Prussia: supply train

 

Dued to professional things, it was not posssible to produce more this month, since my last post..c as life goes its usual way. Today, I finished two Prussian supply wagons from Matthias-Manske, painted in a dark blue with some brown touch. I long time looked for the exact colour of this kind of carriage and found several sources.

Last week I visited then Dresden again and took the opportunity to go to the Military Museum, which is newly opened after renovation. Daniel Libeskind was the architect, but is concept is not convincing.
What I found, was a Prussian wagon in original, system Gribauval, which inspired me for painting the two wagons:

source: Heeresgeschichtliches Museum der Bundeswehr, Dresden; Privataufnahme

source: Heeresgeschichtliches Museum der Bundeswehr, Dresden; Privataufnahme

So I decided this colour mix and printed the covers of the wagons in the computer, including the description, as the Prussians usually did: "Pulver Wagen." and "Grenaden Wagen."

I detected also some pearls of the 18. century: an original coat of a Prussian officer, wounded by an French grenade at Minden - following the description, he was 26 years old at this time, but survived the SYW after amputation of his left arm.
It is - nonetheless - a really frightening sight and very emotional to see how close this individual destiny appaers - despite the 260 years difference to the happening:

source: Heeresgeschichtliches Museum der Bundeswehr, Dresden; Privataufnahme

Generals, Generals

Generalfeldmarschall Seydlitz mit Flügeladjutant der Kavallerie.

I am so obsessed with reading the fantastic rulebook "Black Powder" and its descriptions of army organisations. They propose for a good wargaming operation different sets of brigades (groups of regiments) with their own brigade generals.
This is the reason why I ordered and painted some figures as generals, giving them different characters and skills (according to the playsheet of "Black Powder").

Above you see General von Seydlitz in his typical field dress, accompanied by a staff officer of the cavalry. The figures are Matthias-Manske miniatures, I dared to change the heads using Frontrank ones - they are unique in expression and detail.

Also the French got a second command staff:

Et voilà les nobles messieurs: The general and his staff officer at the right are Trident miniatures (40mm range of the AWI serie) from the US. Der Alte Fritz recommended me that and it was a good advice. The officer on the horse is a Matthias-Manske miniature, sitting on the new edition of his horse serie.

French seem to have huge balls, isn´t it? :-)

Prussia: Frontrank-Regiment No 25

This is the result of my first order at Frontrank Miniatures in GB. The regiment is composed by the original Hessian AWI 40mm serie and, of course, splendidly suitable to be used as Prussians. My compliments for the accurateness of details and the expressive heads, faces and wigs to the manufacturers. I did the 25th regiment, but, if I am honest, just because of the particular flag colours which I like in particular. I painted the sashs of the standard bearers in golden yellow, because I saw some similar templates at Knoetels Uniformbogen.

A Sash&Saber farmers wife gazing at the soldiers

Russian Horsegrenadiers en bataille

My Russian Cavalry-Regiment "Leibdragoner" of the Tsar grows slowly, but today i am able to present the first 12 figures. I did some battle pictures on my tabletop against Prussian Infantery, deploying some skirmishs of Kunersdorf 1759. I like very much the iuxtaposition of the miniatures of different manufacturers - here some Prince-August Grenadiers against the Matthias-Manske Horsegrenadiers.
Can you smell the biting tang of fire and smoke in this picture??

France: Regiment No 70 "Flandres"

This is a Walloon regiment of the French army, the french speaking part of the Belgian population. I like them very much, especially because my relatives lives there and each visit begins with a warm welcome, a good cuisine and a impressive landscape.
Et voilà: Flanders, called Flandres is newly integrated in the French ranks.
The figures are Sash&Saber troops of the serie "French and Indian War".

Deployment: in front the Swiss Lochmann, Flanders and, in the background, Auvergne.

The French Staff Officers (Matthias-Manske-Miniatures)

tracking and tracing in Zorndorf 3D

That´s a good example of our work to find the right and true traces in the battle of Zorndorf.. Vicky is a young architect and very talented, also in 3D-design - she helps me doing the maps. The image shows Vicky´s remarks sitting over different sources and creating a realistic montage of the territory and the armies´deployments. Poor Vicky, I confused her also with my memories of the site, being in Zorndorf 2 years ago...
I remember the river No 3 as a street between Zorndorf and Quartschen, but old sources tell different stories... omg!

As you can see, we torture ourself, not by business, just by idealism.. isn´t it scary?
:-)

Kunersdorf and Zorndorf in 3D

Can you see the idyllic village of Kunersdorf in the center of the image? And the fortress, built by the Austro-Russian allies just in the north of it? This image will be the base for a 3D simulation of the battle of Kunersdorf 1759. The sprawled fires and smokes are result of the Austrian devastations the day before the battle... 

We will do 4 images describing the most horrible battle in the Seven Years War for a book.

Each image will show a deciding phase. More about it later. it isn´t still finished!

And this will be the animated battle of Zorndorf 1758. Above you see the territory, rendered  in the computer, still white; and below, the base for the battle pictures. Haha, Seydlitz will appear from the lower right side of the image, jumping out of the forest with 6000 cuirassiers!

Prussian Jaegers sneaking up to a village

Vorwärts Jungs, da lang!

The Prussian Jaegerkorps arrived from Matthias-Manske and were painted immediately as a Feldjaeger battalion, having order to charge Austrian Pandours which should be near the village.
The figures are placed separately on small, round vignettes, to be used as a skirmishing unit.
I am inspired by the marvellous rule book "Black Powder", which describes syllabi of how to lead armies, their brigades and units. The authors tell about regular and irregular troops - both of them have different skills in combat actions. This Prussian unit will operate as a free battalion without battle order. It is a new experience following this rule, but first tests on the tabletop went well.
They will be integrated in a combined Brigade.

The picture looks a bit like the Deutsche Wehrmacht advancing in Ukraine 1941, but it is purposeless... it´s just the summertime sadness of East-European landscape all around..

I bought some civilians at Sash&Saber, from their AWI-serie, and I like them very much.
Here two farmers, following the Prussian Jaegers with worried eyes.

Russia: supply train (II)

Now, finally, the Russian ammunition wagon is finished as an addition to the two smaller carts from the former post. It contains grenades for the heavy artillery pieces and is hold in the typical, more or less old-fashioned style of the Russian army equipment.
The wagon is from Matthias-Manske, but got a modified cover and some smaller details were changed to the original model.

The convoy stops near the protecting trees in the noon..

combined set with the two other carts

during the stop, a marching infantry regiment is passing, straight ahead to the battle...

a Russian 3-pdr, a wunderful piece of Sash&Saber, the crew are Matthias-Manske figures

Silesian architecture (III): Der Alte Fritz am Gutshof

It is already the last light of the sunset when we recognize his majesty in person, der Alte Fritz and one of his adjutants stopping at this country house, in Silesia called "Gutshof". The peasants´wife and a maidservant open the door to see curiously who is approaching. Of course the dog is with them.
It is a building of the richer peasants who owned a sightly big piece of land. This we found often in the Silesian regions, where,  in general, farmers didn´t live as poor as in the Prussian territories. That´s dued to the better soil fertility, the ground is not so sabolous than in Brandenburg or Mecklenburg.
The building has the typical baroque proportion in the central block - a reminiscence of the urban architecture, found not far away in the city of Glogau and others.
I hope, the building will be useful in the next battle game!

Der Alte Fritz greets the ladies very politely and just ask about their affairs...
Alter Fritz and adjutant are from Matthias-Manske, the ladies from Peipp.

never to forget: a stork´s nest on the top of the chimney