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.