My friend Mike and I have been gaming the BBB scenario book Napoleon's Bloody Big Battles, one common factor in all of these battles is Napoleon, the other is the French Guard, first called the Consular Guard, then the Imperial Guard.
Over last winter/spring I took the time to create enough French Guard figures for most of the battles, in some cases making a summer and winter option.
The Old Guard started as two infantry regiments of Consular Guards (Grenadiers & Chasseurs) and two regiments of cavalry (Grenadiers & Chasseurs). It went through a number of changes, mainly expansion, adding more infantry, dragoons, lancers, etc. You probably already know this.... 😊
The Infantry
Old Guard - summer
Here are the Old Guard in their summer uniform - the Grenadiers have red plumes and the Chassuers red over green plumes. These three bases are enough for most of the scenarios in the book.
As I wanted these troops to look their best, all Guard troops were painted with brass muzzles and firing mechanisms on their muskets (these are normally just steel, as per the gun barrels and the bayonets).
The Old Guard Chassuers have had plumes added to the side of the Bearskin (re-purposed bayonets)
Old Guard - Winter
In colder weather the Guard wore blue Greatcoats, a colour not used by most of the French army, so they stand out a little more.... Here the Middle Guard skirmishers are standing in for Old Guard Skirmishers in Greatcoats.
Middle Guard - Summer
The Middle Guard wore shakos, otherwise (and especially at this scale) they were identical to the Old Guard. They had a number of different flag styles - I went for the gold "N" in a wreath on blue because it sets them apart from everyone else on the table.
Middle Guard - Winter
The Middle Guard also wore blue Greatcoats, so they are easy to tell from the rest of the army.
Young Guard - Summer
I have only made Young Guard in Summer so far, here are the Young Guard Grenadiers. I made the 1st & 2nd Tiralliers and the Flanquers Grenadiers, who wore Green Jackets as they were light infantry. I could have made a skirmish base of these, but I decided to go with a base of formed infantry, partly because I only needed one skirmish base.
Tiralliers & Flanquer Grenadiers
The Cavalry
Here's the Guard Cavalry made to date - you'll need 2 bases of Heavy Cavalry & two of Light.
Guard Heavy Cavalry
The Heavies are the Horse Grenadiers - they get all the +1 bonuses - and the Empress Dragoons
The line Heavies were the Carabiniers - a similar uniform and using the same models
Guard Horse Grenadiers on the left, Line Carabiniers on the right
My other heavy unit is the Empress Dragoons, click on this link to see more. Here's what the two Heavies look like together - suitably scary!
Guard Light Cavalry
The Light Cavalry are the Chassuers a Cheval (one of my favourite units), the Polish Lancers and the Dutch Lancers. The Lancers are covered here in more detail. Here are the Light Cavalry units together
I really enjoyed painting these up. As I wanted to show their using 12 pounders, I increased the crew figures to 5 per base.
As in my second Command & Control post I have now made a General figure to lead these fine troops
Finally...
They are lovely. I particularly like the flanqueurs-grenadiers. Also the distinctive flags. But they're all gorgeous.
ReplyDeleteThanks. They were actually a lot of fun to paint, Mark's scenario book means that they will get a lot of use. The flags are different between the 1805-09 battles and the 1812-15 battles. I hope that this encourages fellow gamers to go mad with the gold paint!
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