Ney, d'Erlon, Reille and Others

Filling in a few more gaps in the French leadership structure - now for the Corps commanders. The figures are from the Old Glory French Leaders pack - some good variety and conversion potential. Spare ADC's and escorts were using some left over Old Glory  Guard Chasseurs a Cheval and some Lancer command figures.

Ney arriving just in time to take on command. 

Marshal Ney joined the Army of the North after the invasion of Belgium had started. He was immediately given command of the left Wing and ordered to block the British and Allies while Napoleon dealt with the Prussians near the Ligny. He quickly joined Reille's Corps and proceeded to engage with the Allied forces just south of Quatre Bras. Incorrectly assuming the entire British and Allied contingent was ahead of him, Ney hesitated waiting for more reinforcements. By the time the attach begun, more British were rushing in to join the outnumbered and outclassed Dutch/Belgians. Ney managed to lose any advantage at the beginning of the day and end up with a draw by nightfall. The retreating Allies were not pursued in their withdrawal back. Not Ney's finest hour. The battle on the 18th of June proved that Ney was indeed having a very bad week.

d'Erlon wandering between two battles

Jean Baptiste Drouet, the Comte d'Erlon was the commander of the I Corps. Late on the scene, he spent  most os the 16th June wandering in the 8 miles between the two battles. Napoleon's orders to join him at Lingy were over-ridden by Ney's request for assistance at Quatre Bras. The end result was that neither received his much needed reinforcements at crucia moments. History may have been very different had he arrived to make a decisive blow at one of the Battles. At Waterloo he attacked the British left in a unsupported frontal assault, which ultimately failed.

Reille ready for action

Comte Honore Charles Reille commanded the II Corps. First to engage at Quatre Bras, his Corps did the majority of the fight in that battle, as well as engaging at Hougumont at Waterloo. Some heavy fighting done by these line troops.

The other Generals include some Cavalry Generals of the Guard - Comte Charles Etienne Guyot of the Heavy Cavalry and Comte Charles Lefebvte-Desnouettes for the Light Cavalry. Guyot was not at Quatre Bras, but in the Imperial Guard reserve at Ligny and not engaged. Both were to take a part in the Cavalry charges at Waterloo.

There are also some yet un-named Generals de Division. I will probably use them for Artillery commanders for the Grande Battery or other gaps in the command structure.

 Lefebvte-Desnouettes and Guyot ready to command the Imperial Guard Cavalry

Two yet un-named Generals de Division

A flamboyant cavalry General de Division

British cassions and limbers

Cassions supporting British RFA and RHA

Continuing the artillery upgrades, now it's the British turn to have some more ammunition. Six Old Glory British cassions and three scratch built limbers.

The cassions came with a six horse crew, which was too much for the base sizes that I use, so I made it a four horse crew and made an additional three limbers with the spare horses.

Quite a few more to make if each gun is to have a supporting limber or cassion.

Scratch built limbers

Dutch and Belgian Artillery and Limbers

Dutch Horse Battery

Perponcher's 2nd Netherlands Division had two batteries of artillery at Quatre Bras - a Dutch Horse battery and a Belgian Foot battery. Each had six 6 pounders and two howitzers.

The Belgian Foot battery was over run by French Lancers and suffered heavy losses. Only two guns made it to Waterloo from that battery. They were deployed on the extreme left flank at Waterloo and saw no further action.

The guns are British from Redline. The crew are Redline French Line Foot and Horse artillery. The limber crew and horses are from Old Glory French Cassion team spares.

There were some spare riders and horses from the French cassions with suitable uniforms for the limber crews. A different paint scheme and they were ready to go. I like their uniform - dark grey with black collars and cuffs and red piping and turnbacks.

The Belgian Foot Battery

I needed to scratch build the limbers out of some balsa wood, tongue depressors and toothpicks, using some spare artillery wheels I had. It was easier than I thought, not bad for a recycling effort.

Base materials for the limbers - a Redline one as a guide

Seats cut from balsa, floors from a tongue depressor

Glued up

Axels made from tooth picks and left over wheels

Ready for priming

Finished limbers

Supporting the battery

Belgian Foot Artillery waiting for the French to arrive

More Ammunition!

The French cassions have arrived with more ammunition, just in time.

They are nice castings from Old Glory. As usual the wagons are solid and well proportioned. They came with 6 horses and 3 riders each, which is a bit much for the bases, so I have only used four on each.

The cassions were undercoated green, the black metals parts painted then a magic wash. The horses were undercoated brown, some detail added, then magic washed too.

