Monday, May 16, 2011

60th Rifles - Royal Americans

One of the drawbacks of not having your own wargames room is that it is often quite hard to tell what is and isn't in your collection. Taking a leaf from my pal, Donoghs book, I've decided to start a series of muster posts; the idea being to take out and photograph all the troops I have at my disposal. My photographic skills mainly lie elsewhere than photographing miniatures, but hopefully like all things in life, they will improve with practice.

We'll start with the 60th Rifles (Royal Americans), specifically the 5th battalion. Originally raised in America during the Seven Years War, I haven't found any reference to them taking part in the American rebellion. These figures represent the regiment during its time in the Peninsula, where they regularly distinguished themselves, though by that time the number of American loyalists in their ranks was relatively small, with the majority of the men being Germans or other Europeans*.

These are mainly Revell figures with a few other manufacturers mixed in. They form the entirety of my Rifle corps and were painted by Mark Bevis of Micromark, they form the entirity of my Rifle corps.



A full Charge! battalion of Royal Americans, deployed in line

You'll see the Colonel, RSM and Colonel's bugler deployed behind the supernumerary rank. A camp follower on the left leads the regiments two baggage animals. I've been unable to find any reference to Rifle battalions having pioneers, so I left them out.


A slightly differant view

The three Charge! companies make up three Command & Colours Rifle units. This is probably rather more than I will ever need, but how can you have too much of something you didn't need in the first place?

The view from the business end

The rank and file are Revell British Riflemen with Italeri sergeants and officers. The Revell figures are slightly smaller, but there doesn't appear to be much difference once they're painted. The Italeri officers have pelisses, so far as I'm concerned this makes all the difference!



The Colonel

The Colonel is a Waterloo 1815 Prince Billy. I couldn't find any mounted Rifle officers that looked distinctive enough for my tastes and I like this figure. I like to think of him as a mad old German coot whose leadership style revolves around hat waving, shouting and schnapps drinking binges the likes of which are rarely seen outside the better class of Norse saga.


Judy O'Grady leading two pack animals

Judy O'Grady is a Uwe Emke figure, leading two 25mm Irregular Miniatures pack mules. I quite like both figures and as Uwe knows I have what my wife would call "...a strong weakness..." for Vivandiere and camp followers. The Irregular figures are probably a bit on the small side for 25mm, but work very well with 1/72 scale plastics. I like Irregular Miniatures, but their output can vary so much that I'm often reluctant to buy their larger figures unless there are pictures on the website.


The last thing many a 1/72 scale Frenchman will ever see...

And that marks the end of my first muster post, I hope there will be many more. I can only hope that my photographic skills will improve and the next few won't be quite so rushed.

The Rifles, hip hip hooray!**




*Though to be fair, the Germans and Swiss were always relatively heavily represented in their ranks.

**Strictly speaking I know its nothing to do with the Royal Americans, but it is a Rifles march and it is American and frankly, you can't beat Souza. Chap was a bloody genius with a rumty te tumpty tune.

11 comments:

  1. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  2. I have these chaps, too. I have tried to reflect historical dispositions and not field a whole unit of rifles, but give each brigade 5 rifleman figures. This is probably represents more than the handful of rifle companies actually fielded, but if I tried to truly represent the numbers, it wouldn't be worth it from a gaming perspective. My reasoning is the small number of riflemen complemented by the light companies of the line battalions should be able to take on the French skirmishers, but it doesn't always work that way ;)

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  3. and fine looking fellows they are. I was expecting to see a Charge! Light Regiment but you get more of them as a standard Regiment and one can't really have too many rifles.

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  4. Nice looking unit, Conrad.
    Kudos and regards.

    John

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  5. Superb looking unit...
    best wishes
    Alan

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  6. A very workman-like unit that will make short work of any D*mn Frenchies they come across! No frills here; just fight'n men.

    All the best,

    Bob

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  7. Very nice! I like the supernumerary figures, especially the vivandiere, Judy O'Grady, and mules.

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  8. The 60th Foot (Royal Americans) did serve in the AWI, being largely based in Florida, but having detachments in other parts of the colonies too. At this time they were not a rifle regiment. Three (?) of their grenadier companies were present at the Battle of Briar Creek in Georgia in 1779.

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  9. Very nice,Conrad thanks for sharing.

    Cheers,

    Paul.

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  10. Good Lord chaps, thank you all very much for the kind comments. I suppose that comes of finally writing a post about wargaming...

    MSFoy - much obliged for the ompa-ompa music, reminds me of my last trip to Hanover. I can smell pretzels!

    Rosbif - I like full Charge! units. You're probably right and it is a bit of an overdose of rifles, but I have used them to represent a company at 1:1 in my Napoleonic rpg. At least that's what I tell myself.

    Ross Mac - I know, I know. I couldn't turn the extra men...I am damnably weak.

    Steve - Thanks for the information, I tend to have a bit of a blind spot when it comes to the American revolt. I think it comes down to much playing and replaying of this
    (http://www.gamebooks.org/show_item.php?id=2128) as a youth. No matter what I did the Americans always won!

    Fitzbadger - There are more vivandieres in the pipeline.

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