THE 93RD SUTHERLAND HIGHLANDERS

Knuckleduster's 93rd Highlanders

There can be fewer acts of valor in the face of overwhelming odds than the 93rd Highlanders' storming of the American advance redoubt at New Orleans. As the British Army was being bled white by withering fire, the 1st (flank) company of the 93rd surprised and overwhelmed a redoubt next to the river on the American right. Unsupported and exposed to a hail of lead from the US 7th Infantry, the detachment was mowed down. The remainder of the regiment, which should have been behind them, were inexplicably ordered on a futile and suicidal march across the middle of the killing zone to join another group assaulting the American left.

The main body of the regiment was observed standing at the canal in front of the the American position without the ladders and fascines they were promised in order to cross the the water and scale the works, awaiting orders which would never come from the silent lips of their dead commanders, "unable to go forward, too proud to retreat."

So we have here, as is so often the case, lions used like dogs. C'est la guerre. Fortunately, the only widows gaming produces are tin widows, so we can send our little men on any doomed mission we can dream up with a clear conscience!

So...

The 93rd assembled in Plymouth, England for the expedition. They were ordered to wear trousers due to a shortage of kilt hose (socks) and a feeling among command that kilts were "ill-calculated for severe service" (maybe it was really a shortage of Bond's Gold Powder). Tartan arrived from South Africa in time to be made up into trousers ("trews"). Their bonnets were considerably simpler than those worn in the Peninsular War or at Waterloo, and certainly a far cry from the Lady Ga-Ga getup worn in the Crimea. A simple blue tam was worn with a wide, red-and-white checked band around the bottom. A pom ("tourie") topped off the cap, white for grenadiers, green for lights, and red for everyone else. 

The tartan was the Government Sett. I own and occasionally wear a kilt of this pattern, so you would think painting it would be easy. Think again. I am very much a novice when it comes to painting tartan, but I gave it my best. I painted them blue, then green stripes, then a light green highlight at the junction of the green lines, then a thin black line down the center of the green. A far cry from the Crystal Brush competition, but it gets the job done and looks good at arm's length.

The 93rd is an essential unit to have if you're planning on gaming the Battle of New Orleans. They were critically important on the day of the battle, and they took part in a hotly-contested night battle during the lead-up to the battle.

I'll leave you with a joke a musician friend of mine from Northern Ireland often tells. Do you know the difference between a kilt and a skirt? If you're wearin' underwear, it's a skirt!

Adios,

Forrest Harris

Knuckleduster

AND HERE'S THE LINK TO THE KNUCKLEDUSTER PRODUCT PAGES!

FRONTIER "JUSTICE"

A sometimes overlooked pack in the Knuckleduster catalog is the "Frontier Justice" set (OW28-310). These six figures include an undertaker (complete with greasy combover), a Sheriff, a prisoner waiting to be hanged, a doctor rushing to the scene of the crime, a judge (or minister) making sanctimonious pronouncements, and last but not least, the hangman himself.

Let's start with him. I used as my inspiration the dour George Maledon, who pulled the gallows lever for the infamous "hanging judge" Parker at Fort Smith, Arkansas. Here's George as he appeared alongside George Clooney in the 1896 issue of GQ:

      

....and here he is as I have immortalized him in tin pewter:

Of course, these figures properly belong with one of TCL's laser-cut gallows:

The rope is not included in the gallows kit; I made mine from some string that came with a model ship. I never found time to build the ship, but the string has come in handy many times!

Poor fella'. No DNA testing in the Old West. Ben Franklin once said, "It is better 100 guilty Persons should escape than that one innocent Person should suffer, is a Maxim that has been long and generally approved." They apparently were not great admirers of Ben Franklin in Fort Smith. Of course, the characters brought in by the US Marshals from the Oklahoma territory were unlikely to include many "innocent persons."

The auld judge said, "Now McCafferty, go prepare your soul for eternity . . . "

Why not add a character from the "working men" set to the grisly scene. Here is a gravedigger regarding the whole affair while leaning thoughfully on the handle of his spade:

"Why may not that be the skull of a lawyer?"

Happy gaming,
Forrest Harris
Knuckleduster

Native Warriors

The Mohawk (properly called the Kanien'kehá:ka), Cayuga, Onondaga, Oneida, Seneca and Tuscarora in the East, and the tribes of Tecumseh's federation in the West, were heavily engaged throughout the War. Native warriors fought on both sides, but primarily for the British. They are essential figures to possess in order to game the Battle of Crysler's Farm, Queenston Heights, the Thames, and numerous smaller conflicts.

