French Grenadiers

Thanks to all of you who voted or left comments in the great re-basing debate. You may be surprised to hear that, despite the overwhelming support for re-basing, I have decided to stick with my current system. I think Roy and Lee tipped the balance when they pointed out that the way I currently base my figures is the true retro style and anyway it’s also the way I had my original Hinton Hunt army based. I’ll just have to put up with them falling over when they manoeuvre up-hill.

With the basing dilemma behind me I have finally managed to move on and find a little bit of time to do some painting. You may remember that I began this batch of French Grenadiers back in December and all I need to do now is apply a finish of Humbrol Satin-Cote and they’re done – that’s a stunning average of one figure a month painted! The figures are:

5 x FN2 Grenadier (charging)
1 x FN10 Grenadier Sergeant (marching)

One of the good points about re-painting old castings rather than just collecting them is that you become aware of things you wouldn’t necessarily notice at first glance. In this case it was only as I started to apply the paint that I realised that one casting (centre front rank) had its legs and head bent in a different position to the others. I think this rogue figure is probably a DK casting rather than Hinton Hunt and I will check this out by looking under the base for any clues when I remove him from his bottle-top. It’s still possible that it is HH because, as I’ve mentioned before, there were often variations in the production moulds that Marcus Hinton produced.

To re-base or not?

Well that’s the burning question once again around these parts thanks largely to an email I received today from Paul (from down under). It turns out that Paul has some Hinton Hunt British based in exactly the same way as Mike’s WHC ones. He kindly sent me this picture of some of his own BN5’s.

Paul said his figures have been based using a material called Masonite, which is a new one to me and sounds suspiciously like something that Superman may be allergic to. A quick check on Wikipedia confirms that it is a type of fibreboard, which among other things is used to make the best wobble boards!

The problem is that I am really taken with the idea of re-basing in this style because it is in keeping with the original aim of this project and I have always admired those old pictures of Peter Gilder’s troops. It would also solve a practical problem that I am starting to have namely that it would stop the troops from falling over and make moving them less fraught with the danger of breakages. My current system is fine for the display cabinet but for playing a wargame it’s really not so clever.

Of course if I go ahead with the idea it will be a massive distraction from painting up new stuff so please let me know what you think by taking part in the poll (top left column of blog). As always please feel free to leave a comment as well. For those of you not familiar with my current basing system take a look here.

Due to some sort of Google error I had to close the polls early (no riots please!) but here are the official results: 11 of you voted with 8 saying I should rebase and 3 saying I shouldn't. It seems like a clear cut victory for the rebasing party but we shall see.

Basing Thoughts

I’ve said before that I am constantly battling the desire to re-base the figures in my various collections. Re-basing is an especially barmy diversion when I struggle to find the time to paint up new stuff but I found my mind wandering down that route for the Hinton Hunts just a couple of days ago.

Don’t worry I have resisted the urge but it was brought on in part by looking at pictures of the superb collection of vintage figures from Mike Ingham’s Wargames Holiday Centre. They reminded me of the pictures of Peter Gilder’s Waterloo terrain and figures that I first saw in Miniature Warfare magazine nearly 40 years ago. Some of these same Gilder figures have found their way into Mike’s collection and although they are a bit faded and dusty round the edges they are still an inspiring sight. I always wondered what material Gilder’s figures were based on and Mike kindly answered this rather geeky question. The bases are 45mm wide x 35-38mm deep (WHC standard size) cut from 3mm hardboard with chamfered edges.

I wish I had known that PG used hardboard when I was basing my original collection because I tried to use plywood, which was very difficult for a twelve-year old to cut with a blunt hacksaw. I soon gave that up for a bad job and discovered plasticard, which remains my material of choice to this day. The picture shows BN5 Private (charging) with BN2 Sergeant (charging) and a converted standard bearer.

Picture courtesy of Mike Ingham - to see more take a trip over to the Hinton Hunter.

It’s a dog’s life

You will be pleased to know that I have finally managed to do a little bit of painting picking up where I left off with the French Grenadiers (click here for a reminder). Not much to show for it yet but at least it’s a start.

