Austrian Hussars (Part 1)

This is a bit of a departure from the normal. The figures are Austrian Hussars, part of a recent batch I received from Don in the US (Don is thinning out his collection and has kindly sent me one or two of his excess figures – actually slightly more than one or two). The reason it’s a departure is that I haven’t painted these figures myself. The existing paint job is pretty superb and it just seemed a bit crazy for me to strip and re-paint them especially considering how many other castings I have waiting in the wings.

So all I have done is scrape away the textured material from the bases and re-touch the figures where necessary including painting some socks on the horses (where my scraping was a little over enthusiastic). I then based them in the usual way and gave them a coat of satin varnish to help them blend in with my other figures. Don’s painting style is similar to my own and his detail on the Hussar’s lace is excellent, painted (as he put it) BB – before bifocals!

Four of the figures are vintage one-piece castings of AN81 Austrian Hussar (mounted charging). The other two are probably Clayton castings being thinner with a smaller base. I suppose they may even be Der Kreigspieler but I don’t know enough about the DK range to tell. I have checked my “I-Spy Book of Napoleonic Austrian Hussars” and think they have possibly been painted to represent the 6th Blankenstein Regiment.

I have another squadron of Don’s Hussars to come plus a squadron of unpainted castings I picked up last year hence this posting being just part one.