By 1812, aboriginal dress had incorporated a lot of European items, so figures from the French and Indian War are not quite right for the period. Crysler's Farm is a good example; during the winter, warriors were likely to be wearing wool coats or capots and stocking caps or head scarves rather than scalplocks and linen. Can you imagine being bare-chested in sub-freezing temperatures with nothing but a loincloth and leggings? (Can you imagine a gamer dressed like that? Now I've gone and lost my appetite!)

Knuckleduster has two packs of warriors; one dressed for summer, and one for winter, plus a pair of high-ranking leaders with large blankets and traditional gustoweh headdresses. Leggings and breechclouts are worn by all, but generally covered by a shirt or coat belted with a sash.

There are numerous excellent Native figures on the market, mostly of the "naked savage" variety which depict traditional summer dress, which is why I only make one figure in that idiom. The remainder of my figures make an attempt to show what they would have looked like in 1812.

Summer dress; only one "naked savage" in this group. Linen shirts and scalplock hairdress for summer. Bare heads were plucked, not shaved (sounds painful), and a small square patch of hair was left in the back of the crown, which was grown long and braided. A decorative "roach" was attached to the hair, composed of dyed porcupine quills, deer hair, and various feathers, creating a very personalized headdress. Mohaws did not have the "Mohawk" hair style we associate with them, and popularized in the movie, "Drums on the Mowhawk." Inspiration for that movie's hairdresser must have come from certain Plains Indian tribes, such as the Pawnee, who had bristling strips of hair on the top of their scalps. 

Cold weather dress; heavier shirts and coats are worn, as well as head scarves that cover their traditional hairstyles. Warpaint is very much in evidence, black and red being the most common colors.

It's difficult to do justice to all their wampum belts and other decorative fabrics. Sashes and belts were finely decorated, some with geometric designs and others with very sophisticated floral patterns woven into the cloth. Even loincloths (breechclouts) sported colorful stripes and geometric designs. As a result, they've been painted to give only an impression of these ornate designs.

 Scalplocks, hair roaches, and warpaint present a fierce appearance. 

For more information, take a look at Stuart Asquith's excellent book on War of 1812 Uniforms, as well as Renee Chartrand's book on the British and Canadian forces.

Forrest Harris
Knuckleduster

REMEMBER THE RIVER RAISIN!

The uniforms of the War of 1812 are varied and endlessly fascinating. One of the most unusual uniforms was worn by the Kentucky Volunteer Cavalry at the battle of the Thames in 1813.

This cavalry unit, which also included men from the area where the River Raisin massacre took place, was trained to fight mounted or dismounted in the wilderness, and were armed with a rifle, hatchet, and long knife.

During the battle of the Thames, Harrison used them to overrun the British 41st foot deployed in the woods on the American right. He commented that nobody could gallop through wooded terrain like American backwoodsmen, and the result of the charge, one of only two cavalry charges undertaken in the War of 1812, was a complete route of one of Britain's most heavily-engaged and well-regarded regiments in North America.

I finally painted a unit of these figures in their distinctive black hunting shirts with red fringe. Their gear was, in reality, probably black, but I chose buckskin belts to stand out against the black shirts, reasoning that it would not be uncommon to find natural colors of leather in use among troops such as these.

They are armed with the Model 1804 Harper's Ferry Rifle, the official rifled longarm of the US Army during the war. It was a half-stock weapon with no sling. I've thrown in a dragoon pistol, since they were ubiquitous among mounted troops of all types during the Napoleonic era.

"Ok you, hand over that bugle . . ."
  (I really need to glue the flag on one of these days!)

The command figures include a bugler and standard-bearer, and in a separate pack is their leader, Richard Mentor Johnson. I posed this figure to be reminiscent of an illustration depicting his supposed duel with Tecumseh, whose death many credited him after the battle (a fact trotted out when he ran for Congress after the war); after I painted my sample, I learned that his white horse was not the sentimental hyperbole I had supposed, and that he in fact rode a white horse into battle!

Forrest Harris
Knuckleduster.com

SHADES OF 1813; THE US ARMY'S TRANSITIONAL UNIFORM

One day in January, having realized my boyhood dream of being able to create a Napoleonic army out of thin air in an afternoon with a few spins of the centrifugal casting machine, I sat down to figure out what I would need to put on the battle of Crysler's Farm using my Knuckleduster figures. Turns out, I needed a new type of uniform for most of my American troops, and I hadn't yet sculpted it.