One problem I have with my new hobby-room that I never had in our old house is that our labrador Snuff seems to think that it’s her room not mine. She likes to lay out on the floor right behind my chair so that I can hardly move and is very indignant at any suggestion that she might get out of the way.

This is a picture of my hobby-room buddy enjoying a little snooze whilst keeping half an eye on General Longstreet as he tries to get Lee to abandon the idea of ordering Pickett’s charge at Gettysburg. I’m a firm Union supporter myself but I have my suspicions that Snuff may have leanings towards the rebellion.

Back in the UK

Well, we made it to New York and back again safely while the Eyjafjallajokul volcano was taking a little break from disrupting North Atlantic and European airspace. I don’t like flying very much at the best of times so I was glad that our flights were unaffected – hats off to the BA crews who navigated their way around the “plume of doom”.

New York was great (in fact a helluva’ town) and we had a brilliant, if rather exhausting time. I was there for half a day back in 1976 but we had a full four days on this trip and were able to visit many of the sights and drink in the atmosphere. Best thing was probably the view downtown from the top of the Rockefellor Centre and of course getting to see Trump Tower for real – although the great man didn’t appear to be in residence.

I also went into the Metropolitan Museum of Art where I took this picture of a painting depicting Napoleon at the battle of Friedland. I’m not sure who the artist was but the detail is stunning. However, I have to report that I’ve still not made any progress on the other type of painting, namely Hinton Hunts but I hope to remedy that soon.

Cabinet reshuffle

I’ve finally got the troops back in the display cabinet and in keeping with the excitement (not) of the forthcoming UK election I have had my very own cabinet reshuffle. When Mrs S gave me the cabinet four years ago I didn’t have very many completed Hinton Hunts to put in it so they were forced to share with a motley collection of 15mm Napoleonic and ACW types. My new rule is that only my HH and DK figures will be displayed and as new units are added they will be given this honour in rotation – a bit like mounting guard at Buckingham Palace.

The cabinet is almost impossible to photograph because of the glare from the acrylic front and the reflection from the mirrored back. Also, any attempt to take a picture from the front results in a lovely reflected picture of me and the camera and not very much of the figures on display. This is about the best I can do and I suppose I could pretend it was a deliberately arty shot with the reflection of the bookshelves superimposed on the back of the cabinet. Anyway I hope it gives the general idea.

All that remains now is to properly unpack the painting gear and get painting Hinton Hunts again. This may well be a little way off as I still have a few outstanding DIY jobs to complete. We’re also supposed to be heading to New York for a few days soon as part of Mrs S’s birthday extravaganza but I’m keeping my eye on that darn volcano.

Getting sorted

I managed to find time yesterday to fix the display cabinet to the wall of my new study/hobby room. I’m still a little way off resuming painting but I hope to unpack all the Hinton Hunts soon and get them back into the cabinet at least.

The display cabinet in situ in my new study. You can just make out some of the troops waiting patiently in boxes full of the dreaded poly-beads on the bookshelves.

The display cabinet is pretty neat because the shelves have a mirrored back to them so you can view the front and rear of the figures at the same time. The whole thing is covered with an easy to remove Perspex case and all the fixings are cleverly hidden so it looks nice and sleek. The only figure on show at the moment is marshal Ney because he came into my possession just before our move and after the rest of the lads had already been packed away.

Marshal Ney - a rather dashing if somewhat lonely figure at the moment.

Back in the early 70s my Dad helped me make a wooden cabinet for my original Hinton Hunt collection. It was a bit more rough and ready than this one but it had sliding glass doors and was big enough to take my entire HH Prussian army plus my Minifigs ECW Royalist army.

The next problem – as several of you have helpfully pointed out – is how to extract the figures from their transit boxes and the grip of those poly-beads.

A quick update in response to DC’s query about the supplier of my display cabinet. I can’t find the exact item with the mirrored back on their website anymore but this is the nearest one. The company is called “Acrylic Display Cases” (clever name eh?) and they can custom make them. Not cheap but they are the bee’s knees!