6mm: Irregular vs Heroics & Ros

Introduction

I have a fair-sized collection of 6mm Napoleonic figures.  However, there are never quite enough to form the truly grand armies I'd like for a large game.  In particular, I don't have too many French.

Virtually all of my 6mm forces are made up of models from Heroics & Ros.  However, I don't believe that H&R Napoleonics are currently available, though hopefully they will be re-issued sometime soon.

So if I wish to extend my army, what are the options?  There are other "6mm" manufacturers such as Bacchus and Adler, but I've always understood that these were rather larger (perhaps more like 8mm tall?) and stylistically rather different.  Please note that this last opinion is based on hearsay and rumour rather than personal experience; if it is in any way incorrect then I apologise profusely!

The other maker of "true" 6mm figures of which I am aware is Irregular Miniatures.  They've been around forever and have a reputation for cheap, but possibly less well-detailed models.  But at least their 6mm Napoleonics are still in production!

I thought it worth buying a battalion of infantry from Irregular to find out whether or not they are compatible with my H&R.  Here we go...

Irregular Miniatures

My standard Napoleonic line infantry "battalions" are 4 bases, each with 3 ranks of 10 figures.  Models from Irregular Miniatures are available in a number of different form factors - including blocks of 3 ranks of infantry.  However, I went for the standard 6-man strips for my unit.

This battalion is therefore composed of 19 x French Line infantry strips, plus 1 x French Line infantry command.  Because I only wanted 10 figures per rank on each base, I needed to cut apart some of the 6-figure strips into 2-man and 4-man parts.  This wasn't too hard, though it was a minor nuisance.

 

From the rear, it is clear that these French are not wearing backpacks.  That's slightly odd, but probably not too important.

Painting the Irregular figures was a little more difficult than I remember being the case for H&R.  Maybe I'm just older, more tired or have less good eyesight than before? Or maybe these models haven't got the fairly-obvious detail of the H&R ones.  Still, I think they turned out all right.

Heroics & Ros

As this is a comparison article, here are some of my existing Heroics & Ros figures.  The only real differences I can spot are that the H&R have shouldered their muskets on the left, whereas the Irregular are using their right shoulders for this and that the Irregular command figures have a moulded, semi-furled standard; the H&R just have a small square of flat metal.  Also, as mentioned above, the H&R are wearing backpacks; the Irregular are not.

From the back, you can also see that I've changed the style of the unit's nameplate for my newest models.  The 93rd Line have my older, all-white nameplates, without any specific battalion identifier.

Conclusion

OK, can you guess which unit is Irregular and which is H&R in this picture?  At first glance, without peering too closely at the image?

If you thought that the Irregular were on the right and the H&R on the left then you were correct.  But my view is that there isn't a lot of difference between them and I'll be very happy to mix units from these two manufacturers together in the same army.  In the end it comes down to which models are easier to obtain.

Of course, I've only tested infantry here.  The cavalry models might well vary rather more between the two producers.

Black Powder: the Bridge at Ebelsberg

Introduction

It's been a very long time since I've played Black Powder.  It might even be as much as 2.5 years ago - that's when I last reported on such a battle: Grochow, 1809.  But despite all this, we haven't forgotten about the game and how much we enjoyed it.  Indeed, last Christmas I got the "Clash of Eagles" supplement.  Although this officially covers the 1812 invasion of Russia, it does have a wealth of stuff that is suitable for my 1809-ish Austrians, French, Confederation of the Rhine &c.

The Scenario

So, armed with this new inspiration it was time for a game.  We pitted my relatively small French & Allies force against Steve's much larger Russian army.  We couldn't really put these numbers head-to-head; the Russians would have a considerable advantage in numbers.  Instead, I took a scenario from the "Blunders on the Danube" Piquet supplement and adapted it.

The Battle of Ebelsberg

In the original battle of Ebelsberg in 1809, a large French army tried to catch a smaller Austrian group as it retreated towards the single bridge over the large & impassable river Traun and into the town of Ebelsberg.  There's a catch, though: the Austrians were waiting for one last, straggling brigade before they could retire.