Knuckleduster's new 1813 figures painted as a variety of units.

So, as is my wont, I sculpted it! Now I have filled this gap in the product line, and a colorful gap it is.

My American troops at that time all fell into three basic types; 1812, 1814, and various militia. But none of these were quite right for 1813. Turns out, the American army throughout the 1813 campaign season (a third of the war), wore a hybrid of the 1812 and 1814 uniform. On paper, the US Army had an entirely new uniform in 1813; a plain coatee without much of the lace adorning earlier incarnations of the garment, and a durable, smart new leather shako. But as any student of military history can tell you, the dictates from on high do not always translate into changes in the field; at least not right away.

Brown coatees. These troops wear the M1813 shako with
the large, brass shako plate issued the first year this new
headgear was distributed.

The leather shako was delivered very quickly to the front lines, and most units had them in hand for the 1813 campaign season. The coats were another story; the old laced 1812 coatee continued to be worn by a substantial number of units, and because of shortages of blue dye, it was delivered to units in various shades of grey,"drab" (which could theoretically be dyed blue at a later time), brown, and black. According to Chartrand, the Army specified that, "the mixed color coatees and garments were to be cut as prescribed in the February 1812 regulations, with red collars and cuffs, and white lace binding."

Drab coatees, which could be dyed blue if the unit happened to
capture an indigo dye factory somewhere in the Canadian wilderness.

Chartrand put together a listing of what was issued during the winter of 1812-1813. There is no guarantee that these were the uniforms worn at Crysler's (not "Chrysler's") Farm, but it is a decent guess. The units wearing this old coat/new cap (as we know, a shako is a "cap" and a bicorne or tricorne is a "hat") configuration, were as follows (coat color follows listing):

LEATHER SHAKO, LACED 1812 COATEE
12th US: Drab, red facings
14th: Brown for some, Drab faced with Red for others.
21st: Blue, red facings
16th: Black, red facings

Black coatee (black is surprisingly difficult to photograph
so that it looks like black and not blue or grey!)

The 25th had the old felt shako and a blue coat faced with red (and with minimal lace). I have no information on the 13th or the 9th. Most would have black leather belting, however on the very dark uniforms, I have used white to make them stand out (for shame for shame). Also, apparently some units had black lace instead of white. If you'd like to track down that information, you are welcome to do so!

If you have corrections or additional information, please pass them along.

All the best,
Forrest Harris
Knuckleduster

Soure: A Most Warlike Appearance, Renee Chartrand, 2011

28MM MOUNTED COWBOYS III; THE TWO BILLIES

With all the sculpting I do, I don't have nearly as much time to paint as I would like, but I did manage to scrape together a few hours to paint samples of my third mounted cowboy pack, OW28-203, Curly Bill and Billy the Kid.

Now as we know from our history lessons, Billy the Kid was a tiny man with enormous teeth. He had three arms; one for shooting, one for drinking whisky, and one for in case something happened to the drinking arm. And as we all know, he was a stark raving mad, murderous lunatic. 

But my favorite part of Billy has got to be those teeth; you could pick corn through a picket fence with those incisors. He sports the hat and bulky cardigan featured in the only known photo of him. I've given him a Colt Peacemaker, in step with the times in which he roamed Arizona; cap-and-ball pistols were long gone by that time.

And then there was Bill Broscious, also known as "Curly Bill." He was portrayed vividly and, from what I've read, fairly accurately in the movie "Tombstone." He was charismatic and intelligent, but unpredictable and utterly without any moral sensibility whatsoever. His acts of violence were infused with a dark humor and a penchant for novelty that made them particularly disturbing, like a nineteenth-century version of a camp Batman villain. There is absolutely no evidence to support the red sash the cowboy faction wore in "Tombstone," however cowboys were right dandies at times, and sashes were not out of place, so I have given Curly one of his own.

Don't forget, these figures are made to match dismounted figures in the product line; in this case, figures from OW28-102, Cowboys. Along with OW201 and 202, the entire pack is available mounted.

Adios!

Forrest Harris

Knuckleduster

Wild Bill Hickok

Of all the western characters I've sculpted, I keep coming back to Wild Bill Hickok. I've sculpted him in three different scales. If you are an artist, perhaps you can see why; the windswept and interesting hair, the dramatic clothes, the unique face, and his uniquely Victorian notion of manhood, expressed plainly in everything from his posture to his dispassionate, but not unpleasant visage.