The spare riders will be used to make some Dutch Belgian limber drivers, with a different uniform painted.

Generals de Division and Brigade

Undercoat the horse colour

I am a bit short on Generals for my French Brigades and Divisions. There isn't a wide choice of generals in 10mm, and the sizes vary a bit.

Pendraken make a some mounted line officers in their 1809 range. I thought I could use them with a little paint conversions. The uniform is a little different to the 1815 style, but they would do as proxies. They had four styles - Bicorne, Shako, Shako with surcoat and a Guard Grenadier officer. I know that Generals didn't wear shakos, but it makes it easier to see who is who on the table.

Glued onto bases ready for texturing and flocking

I bent a few arms and heads to have some variety and cut a few swords off. I undercoated them brown, black and white - mainly the horse colour to speed things up. A quick block in the colours, lots of gold trim and black magic wash.

I based most of the singly on a 15mm square base for Brigade Generals, and a few in pairs for Division Generals on 20mm squares.

I ended up with 4 Division Generals and 12 Brigade Generals. One Division General will be for Drout and there are four Grenadier Generals which will be for the Imperial Guard Brigade  Leaders.

Now I need to find some more variety for the Corps Commanders and Cavalry Commanders. I have some Old Glory French leaders, but they are a lot smaller in body. Maybe the 3 foot rule will be on my side. I might ned to do some conversions for the Cavalry ones.

General de Division Drout with Generals Friant, Roguet, Morand and Michel 

General Foy with Tissot and Jamin

General Bachelu with Husson and Campi

General Donzelot with Schmitz and Aulard

Generals de Brigade Bauouin and Soy waiting for Prince Jerome to arrive

Old Maps - 1815 Campaign

George Hooper's excellent 1889 book "Waterloo - the Downfall of the first Napoleon" had five beautifully drawn maps in the end of the book. In online scanned copies of the book, these have been omitted or badly done. I could not find any decent copies of the maps online. I have scanned them in so others may see the elegant plates on different aspects of the campaign.

Click for larger versions of the maps. They are scanned in at 300dpi so they print out quite well, the detail is very clear. There are some blemishes on the original plates, but I think they add to the look. Hopefully they are some use to people.

General Map of 1815 campaign area

Ligny

Quatre Bras between 4pm and 5pm

Waterloo at 11am

Waterloo 5.30pm

French Engineers

Preparing earthen works for the artillery

The French engineering contingent was very modest during the 1815 Campaign. They were used to clear the bridges in the crossing of the Sambre at Charleroi, as well as in the Battle of Ligny during the Guard assault of the village. As there were no engineering tasks at Waterloo, they were kept as reserve infantry and were used during the retreat.

These figures are from the Pendraken 1809 range. They are dressed in the siege uniform, with a metal helmet and cuirass. They have long coat tails from the pre-bardin uniforms, but I don't think anyone will notice on a 10mm figure. The helmets worn at Waterloo by the Guard engineers were like the Carabiner's helmet with a black comb. Previously they were the firemen at the Imperial Palaces.

Dig in boys!

Not so bad to paint, they have much deeper cuts and creases than the Redline figures, so the magic wash settles making the lines well defined. The eye sockets are quite large for the scale of the men.

I based them three to an infantry base, with some rocks in the front where they are digging.

They will be useful in other campaigns and scenarios.

More artillery

Cannons and Cassions

You can never have too many cannons apparently. I needed to beef up the number of batteries on my 1815 forces so I worked on a big batch - 44 guns, all from Redline. Cannons are very affordable in 10mm, and quick to paint. An undercoat (olive for French, grey for Allied), bronze the cannon, paint all the metal bits black the magic wash. Shame the Artillery men are slower, I'll need to paint 132 to man the guns.

Then there will be the limbers, I will need to make one for each gun! I started six French Cassions from Old Glory. They have six horse teams, but I can only fit four on the base, so I have some spare for other projects, Maybe soem scratch built wagons later.

For the Artillery first off the painting rank is the two batteries the French Guard Horse Artillery (for the heavy cavalry brigade). The some British RHA and KGL Foot batteries to fill in gaps in the Allied line up.

Next I will paint some Dutch and Belgian batteries for the Quatre Bras OOB and some French Line Horse Artillery for the Heavy Cavalry Divisions, and some Foot to fill out the Line.

Imperial Guard Horse Artillery for the Heavy Cavalry Brigade

British RFA joining the 2nd British Division