Historically, most of the Austrians were extracted with a mixture of skill and luck, but the French managed to seize the bridge before the Austrians could demolish it.  This led to some vicious fighting within the town on the next day.  We'll be gaming the approach on the first day.

Our Version

Firstly, the forces are all shifted around to suit the armies available to us.  The Russians would be attacking (instead of the French) and the French would be defending (instead of the Austrians).

French Forces (General LeBeaux):

• 1 relatively strong French brigade is deployed across the road to Ebelsberg, in the middle of the table (Brigadier Gerard).
• A weak brigade of mixed units from France and Hesse-Darmstadt holds the village of Klein Munchen (Brigadier Meier).
• A weak Bavarian brigade enters from the south, starting on turn 1 (Brigadier Shultz).

Russian Forces:

• 2 small brigades of cavalry are already on the end of the table.
• An entire division of infantry (plus their artillery, of course) is approaching from the west.  Their light brigade is already on table; the two line brigades will enter from the left, starting respectively on turn 1 and turn 2.

So, the Russians outnumber the allies by somewhere between 3:2 and 2:1 (I didn't bother to count).  As per the Clash of Eagles supplement, they have a weak command structure and aren't good at musketry, but are stoic against casualties and well motivated to get stuck in to melee.

We decided that we'd randomise command values for officers.  Each of the commanders-in-chief would have a base rating of 9 and would add the roll of a fudge die (i.e. '+', ' ' or '-'), whilst each of the brigadiers would have a command rating of 8 plus a fudge die.  The result:

• The Russian C-in-C was a brilliant general with a rating of 10.
• The 2 Russian cavalry brigadiers were (from memory) a respectable 8 and 9.
• Every other commander rolled a '-', thus leading to a command value of 8 for the French C-in-C and a 7 for all the French brigadiers and all the Russian infantry leaders. It looks as if this is the dregs of the French army; either that or they are under-supplied, tired, hungry and dispirited.  Ooh, err...

Our Game

On turn 1, the wayward Bavarians started to arrive.  Their somewhat plodding general assumed that they were too far from the enemy to need to deploy for action, but he was wrong.  A dashing Russian cavalry leader led a wild charge which saw one infantry column caught in the flank whilst still in column-of-march [for anyone who doesn't know about horse & musket warfare, this is an extraordinarily bad thing for the defenders.  Indeed, for the cavalry involved in such an attack it's possibly the highlight of their entire careers].

Amazingly, the Bavarian 13th Line infantry didn't disintegrate immediately.  They took enormous casualties and were driven back a long way, but they passed break test after break test and just hung on.

As more elements of the Bavarian column arrived, their own cavalry charged the approaching Russian cossacks.  For a few moments, it looked as if the situation might be stabilised...

...but the Russian cavalry, having pursued the 13th Line almost to Klein Munchen, finally dispersed them.

At the same time, the Bavarian cavalry, having seen off the cossacks with some enthusiasm, encountered a fresh unit of Russian dragoons.  The clash between these squadrons was brutal: the lighter Bavarian Cheveaux Leger were swept away - but the dragoons were hit hard as well.  Indeed, that loss caused the demoralisation of the Russian heavy cavalry brigade; they played no further part in the game.

The damage had been done, however.  The Bavarian brigade was also demoralised; it retreated off the table (and presumably found somewhere a bit quieter to huddle until they could surrender and be taken prisoner).

[In reviewing this now, I realise that the Bavarian brigade should not have broken at this point, though they were indeed perilously close.  I had miscounted the number of units in the formation; they had lost 50%, excluding artillery, but not over 50%, as we require for a brigade to become demoralised.  Oh, well - it probably wouldn't have made much difference in the long run anyway...]

Elsewhere, large columns of Russian infantry plodded forwards, although their commanders didn't seem to be in any great hurry.  The more advanced units started to engage the nearest French, though 

true to form their shooting didn't achieve much other than to make a noise and a lot of smoke.

