28mm Royal Naval Guard "Real Marina" of the Kingdom of the two Sicilies 1848

This is the first unit for my Kingdom of the two Sicilies for my Risorgimento project. I hope that this is the start of the last major army for the project. I will admit, my initial figure purchases were all over the place as I compared figure lines and explored options. This is one such exploration.

The naval infantry "Real Marina" unit was an elite unit and comprised half of the Royal guard. That said they were far from ceremonial, participating in several campaigns including the  Battle of Volturnus in 1860. I'll include an image of the Peter Dennis painting of this battle which shows the unit fighting in their campaign hats. I've tried to model this unit after that painting. To do so, I've re-purposed Perry Miniatures ISA33 Infantry marching, flank co, greatcoats and 'Isabellino' caps from their Carlist War line. The backpacks aren't an exact match, but they're close enough for me!

The core of the line infantry for the Neapolitan army will be from the Gringo40 Neapolitan Infantry line, but I wanted something 'different' for the guard unit and this unit and these figures seemed to fit the bill. Not all guard wear bearskins!

Here is a good look at their packs. They are missing the characteristic blanket rolls. I considered adding them with green stuff, but they would have been positioned comically high. Also who's to say that on campaign, the luxury of carrying some non-regulation gear wouldn't be allowed to such an elite unit? Either way, this is how they're going into battle, like it or not!

 

 

These will count for another six figures in this year's painting totals. Next up a unit of Swiss line infantry for the Neapolitans. To the left, the Peter Dennis painting that I mentioned above. I've opted for flank company figures with their more adorned shoulder scales, hoping to set the 'guard' unit off a bit more on the tabletop. Call it creative license.

28mm Battaglione di Faenza, Papal army 1848

28mm Battaglione di Faenza, Papal army 1848. Volunteers of the national guardsmen from the city of Faenza.  These are Perry figures from their American Civil War line: pack ACW61 - Early Confederate infantry in Sicilian Hats.  Unfortunately this pack only contains three figures with these hats. This requires a two-pack purchase for the six figures needed with six left over figures wearing head scarves. The latter I'll use as generic Garibaldists in my Garibaldi forces. I do wish that Perry would make a pack of six of these figures, possibly with additional poses. I have at least two other units that this particular figure would be a great fit for. When doing the Risorgimento, one has to be particularly resourceful to find appropriate figures for some of the lesser known units. Repurposing and converting is the name of the game here. Chocolate Box Wars small figure count makes both much more tolerable allowing exploration into periods with less figure support. 

This unit wore an a simple light blue uniform. With light blue being a challenging color to paint and shade I looked outside my normal process for this unit. I primed the figures in light blue and made a medium blue wash from contrast paints thinned highly. After coating the entire figures with the wash I was very disappointed with the tide marks from the wash.

 

I pressed on wit the rest of the blocking in, and after a light wash on the weapons and faces I repaired all of the light blue uniform irregularities with a thorough highlight pass. Now I'm much happier with the result. If I had to do it over again, I might de saturate the blue a bit, but for a first try, they're good enough for the girls I go out with. I suppose if it ever bothers me enough I could hit the entire unit with another wash of some sort. I'm likely to just leave them as-is.

These figures even look the part from the back with their simple haversack and canteen. Perfect for quickly raised and trained national guard!

Hopefully Osprey will forgive my use of their image here showing the simple all light blue uniform. I can highly recommend both of the Armies of the Italian Wars of Unification books from Gabriele Esposito published by Osprey. These with Espisito's more thorough book, Armies of the Italian Risorgimento published by MMP Books make for nearly everything you need in terms of Uniform research for the period.

These comprise another six 28mm figures for this year's painting totals. Next up my first unit for the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, the elite Royal Guard naval infantry regiment 'Real Marina'

AWI Units Re-Based Courtesy of My Brave Fusiliers! Blog

My good friend Mark from the My Brave Fusiliers! blog offered me the opportunity to purchase two of his superbly painted AWI American units. Mark wanted to fund a new project and offered me some of his figures. I still have a few units in my American force that I bought pre-painted that aren't quite up to the standards of the units I've painted myself. Mark's figures definitely are much better than those and will replace some of those units in my army. Mark paints at least as well as I do, and better in terms of style and historical accuracy. 

Mark had these labeled as Pennsylvanians, which I'm sure is accurate. Mark's units each had 30 figures in them. This matches up perfectly with my preferred basing of two six-figure stands and a three-figure skirmish stand. Each of Mark's units will create two separate units in my basing system, but can also be used en masse as a single larger unit as shown in the first photo above. To the left here is the typical way I'll use them when in open order. In line formation the center stand is removed to close up ranks. 

This unit in hunting shirts is very flexible in how I can use it. The flags give away the units identity to the extremely knowledgeable, but the popularity of the hunting shirt means I'm happy to substitute this unit for many others. 

A look at the back of the figures showing off Marks' excellent brushwork.  I'll be counting these units as twelve stands re-based in my annual painting totals. Thanks for the figures Mark!

28mm French Napoleonic Marshals - Finished!

After posting several WIP posts about these, here they are, finished. The eight figures make up four brigadier general stands and two corps command stands. There are six Old Glory figures and two Perry. Now that they're mixed on the bases, you're hard pressed to tell the difference. I think Old Glory sometimes gets criticized unfairly by some wargamers. Sure, there are some exceptions, but in general I feel they're a high quality and very high value figure line.

I'm counting these as sixteen figures for my annual painting totals. Like all mounted figures I count the rider and horse separate. I feel this is justified since I paint them separate and mounted figures are twice as much work as foot.