Here's my 40mm Wild Bill, seen from four angles.

This figure is from KOW48-012, Heroes I. The base is a simple metal washer, and the basing was done by sprinkling sand over white glue, and dry-brushing from medium brown to tan. A tuft of static grass is the one patch of weeds growing in Abilene's street at didn't managed to get eaten by a cow or trampled by a horse.

Wild Bill is interesting to paint because of his penchant for fancy duds. I set off his Prince Albert frock coat with a faint line of gray piping which is not actually sculpted onto the figure. In one famous photo he's shown with plaid trousers, which I did my best to paint (although I chose a slightly different plaid than the one in his photo). His hat is a popular style known at the time as the "Boss of the Plains," or "Boss of the Prairie." It features a low crown but a wide brim, and was usually tan, gray, or white. It pre-dates the Stetson.

His hair was auburn. I began with a dark brown undercoat, a burnt-sienna medium tone, and for highlights mixed burnt-sienna with yellow ochre.

Wild Bill's most famous post was Abilene, the summer of 1871. Cowtowns were dusty, except when they were muddy. His shoes, trousers, and the bottom edges of his coat were dry-brushed with a very faint mix of medium brown and yellow ochre to depict the  ever-present filth which was impossible to avoid, regardless of how dapper you tried to be.

His guns are nickel-plated Navy revolvers, with ivory grips. He fastidiously maintained these weapons, making sure they worked when called upon. I have fired a replica Colt's Navy 1851 revolver, the model he used, and I managed a misfire rate of about 50%! He took great pains to clean, shoot, clean again, and reload his pistols every morning to be sure the cap popped, the spark reached the chamber, and the powder ignited.

All the best,

Forrest

Knuckleduster Miniatures 

Piebald Horse and Rider

Howdy,

This here's what's called a Piebald horse. Piebald isn't a breed; it's any horse with black and white coloring. White with any other color is called a Skewbald (for instance, white and brown, or white and bay). In the Old West, your Piebalds would  likely be a quarter horse or Indian pony.

When painting horses, I'm careful not to leave the shadows too dark. I used to dry-brush my mid-tones directly over my dark undercoat, leaving all shadows the very darkest value. This approach worked just fine with bays, browns, or blacks, but not so well with white, palomino, or dappled greys. The extremely dark creases looked less like shadows and more like mistakes. 

This piebald has large white patches, to which I applied a grey first coat, being sure to completely paint over the underlying dark undercoat. Next, I painted a lighter shade of grey on all but the deepest recesses, and finished off with bright white on the higest spots.

The black part of the horse was done with a black undercoat and two shades of grey, the final shade being a mere dusting with a dry brush over the tips of the mane and tail. The hooves were done with two shades of a greenish-grey, starting with a fairly dark shade. Horseshoes were painted on because I'm using 40mm figures, and the figure wouldn't look finished without them.

The figure is from the pack KOW48M-031, Outlaw With Pistol. His matching dismounted pose is from KOW48-3, Outlaws (the raggety white edge is because I clipped him out of a photo with two other figures).

I gave him a striped vest. I like to add some kind of pattern to an item of clothing on every figure, even if it's only a bandanna. Many people can do this well on a 28mm figure; I just don't happen to be one of them. 40mm gives me a bit more elbow room. It's also fun to run a fine line around the edges of the fabric as if it were piped or trimmed out "extry fancy." 

His boots are called "Napoleon" boots, and are characterized by the high front peak and high heel, small in size and set back on the shoe fairly far. They were a popular style during and after the Civil War. The boots worn during the 1870's and 80's more closely resembled cavalry boots than what we call "cowboy boots" today.

Until next time,

Forrest Harris

Ol' Knuckleduster

Johnny Fandango

Howdy,

Here are a few photos of Johnny Fandango, a character I created from Knuckleduster's Outlaws packs (mounted and dismounted). He is meant to be a Texas outlaw of the sort that roamed the Southwest in the 1880's. There were many loosly-affiliated bands of outlaws who operated in West Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona during this period, rustling, robbing, and causing considerable mayhem. The "Cowboys" of Tombstone fame are typical of the breed.

This hobre features a really capital horse, and a fancy stitched coat. For the stitiching, I chose the "yellow rose of Texas" theme. The roses can be seen in various places on the coat (sorry about the photo quality--I'm still learning). He's toting a pair of Colt's cap and ball "Pocket Navies," which are quick to bring into action. 

The next photo shows another character I created with the same body, but a different head.

Adios!

Ol' Knuckleduster