Thursday 25 August 2016

Great Boers

I finally received my packet of Jacklex samples this week and set about painting a few up. The first thing I noticed was that, as Matt had warned me, they had quite a lot of flash metal and it took about 45 minutes just to de-flash them and file the bases. However that said they are surprisingly charming little figures although sadly they suffer from the same problem as the Newline range – they’re not to a constant scale. The marching highlander for instance is a good few millimetres taller than his advancing friend.

Jacklex BW4 Boer running with separate rifle - simple but charming

This is a shame as I could have been tempted and I particularly like the running figures with separate rifles. It’s a bit fiddly gluing the rifles to the hands of the figures but it’s well worth the effort, the regular British infantryman is the best of these. So far I have only painted one Boer but I will post the rest here in due course.

Newline Designs BOE02 - Boer cavalry

I’m glad I got these samples but in the end in it just reinforced my original decision to use the Newline Designs colonial range for this project. This decision was also helped along by the recent release of Highlanders by Newline (see my last post). The one remaining problem is artillery as I can’t find anybody who makes 20mm Boer artillery and of course I must have a pom-pom! Jacklex do a decent range of British artillery including a very grand looking 4.7” naval gun and a deadly maxim gun. I may possibly be able to convert or scratch-build some Boer guns, I’ll have to see.

12 comments:

  1. Raventhorpe suposedly do a pom pom!

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  2. Any idea where you can buy them from in the UK?

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  3. http://www.rlbps.com/RLBPRav.htm#Col

    The guy who now has Raventhorpe is in the States, but hey you only want one gun...His ordering system appears to be snail mail, but then he does give a telephone number.. No one said it would be easy! Otherwise its a scratchbuild as far as I can see.

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  4. A guy on TMP likes them!

    http://theminiaturespage.com/boards/msg.mv?id=193628

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  5. If you aren't already aware, 'Commando' by Denys Reitz and 'Three Years' War' by Christiaan de Wet are two of the best histories of the Boer war, both written by participants....

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    1. Hi Iain - actually I hadn't heard of either of those so may put them on the list. I don't have many books on the subject but Packenham's illustrated Boer War history is my favourite.

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    2. For a good general history try 'Goodbye Dolly Grey' by Rayne Kruger....also 'Thank God We Kept The Flag Flying' by Kenneth Griffiths for the siege of Ladysmith....and make sure to watch 'Breaker Morant'....superb film featuring Edward Woodward...

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  6. I found a UK distributor and have sent his email address under a separate cover. He does a 1 pdr pom pom and has limber and team available.

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  7. Minor point here - are your British carrying Matini-Henrys or Lee-Metfords? Most infantry carried the former in the First Boer War (1880-81) but had moved on to the Lee- Metford by 1899......?

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  8. Iain - the Newline British are actually from their Sudan range so possibly not Lee-Metfords? The Jacklex range are less specific (although their equipment is more accurate).

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  9. The Raventhorpe Pom Poms, limbers and mules arrived today. They are excellent, a really good fit to scale with my Jacklex. A sample Boer was included and he fits well too!

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    1. That's good news Roy I will be ordering some too!

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