Anglo-Zulu War - Rorke's Drift - 28mm

 

The last few weeks have seen my first proper foray into making and painting buildings.  This is not something that I normally do.  I find buildings to be a complicated beast on the wargaming table unless it's a skirmish game. A real scale conundrum.  Anything approaching scale size for a figure is probably going to be the same length as a battalion, so the small barn becomes about 300 yards long on the board!

However, this is Rorke's Drift and it just has to be made to work!  I was inspired by the game scenario in the Zulu War supplement produced by Warlord Games.  To be honest I think the scenarios in this particular book are brilliant. A wide variety of methods of play and they all look great fun.

I really liked the look of the Rorke's Drift battle set that Warlord Games brought out a number of years ago.  Unfortunately I was a bit slow and by the time I decided to buy one, they had become almost unobtainable.  After an extensive search I found a set advertised by a company. After ordering it they contacted me to confess that it was an error but they had the same parts to put a near complete set together but not 'in the box'.  I took up the offer.

Most of the items are here, though I had to buy the barricades and walls from Warlord Games recently.  Of course, Warlord Games are back in full production of the battle sets again now!

I decided to use Perry's British Infantry as they are such superb figures.  I just really like their figures...a lot!

I also like all of the biscuit box barricades made by Warlord Games and they were not too hard to do once I decided on methods. I did consider whether to use washes or dry brushing and ended up doing both.

Photo above by war correspondent Norris 'Noggs' Newman (or maybe not!)

The Zulus I have so far are mix of the Warlord Games figures and Perry's. I'm a long way off from having thousands of them yet!

The dreaded mealie bags - Oh my goodness, the painting pain that these were!

Before I get onto the buildings, I should mention the Mealie bags, again made by Warlord Games.  These are really nice and look right.  I have seen some sets by another company where the bags have been stacked on top of each other in the fashion that a child might stack 4 bricks and then stack 4 next to them and so on, with no overlap.  I suspect the Zulu's would have found such a method of stacking literally child's play to knock over.  

So top marks to Warlord Games on getting a great 'hurried' but stacked 'under the eyes of a Royal Engineer Officer' look about them. The texturing is nice too. 

I was not sure whether to paint the red and blue lines on them. I did wonder if the lines were authentic and on Googling the question, I found the topic had been asked some years ago on the TMP page.  Unfortunately the poster had been utterly ridiculed (the fate of many decent sorts asking help I note, on that very odd website).

I thought his question valid, as the lines really do say 'Mealie bag' and not sandbag. It's that little attention to detail that makes a difference.  It's why we paint the right lace, collars and cuffs on our Napoleonics or Seven Years War figures. 

Anyway, a little search found this portrait of Rorke's Drift by Lady Butler and the detail is below. Perfect!

The frustrating bit...  Having decided to put the lines on, I settled on Carmine Red and a Foundry French Blue 'C'.  The lines took ages.  Ages and ages.  

When I had just two more barricade sections left, my mind wandered and I thought to myself. 'I wonder if there is a market if I designed some simple way of putting lines on models?.....and then it hit me...a pen!  A red pen and a blue pen... so simple!. Biros would be perfect!  And so they were!  A 4 hour job of one section became about 10 minutes.

 It was miraculous...at least until I put the spray varnish on. Then the colours bled into the mealie bags...and so I had to start again...with paint and thin brush again.

Ah well...It's done now!

I have only ever made one small MDF building before so this was really interesting to make.  The buildings are from '4Ground' and sold in the Warlord Games sets.  The buildings go together really well and I quite enjoyed making them.  My only issue with MDF is that they look a bit flat. I read of a technique using 'Degu Dust' from pet supplies shops to texture MDF buildings to put some life into them.  As ambitious as it was, this is what I did.

The thatching is teddy bear fur which I coated in PVA glue and water prior to painting. There were some long off-cuts which gave me immense fun pretending to female friends that I had grown a 'ginger mullet' over lockdown by sticking one end in the back of my collar....