Since there were no survivors from the Bavarian contingent and therefore no need for them to stay where they were, many of the French units started to move back towards the bridge.  There was still a long way to go, mind.

The Russian advance was most active on the far right of the table.  Their leading infantry came off rather worse in an exchange of volleys with the French 4th Line, but there were plenty more attackers nearby to fill the gap.

A single unit of French heavy cavalry tried to fend off a Russian hussar brigade.  Both sides were wary, but in the initial clash both the French and one of the Russian squadrons were devastated.

With the French cavalry out of the running, the other Hussar squadron fell upon the flank of the exposed French infantry and sent them routing in all directions.

About this time, the Russian C-in-C all but gave up trying to get his subordinates to move their forces.  Instead, he took over command of all the units that were near his position and formed them into an ad hoc task force, which then proceeded to steamroller forwards.

The French continued their retiral, hoping to put some distance between themselves and their pursuers so that they would have time to negotiate the bottleneck of the bridge.  However, at least some of the Russian units kept up with them and stayed within musket range.

For a brief moment, it looked as if the bulk of the French infantry had indeed outdistanced the enemy.  The leading Russian battalions were pinned in square by the threat of a lone unit of French light cavalry, whilst the intermittently-rallied Carabiniers again slowed the Russian cavalry brigade, though at some cost to themselves.

The Russian commander was wary of the garrisoned village of Klein Munchen; past experience suggested that this type of position would be tough to crack with just infantry.  However, the Hesse-Darmstadt artillery was in the field outside the village.  A battalion of Jaegers assaulted the small battery and overran it; despite being lashed with canister and shot they simply ignored the casualties and came on regardless [by rolling a double '6' to save hits and thus managing to avoid the need for a break test]!

So, did the French escape?  For (I think) 3 turns in a row, Brigadier Gerard failed to give a coherent order to any of his units!  The French C-in-C ("LeBeaux") was too busy trying to shore up the right flank to intervene, so nothing moved.  Maybe a wagon was stuck on the bridge?  Or perhaps there were arguments over which unit should go first, or engineers were busily trying to prepare the bridge for demolition?  Whatever the reason, the delay was costly.

Russian infantry poured around the village, keeping carefully out of musket range, whilst (some of) their artillery pounded the buildings and their occupying Hessians.  The only good news for the French at this point was that a blunder sent a second Russian battery retreating at full speed back to where they had just come from.

Finally, a few French units formed into column of march and hightailed it along the road and across the bridge, whilst the French cavalry tried to slow down the Russian advance.  But there were simply too many attackers and the retreat had been delayed for too long; most of the remaining French units were caught in a pocket; we called the game rather than play it out to the inevitable end.

Conclusion

4 French units made it to the bridge (in column of march) and escaped; this was definitely not as many as I'd hoped.  It's just as well that Brigadier Gerard was captured, else I'd have had him court-martialed and shot!  I also note that not a single Russian unit was routed, though a number of them were shaken and only just survived break tests.

It sounds like a very one-sided massacre, doesn't it?  The early (and incorrect!) loss of the Bavarian brigade didn't help, yet the game felt remarkably even.  Right up to the very end it was possible that another 4 or 5 French units might have escaped, possibly even more.  Both sides had their chances and their frustrations, so it was engaging all the way through.

The bottom line: both players enjoyed this battle immensely, it was refreshingly different from the traditional "encounter" game and the way events unfolded with surges and pauses in the action felt like a real Napoleonic battle (as we understand it).  I don't think we could ask for more, really 😄.

6mm Napoleonics: Bavarians

Introduction

I'm on something of a 6mm roll at the moment, so it seems fitting to document some of my French allies.  This time it's the turn of the Bavarians.

