An Alpine Interlude...

I'm on a bit of a roll at the moment, and i've just finished this fellow off. He is the excellent Eureka Miniatures Andreas Hofer figure. He’s the first of a large order of Eureka’s new Tyrolean range. With a part of my tax return (the lion's share went towards saving for another trip to Europe) I’ve bought two 12 man units; one with muskets, the other with melee weapons. I’ve also got the excellent little home-made cannon and crew. All of these are superbly sculpted, in my opinion comparable in both style and size to the Perry brothers work. The Tyroleans weren’t originally one of my planned forces, but the figures were just too good to pass up. Also, Sharp Practice is very well suited to playing out some of the actions from the rebellion. Nonetheless, I’ve forced myself to put the Tyroleans on hold until I’ve completed a few more units for my main forces – or at least a couple of 12 man Bavarian companies so they’ve got someone to rebel against!

In addition to Mr. Hofer, I’ve been working on a half squadron of Front Rank Chasseurs a Cheval, a unit which has been on the painting bench for far too long. This first 'group' will be the 6 figures of the elite company, along with an officer and a trumpeter. All except the trumpeter are wearing the rather fancy looking bearskin colpack, so they should turn out to be quite a nice looking little unit, after the utilitarian looking Austrian artillery. I know that the Chasseurs may not be as glamourous as the Hussars or as imposing as the Cuirassiers and Carabiniers, but they were perhaps the most common of French cavalry - alongside the equally denigrated Dragoons. I've done a bit of modification work on the figures themselves, bending sword arms into different positions, adding greenstuff plumes and what not. I like as much as possible to have each figure with a bit of individuality, especially at the Sharp practice scale. I've finished the first four chasseurs and the officer, and am 90% done on the remaining two and the trumpeter. Hopefully i'll be able to get these finished, based and get some pictures up in the next week or so.

I’m planning on painting up the first squadron of the 11e Chasseurs a Cheval for 1809. I've got the remaining six chasseurs - all in shako - sitting in a box waiting to go. The 11e Chasseurs were part of General de Division Montbrun’s force which saw a lot of action in 1809. But that's a long term project. After the elite company is done, I’ll get working on some Austrian Uhlans to oppose the Chasseurs. Then I think on to the Bavarians.