Above is one of the nicest things that I have painted up! It is a resin model of a wagon covered in mealie bags. Ammunition boxes and biscuit boxes are on there too as part of the casting. Even one of the mealie bags has split open inside and spilt the grain. It is a wonderful model and made by Warlord Games. Again top marks to them, it really is an absolute beauty.

Some more shots of the buildings follows.  With the Degu Dust it was necessary to apply it over PVA glue and then I had to use 3 thick coats of varnish spray to help it to stick without rubbing off. I store it in it's own boxes and I won't be playing Rorke's Drift too frequently, so I hope it lasts.

One downside to these battle sets becomes apparent when finally putting it all together.  It is large.  I think I need a bigger table and this one is 8 feet by 4 feet!  I'm really not sure how I'm going to be able to play with it on the field!

There is one major absence (besides enough troops and table space!).  And that is the mealie bag redoubt.  I note that Warlord Games no longer sell it separately and only put it in their boxed battle sets.  I will write to them to ask if they can sell one separately (which would be jolly nice of them) or I shall have to keep checking Ebay or make my own.  The latter will be a joy of course...as this will mean not only having the pleasure of painting more lines on Mealie Bags but making them too!

Maybe I should have opted to create Isandlwana!

Update 26 May 21 - I emailed Warlord Games last night to ask if I could buy the Mealie Bag Redoubt set  from them even though it is a battle set only item, and they have very kindly agreed! I'm delighted - Thank you very much Warlord Games!

Anglo-Zulu War - umCijo Regiment - 28mm Perry Miniatures

 

I don't know what happened. One minute I'm there happily painting Greek Hoplites and the next I find myself reaching for the boxes of Perry's plastic Zulus that I bought last year.  I must have imagined that I heard the drums of an approaching Impi, or perhaps it was taking my Martini Henry rifle to the range last week for the first time for a couple of years, but either way I was inspired and before I knew it I had finished painting the whole box!

The figures really are very well designed.  Unlike a lot of plastic sets from some other manufacturers, it is possible to be imaginative and create a lot of different positions.  The arms and heads are separate from the warrior's bodies so allow a lot of creativity.

I thought I would try to use washes extensively with these figures, using the main colour as the base coat and applying a wash and a final highlight. This worked very well and sped the process nicely.  There was no escaping the need to add some detail and carefully highlight the skin to avoid the figures looking too plain though. 

I decided to go for a regiment that was in the thick of some of the major actions of the Zulu War.  The umCijo regiment were heavily involved so I opted for these. As an unmarried regiment, the warriors do not have the head ring.  

Some manufacturers show unmarried warriors wearing a whole plethora of exotic head-dresses.  This does not appear to be borne out by historical records.  King Cetshwayo ordered his troops to muster without ceremonial accoutrements prior to the first engagements with the British.

I have chosen to have each stand of 8 figures represent an amaviyo, of company strength.  There is one leader of each amaviyo who has slightly more exotic head-dress to show his status.

I have to say that it was great fun to try to make each figure into a real character.

One time consuming part was having to paint on all of the white strapping on the shields which holds the leather hide to the central spar.  There was no getting around this. I have tried dry brushing but the raised surface texture always catches half of the paint and extensive touching up is then necessary.  It was better to pick my time, put on some good mellow music and just hand paint each line as carefully as possible.

A nice touch was the figure falling backwards from being shot. This is a great figure that the Perry's give instructions for on how to assemble.

A sepia photo below - straight from 'The Graphic' newspaper of the time (!)

The Zulu's had quite a lot of firepower and the Perry's give a good number of muskets and spare arms to make more shooting troops than I chose to do from this box.

Also really useful are the casualty figures which make superb markers.  I avoided putting blood etc on, it's clear enough what the figure represents and our imagination can fill in the rest.

