RML 2.5 inch 7 pounder screw gun battery

While contemplating the challenge of painting various kinds of grey stallions for the 19th Hussars, I decided to begin work on my screw gun battery.

I have read that these handy artillery pieces were transported on three sturdier camels (which meant that the barrel could be carried without disassembly by one animal, the carriage and wheels by two more). Once deployed they could fire explosive shells, shrapnel rounds, or case shot.

I plan a battery of two pieces, with three crew figures each, and a battery commander. I have made some minor modifications to two of the crew figures so that each group will look different enough.

These guns are so small that I have decided to paint them prior to assembly.

A future modelling project is a screw gun in transit, for which I have the components – I just need the time.

Minor modiciations using hands and arms from the Perry Miniatures’ plastic Sudan/Afghanistan British infantry set, and the crew and guns ready for priming. That’s Private Thomas Edwards on the end, soon to join a pair of Naval Brigade ammunition mules.

Progress on the painting bench

In addition to a number of finished or nearly finished terrain pieces, I have a handful of figures and equipment ready for shading and varnishing.

Bases are 2mm MDF affixed to thin magnetic sheet, and will be prepared with Vellajo sandy paste before painting.

It’s taken me far longer than it should have to get to this stage, but I now have some momentum, which is just as well because I have a large number of figures primed.

Gatling guns, limber, Hadendowa flag bearer, and the staff of my field hospital, with a couple of casualties.

Clockwise: Melton Prior sketching, Captain Arthur Wilson, and Colonel Frederick Burnaby. Bases have been prepared with Vallejo sandy paste, and are ready for painting.

Mahdist brass 7pdr mountain gun battery, with crew members converted from metal and plastic Perry Miniatures’ figures.

Half of the first Hadendowa rifle-armed band, with leader based separately …

… and the remainder. These are a mix of metal and plastic figures.

A little progress: 40pdr and Gatling gun limber

Most of today’s effort has gone into applying the first coat of varnish to twenty-odd Hadendowa rifle-armed and gun crew figures, along with Burnaby, Wilson and Prior.

I also spent about five minutes on the Gatling gun limber and a couple of hours on the 40pdr.

Yesterday I did most of the cutting and trimming to narrow the two carriages for the smaller weapon. It’s the first time I have worked with resin, and it’s brittle stuff, requiring slow careful work to avoid disastrous chips and breakages. I had one of the former, but a bit of filling was required in any case.

I added larger diameter trunions to the barrel, drilled the gun carriage for the wire rope, and added a pair of leavers, one each side. I need to add small wheels to the rear of the carriage, and model the elevation mechanism. The latter needs some investigation. I also need to source some blocks of a suitable size for the tackle … so quite a bit still to do.

The limber is nearly ready for priming, while the 40pdr is going to take a while longer.

7pdr mountain gun and Mahdist crews

I was browsing North Star’s web site over Christmas and noticed their ‘arsenal’, a small range of guns with and without crews. While Perry Miniatures’s Sudan range features Krupp field guns with Egyptian crews in chains, I wanted to model a battery of mountain guns, likely captured when the Hicks Pash Obeid relief expedition was defeated.

I have repurposed plastic and metal figures, the latter from the crouching warriors code (SA11). One fellow directs another hurrying with a sponge and bucket, another crouches with shot, one crouches with a sponge, another crouches clutching a ramrod. The last is firing one of the guns. I twisted a lanyard for the friction fuse from 34 gauge beading wire, and I’ll adjust the length and attitude when I base the gun and figures.

The gun crews and one of the tiny 7pdr mountain guns, additional figures not yet primed. Medical Staff Corps figures in the background.

Mahdist artillery

I fancied an alternative to the Egyptians shackled to Krupp 6pdrs, and references to ‘brass guns’ in the Mahdist armoury, most likely mountain guns captured when Hicks Pasha was defeated at Shaykan (on the way to relieve El Obeid), suggested a little modelling detour.

I ordered a pair of North Star’s 7pdr mountain guns [link]. Given their small size I thought to convert some of the crouching Beja figures into gun crew, with others from the plastic set.

The first of a handful of Beja gun crew with sponge, shot, sponge and bucket, with the battery commander on the right.