Progress while an east wind blows

I’ve been hunkered down with my RMLI and Naval Brigade, finally finishing them.

Meanwhile a hoard of Hadendowa and another British infantry company are ready for painting, and I am beginning to think about modelling the Jack Tars hauling the Gatling gun limber, and a screw gun carried by mules or camels.

Top to bottom: The Naval Brigade contingent from HMS Hecla join their chief, Captain Arthur Wilson; the RMLI company from HMS Tyne; Rear Admiral Sir William Hewett VC KCB; war correspondents and great friends Melton Prior and Bennet Burleigh.

Heliograph section and Bennet Burleigh

I’ve allowed myself a bit of a distraction while putting the finishing touches to my first Hadendowa Rub: painting the Perry Miniatures’ Heliograph section and Melton Prior’s great friend, and fellow journalist, Bennet Burleigh.

I’ve had Burleigh almost two years, and the heliograph section since before the first lockdown began here in the UK, so it will be very satisfying to get them finished.

Meanwhile, a RMLI company and a second Naval Brigade contingent await further work.

Hadendowa commanders, Burleigh and his mount, and the heliograph section.

Melton Prior inspired Hadendowa conversion

A while ago I bought three boxes of Perry Miniatires’ Sudanese tribesmen, so there are quite a lot of plastic figures to assemble. From time-to-time I read complaints about having to assemble these figures, the nature of it being characterised as a chore. I enjoy assembly, actually; it takes me right back to my early teens self assembling Airfix models. I make one or two at a time when I have a spare moment, and day-by day this gets them done at a reasonable rate. Priming and painting is another matter, though.

As I did all those years ago, I like to make things my own with minor adjustments or major conversions. The principal advantage of these hard-ish plastic figures is how easily they lend themselves to conversion. This account of a moment at El Teb in Melton Prior’s memoir Campaigns of a War Correspondent suggested assembling a figure with a throwing stick in one hand and two spears in the other:

One man in particular I noticed. He held spears in the left hand, and he actually flung his boomerang and succeeded in hitting one of our men on the leg before he was killed.

Three easy conversions. The fellow on the left has just drawn his sword. The fellow on the right was inspired by an account by Melton Prior at the second battle of El Teb. He’s left-handed, obviously.

Two Victorian heroes and a Gatling gun battery

I haven’t painted anything smaller than a house for about three years, so it’s taken me a while to get my eye in. It also takes a while to familiarise oneself with the castings and mouldings, guides to uniform and attire, and develop a work flow.

Apart form the Beja riflemen and gun crews I’ve been working on a few British personalities, the British Field Hospital, and the Gatling gun battery. I have a Naval Brigade detachment and RMLI company primed, and have got the base coat on a Hadendowa camel band.

Colonel Frederick Burnaby was almost a metaphor for the British Empire’s might, a giant for his times at 6' 4" and 20 stone, a classic Victorian heroic adventurer. Having trekked solo through a Russian Asian war zone, he made a crossing of the English Channel by balloon, and endevoured to get himself attached to whichever military expedition was going. Famously he took on the Mahdist warriors with a shot gun at the second battle of El Teb.

Here’s a an article about Burnaby, and some details of the shot gun, in Guards Magazine:

Link

Captain Arthur Wilson, RN, of HMS Hecla, was in the thick of it at the second battle of El Teb too, protecting a Naval Brigade gun detachment by holding off the Fuzzy Wuzzys with the hilt of his broken sword, a feat for which he was awarded the Victoria Cross.

Melton Prior was an artist and war correspondent who covered many of the British Empire’s military adventures. Also always in the thick of it, his detailed sketches appeared in the Illustrated London News. I am reading his memoir at the moment.

Colonel Frederick Burnaby and Captain Arthur Wilson … both need a bit of dust adding to their boots.

Melton Prior sketching. I added reins from foil to his mount, since I plan to repurpose his servant to be an ammunition mule driver.

A Gatling gun limber on the right, showing that the lid was a single piece. A useful photographic confirmation of information I have gathered.

I have added hooks for fine chain to the gun carriages, added the handles to the Broadwell magazines, and prepared the hauling chains for the static and towed limbers.