Indian Army General

Just adding some pics of the commanding general of my Early Indian army, and his "Maiden Guard" bodyguard - yep, an elite band of fighting women!

Indian women seem to have played a more proactive role in "defending their homelands" than most of their western counterparts in this era, and Hat included a female guardsperson in their models, so I had to include their unit!

My Indian army is taking shape - not so slowly at the moment. I just hope I can keep this pace up throughout the month and get the whole army finished!

Early Indian Army

I really didn't intend to spend this month working on my Early Indian army, but that's the way it is turning out.

I bought all the figures four years ago of course, and painted the elephants and the horsemen, but was having problems with the paint taking ages - and I do mean ages, in that it was still sticky several months after being applied - to dry on the figures, for which I blamed the "new" plastic that was used for the figures, so didn't press on with the rest.

For the most part, time seems to have cured the problem - the figures now only take a couple of days to dry! So I've been pushing ahead with the rest of it. Still lots to do before the full army is assembled, but these shots show off most of the basic units.

I'll post the full army (famous last words!) later in the month.

Collector's Show and Other Bits

My Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth army attracted some interest at this year's collector's show, especially from a local family of Polish lineage. Thanks to my co-worker from the News-Banner, Barb Barbieri, taking the photo I was able to be included in the shot.

While I haven't posted much over the past couple of weeks, I have been busy.

I have now finished (?) my regiment of Russian Dragoons from Peter "The Great's" army - just need to take some pics now to post here!

I'm also finally (after four!!! years) getting around to painting the infantry for my early Indian army. I've had the elephants and a couple of horse units waiting all this time for the rest of the army, and they were getting a little restless. I also now have a Commanding General riding in his chariot, to lead it, and am planning their first battle - against my Achaemenid Persians, for the new year.

Once again, I just need to get busy with my camera!

Photos hopefully will follow shortly!

Seven Year's War Prussian Cuirassiers

I've been way too slow with my postings this year. Hopefully that will change soon.

In the meantime, the above pictures are of my Seven Years' War Prussian Cuirassiers (heavy cavalry) riding off to find some Austrians (or Russians) to fight.

Not exactly TOY soldiers......

I'm STILL working on my regiment of Russian dragoons that about a month ago I thought I would have done "next week".

But in the meantime, compliments of Mr. Gib Young, are some photos of me all dressed up as a Union soldier (American Civil War) at the Memorial Day celebrations in Huntington May 30.

Hopefully I'll have those Russian dragoons finished soon!

And also, I'll be back in uniform at the Wells County Historical Society's Ice-Cream Social on Sunday June 28th at the county museum. Catch me there in person!

Great Northern War - Russian Dragoons

Working on a regiment of these this month to start my Great Northern Wars collection.

My Russian Dragoon regiment commander looks good. I hope to have the first squadron of his men finished over the weekend and ready for photography next week.

Building Better Communities - Japan

Slowly my villages are coming along. They will look more impressive when deployed on the battle field, but this will give you some idea anyway.

My Japanese village is coming along nicely. I think I have sufficient houses now, but still have some wall sections on order awaiting delivery. I don't expect to be adding beyond that, but we'll see. (Again, it's a low priority, but if something interesting appears, I might think about it.)

For my village, I have the options of one samurai's house (the building I have put the walls around), three residential dwellings (with the red tiled roof - yes, I know. Only two are in this photo - the paint on the third was still drying when I took this), a candle shop and a small inn for travellers, and several wall sections, plus a gate of course.

This village should be in action next weekend, as my Japanese army fights my Poles as part of the Pike and Shot tournament I started back in January. I need to get this competition over with so I can move on to my next project for the year.

My major building project for the rest of the year will be an Arabic village that I can also use for early "middle east" battles ("Middle East) covering from Egypt (actually from Carthage, even further west) across to Persia. That's going to be a BIG one.