Brunswick Oels Jagers for the Peninsular. Did somebody die?

 

The answer is, yes. If you want to know who, go to this wiki-link.

This is one of those iconic units so beloved by wargamers. I wanted one too, so when Alec sculpted these last year they went straight into my next Front Rank order. I wasn't disappointed, they are superbly designed and executed. 

The trouble with this unit, and I've painted it at least twice over the years for clients, is that it's a headache to paint: Black, black and more black; even the buttons are black; and so are the cuffs, which I'd forgotten were black.

Although I don't usually do painting tips in blog posts like this, I will for this unit - they might be useful in this case.

I've learned that I have to throw away my usual painting 'order of march' when doing this unit. 

After undercoating, I painted the whole figure with my black base paint (Humbrol 33), stem to stern. 

Then, in the following order, I: 

1. Painted hands and faces.
2. Painted none black equipment (canteens, packs and pack rolls, musket stocks), and hair. 
3. Highlighted coats, lace and shako plumes.
4. Painted blue collar and shoulder straps, which are best highlighted very light.
5. Touched up belts, shako, shoes, and musket metal with plain black to re-establish some nice hard edges.
6. Highlighted black belts, shoes, shako, etc. 
7. Finished, as usual, with metals.

I think the trick to livening these boys up is to use two or more black hues using the same black base. I used two hues; two or three highlights of each hue. I paint in enamels; I've added the Humbrol numbers I used in parentheses.

1. Blue Hue: Used for soft stuff such as clothing, plume and lace: Black (33) and sky blue (89). I added a bit of white (34) to this hue to get a third highlight, dry brushed over lace and plume to bring these details out even further. 
2. Grey Hue: Used for hard stuff such as belts, shako and shoes: Black (33) and white (34) - only two highlights used. 

You will note that the officers have red sashes; apparently they wore red, not national colours, in the Peninsular.

All in all, they make for quite an impressive, if funerial, unit. 

They are not quite as monotone black as you might imagine and I put this down to the using sky blue in the main highlight hue - it has more life than plain black and white grey.

Bases are 2mm MDF: Square bases are home cut 45mm x 45mm. Round bases are 45mm diameter from Warbases.

Lastly, I also bought a six pack of jagers to add to my 'floating' divisional skirmish stand count. 

I will always remember these guys because, a couple of decades ago, I played in a huge Salamanca game where I commanded the odd base of these chaps. Being something of a Napoleonic noob at the time, I enquired who they were by asking "Why do I have Austrians?" I still think it was an easy mistake to make.

Though, I should have remembered who they were from my second oldest wargame book: Blandford's Uniforms of the Napoleonic Wars (received Christmas 1976; now without dust cover and looking very tatty), from which I've taken these uniform details.

The thing is, I can't find a picture of the the hat badge for this 1809 unit. These Front Rank figures came with a running horse badge, so they have that. If you know differently (I suspect they had a hunting horn) please let me know so I can edit this with proper info. 

Note that, as per Blandford, I have removed the figures' hat plumes. 

Blandford also shows the uniform without a blanket roll but, I think this is 'campaign dress' acceptable.

Officially, that is the Anglo-Portuguese project done. All of the originally planned units, plus this late addition, are now painted. However, when I ordered the Spanish hordes a few months ago, I added a couple of extra British units and three French units. Consequently, I'm ploughing on. 

Next up, 51st (2nd West Riding) Light Infantry - my local regiment, their regimental museum is in Halifax - to fight alongside the Brunswick Oels Jagers as part of 7th Division.