Saturday, November 20, 2010

The "Minden" Austrian Army, So Far...


Regiment Kollowrat - 2 battalions (5 musketier stands and 1 grenadier stand per battalion). Minden Miniatures painted by Der Alte Fritz. Click the pix twice to enlarge the view.

It occured to me that I had not previously posted pictures of the Austrian infantry that I had painted for my Minden Project. Today's pictures will remedy that short sight. In my army organization, the Austrians will have a two-battalion regiment with a stand of grenadiers detached from each battalion. Two regiments will comprise a brigade and have a separate brigadier general command stand, a brigade ammo wagon, two 3-pdr battalion guns and two regimental command figures. The grenadier stands from each battalion will be converged into one battalion of 24 figures, so each regiment donates two stands of grenadiers to the converged grenadier battalion.



Austrian artillery battery (12-pdr on the left and 6-pdr on the right). Note drag ropes attached to the 6-pdr. Guns & limbers from Berliner Zinnfiguren and limber horses and rider from RSM.

The picture above depicts two sections of a four section Austrian artillery battery. Each section will have the artillery piece (from Berliner Zinnfiguren), four Minden artillery crew, two artillery fusiliers converted with paint from the Minden pioneer figures, one supply wagon per section, one limber (4 horses and 1 rider - from RSM). Later, I might add extra artillery figures in marching poses so that when I limber a gun, I can remove the artillerist that are glued onto the artillery stand and just attach the gun model to the limber. Then, while the limber is moving, I can set down a stand of 4 gunners walking behind the limbered cannon model.


Detached grenadiers - two stands per regiment. These will be converged with two stands from another regiment to form a 24-figure unit. I might add a fifth stand of a completely different regiment in order to build the converged grenadier battalion up to 30 figures, same as the musketier battalions.



What is an Austrian army without its Croat light infantry?

Eventually, I will have two brigades of Austrian infantry with each brigade comprised of two regiments, each regiment comprised of two battalions. The converged grenadiers might be brigaded with the Croat light infantry and the artillery battery.

As for the cavalry, so far, I've painted only a dozen Austrian cuirassiers. My plan is to have one cuirassier regiment (32 to 40 figures), one dragoon regiment (same number of figures), perhaps one hussar regiment and maybe one more dragoon or cuirassier regiment to keep an even number of cavalry units in the brigade. I happen to like symmetry. :)

6 comments:

  1. Lovely lads indeed! A fine upgrade of your RSMs, lucky for me...

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  2. Great looking troops, a good start to the Austrian forces of your Minden project

    What you could do for the converged grenadiers is have 2cys from each parent regiment and a fifth stand with 3 extra figures from each regiment, 1 pioneer, 1 officer with partizan, 1 grenadier - or other combinations (drummer perhaps)

    -- Allan

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  3. What frontage are you using as a matter of interest - looks like 20mm?

    I ask because I am in process od rebasing my army from Age of Reason's 12.5mm/man

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  4. I use 60mm frontage by 40mm depth on my stands. This leaves a little bit of room at the edge of the base so that you can pick up the base and not damage the muskets, spontoons or anything else that sticks up in the air.

    This leaves the appearance of a modest gap between stands, but I assume that each stand is a company or peleton and they left a gap between peletons on the battlefield anyway.

    Bottom line: it looks "right" to me and I am not changing it.

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  5. Fantastic work on your Austrians, Jim! I'm especially partial to that ragged firing line of croats. INspiring work there.

    Best Regards,

    Stokes

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  6. Stokes: I agree with you on the Croats. The animation and action of the group is so realistic. These are some of Richard Ansell's best sculpts (I like ALL of his work, but the Croats are special).

    Jim

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