David Bickley's Wargames Blog

The occasional ramblings of an average gamer, journeyman painter, indifferent modeller, games designer, sometime writer for Wargames Illustrated and host of games in GHQ.



Friday 24 January 2020

More Hessians for my AWI games

Despite the best efforts of hand and eye to thwart my painting intentions I have been steadily working my way through a new Hessian unit for our AWI games here in GHQ. The figures are the venerable Front Rank ranges, a mixture of codes from their AWI Hessians and SYW Prussians. No doubt that would trouble some, but not me. The flags are from Flags of War and the bases as usual from Warbases ~




They are meant to represent the Grenadier Regiment von Rall, although both the figure coat design and the painting are compromises on my part. They will also be doubling up along with their fellow AWI Hessians in future SYW games as I need more figures to fight my bloated French army. I also added a single mounted officer to act as an ADC in Black Powder games ~

I used a couple of prints by Don Troiani as the inspiration for these and thought you might enjoy seeing them ~
A depiction of the Regiment in action at the Battle of Trenton which I found while browsing for examples as sources for painting the figures. Not a print I own sadly, but one I would really like on the wall in GHQ.
The study of an individual Grenadier highlights both where the figure itself and my painting of them deviate from their probable contemporary appearance. I’ll leave you to work out the differences, if you are that way inclined that is. They will do for me!
Now that these are out of the way I’ve some Highland Infantry Grenadiers for our F&IW games. They are by Redoubt Enterprises, picked up last year from Colonel Bill’s. I hope to finish the figures off before the end of the month if possible.




16 comments:

  1. I must say you've done a great job on these and the command figure really adds to the unit.

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  2. Mixing SYW Prussians with AWI Hessians bothers me not either. Nice work!

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    1. Always good to know I'm not alone there.

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  3. Excellent work on your hessians! I think it's a close enough call and if it's close enough, it's good enough in my book!
    Best Iain

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    1. It's pleasing to realize the uniform Nazis are nothing but loud mouthed minorities, so thanks!

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  4. Splendid job Mr. B, they will be a pleasure to employ in due course.

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  5. Top notch job, they look great!

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  6. Fine fellows David... they all appear to have a happy and pleasant demeanour...
    All the best. Aly

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    1. That's the difference with more contemporary tastes though isn't it? The 'Goldfish Gamers' need far fewer figures so drive the 'individual look' but in reality on the table who can even see the differences?

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  7. No doubt that would trouble some, but not me.

    Living life on the edge, as always!!

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    1. Well it needs shouting from the rooftops really. TOYS IN A BLOODY GAME! No more, no less!

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  8. Nice job David and we all seem to agree about the uniforms...I did exactly the same thing with my AWI Germans twenty plus years ago, using the exact same ranges, then about the years ago, added some more from the Foundry range. If you fancy a look, I put images of them up on my blog a couple of weeks ago

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    1. Yes, I think I have seen them. I'm glad all on here seem to be of one mind, I'm too old now to bother with those who think our hobby is somehow more than playing with toy soldiers.

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