Peninsular perplexities in plaid........

[badbones777]

.......or at least government tartan

Hey guys, asking you fine chaps for a bit of advice

It was the Victrix Highlanders that did it. A couple of years ago I got a flank box set and a centre one as a birthday
prezzie which were opened and drooled on a little. Then they were put away and following a move, (albeit only over the water from
Liverpool to the Wirral - my own little peninsula!) a new job and the arrival of a child, that has been were they remained. Resolving to get them done up and standing proud I decided to do a Peninsula war Brit force for my next hobby project. All that remained was to pick a Highland regiment to base them on (or make one up), I thought, and I'll be on my way, with "Big Willie" standing proud (!) in the front ranks.

Then I read about the 42nd and decided I had to do a project based on them in some way. As it stands my plan is to more or less "follow" the Blackwatch -which means that before 1813 I will be gaming using the 1st division and 1813/14 they were with the 6th.

As such I am looking for advice on representing the units themselves. I have a shortlist of units sorted roughly by the amount of times they were fielded in the same division as the 42nd, with any unit that showed up alongside them 3 or more times being a unit I am happy to represent as a unit in the game. Obviously though I do not wish to go through the time and expense of putting together a unit that might only have been in the same division for one battle.

As such I thought I would put it to the experienced and learned folk on here to best advise me as to whether I should "zoom out" my level of perspective and have what would have been entire Divisions in reality represented as Brigades, or stick to my plan, or maybe even "zoom in" and instead of basing my army on the Divsion(s) they fought in, perhaps base it on the Brigade.

As a final query how/is it possible (in 28mm plastic) to represent KGL, Coldstream Gds and Scots Gds? I know they were in the 1st Division at the same time as the Blackwatch but I have no idea of the uniform and so on. I am not overly concerned with anal levels of historical accuracy, especially with uniforms, and I envisage a lot of the scenarios I play are likely to be "what if's" anyway. I was just wondering if I could "get away with" picking an existing range of plastics and with a change of colour scheme make a decent fist of the above named units.

Well, that's quite enough for now, I appreciate any and all advice and if anyone can recommend any units they think I should definitely be including I am all ears.

Just thought it would be a fun project


Cheers guys

Aidan

[ClausewitzRulesOk]

I think if you are interested in modelling particular battalions then you might benefit from the sort of 'Black Powder Rules' way of doing things.
Your basic unit is a battalion of about 24-36 miniatures. That way you can build up the brigades as they were, and then eventually have enough brigades to do a division.
As for the miniatures themselves, KGL and guards should be fine represented with normal red coat models appropriate for the period/whichever hats you like best. I might be wrong about guards though, my recollection is from a flick through a uniform book quite a while ago!

[Humbugged]

Coldstream guards would have had standard scarlet uniform with blue facings & turnbacks. Flank compnies had blue wings, drummers had red jackets with blue & white lace. As previously mentioned, depending on the period white trousers and stovepipe Shako or post 1810-ish grey trousers for other ranks and belgic false front shako post 1812. Victrix do both periods as I'm sure you already know.
The 1st (or the royal Scots) regiment of foot were pretty much the same, flank co's had red wings changed to blue after 1805. Not sure about the drummers lace but all guards and royal regiments drummers had scarlet jackets not the "reversed" colours as per other reg'ts.
The 42nd wore the government or universal tartan with "the blue turns showing on the fold." Not at all sure what that means!
That all came from "British Napoleonic Uniforms" by C. E Franklin. Interesting book if you can find it.
Hope any of that helped.

[badbones777]

Cheers for the replies Humbugged!

Yeah I was pretty much planning on using Black Powder-I love it! It's such a versatile system, and I like the focus on fun
and the style in which all the Warlord Games Home grown systems are written.

Thanks for the info-that's a weight off my mind as while I could wait however long it took for KGL specific models to come out, I'd like to get cracking now! It certainly has been a great help. I can't wait to give Big Willie some support-though he's such an imposing chap
I'm sure he could look after himself!

Many thanks for all your advice-time to get a bit of painting done methinks!