During the Napoleonic Wars there was no Germany as we know it now.  Instead the land was split up into many different states, some larger and some smaller.  The best-known of these are probably the relatively large kingdoms of Prussia, Saxony, Westphalia and Bavaria.  Prussia was usually an enemy to the French, but many of the other states were organised by Napoleon into a grouping of client states called the Confederation of the Rhine, thus supplying his armies with a good source of fresh manpower  Indeed, I've heard it said of Napoleon's 1812 invasion of Russia that he planned to fight "to the last drop of German blood"!

The Bavarians

Artillery.  Either 1 large battery or 3 smaller ones...

A small unit of light infantry in line formation, with skirmishers deployed to the front

2 units of line infantry.  Bavarian line infantry are known for their pale blue uniforms and tall helmets.  One of these units has black facings, the other has red facings.

Chevaux Légère: light cavalry.  Note the French name for the troop type, even though these are ethnic Germans.

Conclusion

All the Bavarians.

As with my other 6mm Napoleonics, the figures in this force are entirely Heroics & Ros 6mm models.  I've got enough for a good division under the Black Powder rules, though the mixture of line infantry and cavalry in the same formation would be a little unusual, I think.

The Bavarians (and many other Confederation of the Rhine nationalities) fought with the French against the Austrians at Wagram in 1809.  With them and my French force (here), I can easily field enough for a decent afternoon's game - though I'm maybe a little short of being able to portray the entire battle!

Showcase: 6mm Napoleonic French

Introduction

Recently, there was someone asking on The Miniatures Page for pictures of painted Heroics & Ros 6mm Napoleonic figures.  There was very little response to the question and it occurred to me that there are indeed very few such images around.  It's a pity, as 6mm models work very well for the type of massed battles which occurred throughout the "Horse and Musket"/"Black Powder" period.

With that in mind, I thought it would be worth while documenting my relatively small 1809-ish French force.  Here goes...

The Infantry

"Vive L'Empereur!"  3 Line regiments, each in attack column formation and with skirmishers deployed forwards

 My forces are based for use with the Black Powder rules.  A standard infantry or cavalry unit has 4 bases; each base has a 40mm frontage, but the depth varies for different troop types.  Infantry depth is 20mm, cavalry is 30mm and artillery is 40mm.

Closeup of a Line regiment

Line infantry have 30 figures per base, in 3 ranks of 10, whereas light infantry (Légère) are in 2 ranks of 10.

The Heroics & Ros packs come with a goodly proportion of command figures.  I'm not particularly expert on the Napoleonic period, so I allow 1 flag per regiment.  However, many of the other, non-flag bases have an extra officer and/or drummer in the front rank.  Some bases have the colonel (on horseback) alongside the standard; to fit the horse I need to remove 1 figure from the 2nd rank.

A Légère unit in line formation, also with a skirmish screen deployed.

 I use extra bases with rounded ends to denote skirmishers, rather than trying to use bases from the main body of the regiment.  These skirmish markers have a small number of figures dispersed over a relatively large area.  Typically the skirmisher models are positioned in pairs rather than being completely random, as I have a vague memory of being told that at least one Napoleonic army's doctrine was for each skirmisher to operate with a buddy so that one man could fire whilst his mate reloaded.

The Cavalry

French Carabiniers: heavy cavalry knee-to-knee in a single line on each base, but with a few officers & standards out front.

Unlike the infantry, my French cavalry is composed of the less common types.  Rather than the ubiquitous Cuirassiers and Chevaux-léger, I have a single regiment each of Carabiniers and Hussars.  Oh, well - it gives me expansion possibilities, doesn't it?

French Hussars: light cavalry in a slightly more dispersed line, but still with officers, buglers and standards in advance.

The Artillery

I mount my guns 2 to a base; this gives plenty of room for the various crew and officers to be positioned.  For Black Powder, we would normally use a single base to represent a battery, though I suppose there is no reason why we couldn't be more generous and use 2 or even 3 bases.

Commanders

Many games require commanders to be based separately; Black Powder certainly does.  With 6mm there is plenty of room for several figures, even on a 20mm base.  I typically use 2 models for a 20mm diameter brigade command stand and 3 models on a 25mm base for the division commander.

