELMET sword, his sash and missing pistol built up, and white plume added. Additionally I added a load of greenstuff ornaments including shabraque to an Italeri Saracen horse, and based the whole thing on one 0f the colour plates in the Osprey Mameluke book, which was very useful for colour scemes and details of armament these chaps carried.

The Light Dragoons will be seen in the War of 1812, Peninsular and Waterloo scenarios, the Hussars in Spain and Belgium and the Mamelukes will face them in the same battles, so all in all some fairly flexible units.

That's all for now, comments, feedback, questions and blank cheques all welcomed.

Cheers

Eric