Suffolk’s on parade

The 1st battalion the Suffolk regiment is complete and are now being put through their drill prior to embarking for South Africa. The Suffolk’s didn’t actually take part in any of the battles in 1899 so I may have to stretch reality a bit to let them take part in my planned campaigns.

The battalion in close column, officers to the front. Roy's right, they
do look a bit like flapping seagulls!

Deployed in line and ready to advance.

Extended order - this new fangled formation is frowned
upon by the senior NCO's.

A half battalion - some scenarios will call for smaller British units.

The sergeant major on the right is sensibly carrying a rifle to
make himself a less conspicuous target. The officers however
may not last long once the mausers start firing.

I’m really pleased to have finished one British unit and hope to start on the next one soon. In the meantime I need to return to the Napoleonic figures on my painting desk who are feeling a little bit neglected.

First British unit done – almost!

My first unit of British infantry is now varnished and based and only requires some base texturing to complete it. Overall I’m really pleased with the way these look and I think my final decision to go with 24 figure units has paid off. These are all Jacklex with the exception of one of the officers and the sergeant who are from Newline Designs.

I’ve gone through quite a few changes of direction since I started this project but these are now my final thoughts on things:

1. The British and Boers will be based to the same spec with 3 figures per infantry stand measuring 60 x 20mm. Cavalry will be mounted in 2's on a 40 x 40mm stand (some stands will be broken down to enable casualty removal).
2. Painting style – simple block colours. The figures will be matt/satin varnished – I had a go with gloss but it just doesn’t seem right for the look I’m after.
3. Bases will be textured and painted – I tried the plain green ‘old school’ style but again this didn’t seem right for this project.
4. The rules will be ‘traditional’ wargame ones but I may at some point try a Commands & Colors type secondary set.
5. I’m keeping this small, my aim will be – 4 British infantry units plus 1 cavalry unit and a couple of guns, 5 Boer commandos plus 1 mounted commando and a couple of pom-poms.

This all seems quite achievable but we will see.

First of the Guards

I couldn’t resist painting up this test figure for what will be my Guard battalion – no particular one in mind but possibly they’ll represent the Coldstream Guards who took part in the actions at Modder River and Magersfontein.

The figure is from Raventhorpe Miniatures ref BO13 British standing firing. I really like this range as they are amongst the few 20mm models available specifically designed with the Boer War in mind. There is a lot of character in this pose that somehow conjures up that Boer War feel.

I’m going to need more British troops because I’m hoping to receive some Boer reinforcements shortly and we can’t have the Boers outnumbering the British as that just wouldn’t be cricket.

Tommies - thousands of ‘em!

Maybe not thousands but a lot for me and representing a rare attempt at mass production. I normally paint in very small batches to fend off boredom and also because my Napoleonics required a lot of fiddly detail. However in an attempt to get this project properly off the ground I decided I have to make a bit more effort.

I’ve impressed myself because I have managed to de-flash, glue on rifles, undercoat and completely paint these in 5 evenings. They still need touching up, especially the white straps but the hard work is done. I’ve even ordered some laser cut bases to speed up the basing process and try and get them off the painting desk in super quick time.

Once these are finished I will be able to give my rules a proper test albeit on a very small scale of one British unit attacking one Boer Commando.