As well as the general himself and any aides, I often include a standard bearer.  This may not be entirely historical, but it serves 2 useful purposes:

1. It allows the identification of nationality more easily in the heat of battle.  After all, one 6mm guy riding a horse and wearing a bicorne hat looks much the same as another - and I wouldn't wish to confuse my generals with the enemy's, would I?
2. It makes use of some of the excess standard bearer models from the H&R infantry packs!

Conclusion

I've got a fair number of other bases for my French army, from the days when I had it set up for DBN.  That game used far fewer models than Black Powder and so these miscellaneous bases aren't enough of any one type to form a regiment.  Still, they would provide a useful foundation when expanding this force.  One day, one day...

Lots of 6mm H&R Napoleonic French!

Dumbarton Castle: A Walkround

Introduction

The weather was beautiful last weekend, quite unusually warm and clear for the time of year.  On a whim, I decided to take my 2 younger children on a visit to nearby Dumbarton Castle in the afternoon.  After all, I'm already a paid up member of Historic Scotland (who own the castle), so we get free entry!

This aerial shot isn't my own picture, but it gives a good overview of the site.  I'll use a scaled-down and sepia-toned version of this picture during the rest of this article to indicate where my own pictures were taken. 

Dumbarton Rock is a volcanic plug that sits where the river Leven flows into the much larger river Clyde.  Although the site has been used for many centuries, most of the current configuration is a Napoleonic coastal defence fortress, built to protect the city of Glasgow some 10 miles further up the Clyde.

The rock itself consists of 2 peaks with a narrow gulley between them.  At some points, the cliffs around the perimeter are very steep, so that walls are only present around the north and south edges of the castle.  I guess that there was never a realistic chance of anyone attacking by scaling the east or west faces!

A Brief History

View from the west, across the mouth of the river Leven

This site has at least many hundreds, if not thousands of years of history.  I'm not going to even try to list them all, but here are a few highlights:

• The name of the town derives from the fort: Dum (or Dun) is a hill fort and Barton is a corruption of "Briton".  Thus, the fort of the Britons.
• Dumbarton castle was the capital of the ancient kingdom of Strathclyde (i.e. the Strathclyde Welsh faction in the Studio Tomahawk's very popular SAGA wargames rules).
• In 870AD, 200 Viking ships besieged the rock for 4 months and carried off loot and slaves to Dublin when the well dried up and the castle fell.
• Both William Wallace and Mary, Queen of Scots passed through the castle; the former on his way to execution in London and the latter on her way to France to live out her childhood.
• As a royal castle (i.e. one owned by the monarch rather than one of his lords), Dumbarton castle was often used to hold important prisoners of state, for example after the Jacobite uprisings.
• Later, the castle housed French prisoners of war during the Napoleonic wars, including General Simon who was captured at the battle of Busaco (1810).

The South, River Face

Starting near the entrance, just below the Governor's house, is the King George battery of 12pdr cannon.  This is one of the larger batteries in the fortress; it protects the most easily accessible part of the rock and consists of maybe 4 or 5 guns (most of the batteries have their cannon still in place, but a few are missing).

How do I know that these are 12pdr guns?  Well, there are various marks on the cast iron, either on the carriages or on the gun barrels themselves.  I've always been fascinated by the amount of information present, though I suspect that most visitors aren't even aware of it.

From the top, clockwise:

• "12Pr" is the weight of the cannonball that the gun would have fired.
• The broad arrowhead denotes "Government property".  It's probably better known on the clothing worn by convicts, but the meaning is just the same!
• The date of this carriage is "16-3-7", or in other words 16th March, 1807.
• The crest with "GR" under it will be for the king.  "Georgius Rex" is, of course, Latin for King George.  I'm guessing that this will be George III as he was on the throne from 1760 to 1820, which is the right time period for this type of gun.
• There are a series of horizontal marks at the rear end of the cannon.  These are for range finding: the gunner would choose the mark for the desired range and look along the side of the barrel to line it up with a single notch at the muzzle of the cannon.  Assuming that line also passed through the intended target then he would be aiming correctly!

