Thursday 23 November 2017

Old Young Guard

FN/77 Voltigeur Guard (running at the trail)
I spent many hours in my youth leafing through my Hinton Hunt catalogue (I didn’t get out much) but one page held a particular fascination for me, the very first one. This is the page that had all the listings for the Imperial Guard. I had heard of the Old Guard thanks to the film Waterloo but the Young Guard was a bit of a mystery as the only information I had was that written by Marcus Hinton:

"The Young Guard was formed to increase the numbers of Imperial Guard Regiments on which Napoleon greatly relied and also to eventually be recruited into the ranks of the Old Guard. The Young Guard wore corded shakos, short tailed coats, waistcoats, knee breeches and short gaiters. The Tirailleurs wore round pom-poms on their shakos and had pointed shoulder straps. The Voltigeurs had tall plumes in their shakos and wore fringed epaulettes on their shoulders."

In the end I was too baffled by it all to order any Guard figures and perhaps also back then I didn’t feel my painting ability would do justice to Napoleon’s finest. Since I started this project however I have wanted to paint up a unit of Young Guard but it has been a painfully slow process to collect enough vintage figures. Finally, thanks to Clive, I have managed to assemble enough castings for a unit of Voltigeurs and have been able to make a start.

15 comments:

Anonymous said...

A fine looking fellow, but he will need his comrades in order to halt the Prussian hordes!

Paul

Stryker said...

Don't worry Paul he has another 23 friends but they don't look as pretty as him yet!

Ross Mac rmacfa@gmail.com said...

and pretty he is! Worth waiting for.

KEV. Robertson. said...

Ian- it is great to see you fulfilling your younger dreams and yearnings with completing these French Soldiers..splendid effort- well done. Cheers. KEV.

Stryker said...

Ross - thanks, I've been looking forward to painting this unit for quite a while and now finally have the painting desk cleared for action!

Stryker said...

Kev - yes, I guess a lot of this project is to do with childhood dreams and the rest is about painting gaudy uniforms!

Mark Dudley said...

Do you normally paint up one figure of a unit as a test ?

I also plan to have a young guard unit. Problem is my plan keeps changing.

Mark

Lee said...

I really like that pose, I painted a full battalion of those for Roy couple of years back and they were great castings. I look forward to seeing the completed unit.

Stryker said...

Mark - yes, I find it wise with HH to do a test figure to decide how best to interpret the detail!

Stryker said...

Lee - it's one of my favourite HH poses although I only have 5 of these, the rest will be the charging figure.

Mark Dudley said...

Out of interest do you then paint the rest in batches and if so how many in a batch.

lewisgunner said...

https://i.pinimg.com/736x/bc/13/09/bc13090799557135870157ee704664c0--french-army-napoleonic-wars.jpg


You have captured him perfectly.

Wellington Man said...

I think that's got to be the most Hinton-Huntish figure I've seen, Ian! Cracking paint job too, as always.

Stryker said...

Mark - I normally paint the rest in batches of 6 for infantry and 3 for cavalry, more than that and I get demotivated!

Roy - I used the HH painting instructions for this one.

WM - I agree about the figure pose, don't think I've seen anything like by any other maker.

caveadsum1471 said...

Lovely looking figure looking forward to the other 24, I'm sticking to line regiments I think, once I've got a few of those under my belt I'll think about Guard units!
Best Iain