I have the Rorkes Drift set currently on my table being finished off and I will hopefully do a post on this soon.  I'm hoping the enthusiasm stays with me to do a number of boxes of Zulu's as I do need rather a lot of them.  I shall take my Martini Henry out on the range this weekend and see if it helps to keep me focussed on this fascinating period of history.

Anglo-Zulu War British - 24th Foot

So, it happened again!  The change to a new historical period, messing up plans of completing other armies, and yet an exciting and interesting change that enlivens the hobby and keeps it ever interesting. 

I blame the new period on getting to fire my Martini-Henry rifle at the range for the first time last month.  I have owned it for about 3 years but never got around to getting the ammo or the kit to make the rounds up. When I finally had made some ammo, off to the range I went...and I don't think the smile left my face for a week!

So enthused in spirit I purchased a copy of the Warlord Games 'Zulu!' book for their Black Powder rules.  I have to say how impressive these are too.  Each scenario seems to have a completely different approach to the game, from using small sections for Rorke's Drift to companies for Isandlwana and to battalion units for the final large battles.  I really like the thinking behind it and it got my imagination racing even more.

I placed an order for Perry's Anglo-Zulu War British Infantry and I have to admit to stopping another project on my work bench to throw myself into making and painting these.  I even took the figures with me to construct and start to paint when I had to spend a week working away from home.

I have started with a 16 man unit instead of my usual 24 - the idea being that I can now downscale the number of Zulu's I need by 1/3rd on this ratio.  There are already going to be plenty of Zulu's but I do want some room on the board for figures to move! 

As usual with plastic figures from the Perry's, the troops were a joy to construct with not too many parts and nothing especially weak.  A couple of bayonets did get clobbered by my clumsiness during construction, but nothing broke or bent.  There are 38 figures in the box including casualties which gives a great mix.  I'll make and paint the standard bearers at a later date. They are in the box too along with the Colours for four regiments on the printed sheet supplied.

The commander of this unit (for it will be a company or battalion depending on scenario) is not of the Stanley Baker/Michael Caine clean shaven appearance but has the full 'eating a bear' beard popular of the time.

As a small digression I should mention that these are the first 'proper' colonial period figures that I have...which amazes me! The history of this period is just so incredibly interesting and the redoubtable British Soldier was active all over the place with his trusty Martini-Henry.  I do have Esci 1/72 Zulu War plastic figures in the attic but it has been a long long time since they were painted and saw daylight.

I used the Foundry Triad colours particularly useful using British Napoleonic colours mostly and the French Dragoon greens for the cuffs and collars.

 

I really wasn't sure how to base the troops and gave this a lot of thought.  The casualties were always going to be based on Warbases casualty stands which give space for a small dice to be placed to show 'excess' casualties, as well as a numeric dial.

To give the greatest flexibility I decided to use circular single figure stands, again from Warbases, but in addition I purchased 4 man skirmish type movement bases and 5 man close order bases. 

I chose the bases which could be fitted with their 'rare earth' magnets.  These little magnets are great fun on their own! Prising them off each other was a great challenge and trying to drive two opposing tiny little magnets together was a real test on something so small!  Amusingly when setting these photos up I discovered that one magnet was the wrong way up.  The figure was ejected from the movement tray to my bafflement until I realised what I had done!

I had never used the magnets before and wondered if they were sufficient to hold the figures safely in their movement bases. I can safely say that the figures are well held. As a test I held the base upside down and shook it and there was no movement whatsoever from the figures.

It took me 6 weeks to get these chaps painted up. This involves research and doing lots of other things at weekends and I am now ready to paint something else!  In my early enthusiasm I ordered a huge battle set of Rorke's Drift from 4Ground with many boxes of Warlord Games Zulus. I decided that I would keep this box as my gift to myself at Christmas so I have yet to open it!  I am sure I will be ready to paint more British Infantry then...and Zulus........... 'Tharsands of 'em!'