Around the south wall. the path goes up and down a lot as it hugs the steep side of the rock.  There are 2 or 3 small batteries, each of 1 or 2 cannon, wherever there is a slightly wider point.

At the far end (the Spanish Battery), there is no cannon.  All that's left are the flagstones on which it would have sat and an iron ring in the side of the cliff.

The Central Cleft

To get into the main part of the castle, it is necessary to climb the gulley that runs between the 2 peaks of the rock.  Even though the modern stairs are well constructed, it is easy to see how hard it would be to assault this position.  There are 2 guardhouses on the route and one of them has a portcullis as well!

The French Prison, where prisoners from the Napoleonic wars were held

At the top of the cleft there is a flatter piece of land.  This is large enough to have some buildings on it, including the foundations of the late medieval gatehouse which gave entrance to the castle from the north-west.  There is a small flight of stairs down to the well, but the area is dominated by the French Prison.  Sadly, it's not possible to see inside this building; it's undergoing restoration work and may be opened to the public when this is completed.  I can't help wondering just how many people were held in here...

The Lesser Hill

The Duke of Argyll's battery

Moving up the smaller, flatter mound to the east, we come to the Duke of Argyll's Battery of 3 x 18pdr cannon.  These are the heaviest guns in the fort, but they're pointing up the river Leven towards Loch Lomond and the Highlands.  It seems to me that they wouldn't have been much use against an invading foreign fleet - though any land army coming from the north would have been easy targets.  Perhaps the battery was placed here simply because they could?

Slightly further around there is a good view of the stadium for Dumbarton Football Club.  Apparently, the castle is closed to visitors on the days of big matches!  It does show just how flat and open the land to the north is, at least for a mile or two.

The Prince Regent's Battery is next.  This also faces landwards, but has slightly lighter guns (1 x 12pdr and 2 x 6pdr).  Once again, the field of fire is excellent and it's hard to imagine how a successful attack could be mounted from this direction.

Perched on top of the lesser hill is the Magazine.  I had great arguments with my 9-year old daughter, who insisted (still does) that a magazine was a kind of comic book.  She just wouldn't accept that it's also the name for a place where ammunition is stored.

Many of the design features of this type of magazine are explained on boards nearby; all are designed to keep the gunpowder dry but to prevent an explosion - or at least to limit the damage if the worst should happen.  The most obvious such measure are the double walls around the building itself; if the magazine blows up then the explosion will go upwards instead of outwards!

Musketry loopholes and a rather nice little 2-storey sentry box/lookout post.

There is little provision for muskets in Dumbarton castle, but to the north east one wall has a number of firing ports.  It seems to me that the range would be fairly extreme for a smooth bore musket, even to the closest point outside the fortress.  I must be missing something here; I imagine that the builders of the fortifications knew what they were doing and that these weren't just for show.

Looking west from the lesser peak towards the taller mound.  The gulley between them isn't very obvious in this picture.

There's not much evidence of human construction on the tops of the castle rock.  However this picture does demonstrate how rugged are the sides of the rock and what a good viewpoint it makes.  No wonder that it has been popular as a fort for as long as people have been in the area!

The Western Peak

The path up to the taller, western part of the rock is steep and tortuous.  Apparently General Simon, the French prisoner, was allowed to walk this way twice a day as a special privilege.  He was accompanied by 2 guards during these excursions, mind!

From the top of the hill, the modern town of Dumbarton can be seen spreading out to the north and west.  In this picture you can clearly spot the double-walled magazine on the lesser peak, together with the Duke of Argyll's Battery.  The smaller Prince Regent's Battery is partially hidden, just behind and below the magazine.

Finally, here's the view down the Firth of Clyde.  The Clyde flows from bottom to top, while the river Leven joins from the right.  Any attacking fleet, whether they are Viking longboats or French ships of the line, would be visible for many miles and would have to pass the channel in front of the castle to go anywhere further.  Good luck with that!