JTinQT - Week Nine - More VBCW Government Forces - The DFF's

Hi All

Few more government forces in VBCW genre and pleased to get on to a unit I knew I definitely wanted to field, although militarily they had a terrible record. The "DFF's" or Damm Fine Fellows! This was also a play on the initials of the unit commander Dominic Farrar-Foxley, old Etonian, City of London banker and socialite with royal family links. A brilliant publicist Farrar-Foxley made sure that the unit had plenty of newspaper coverage where they were often referred to with the other nickname of "The Chaps".

Here are the first six figures, from Footsore with an additional very old Western "Doc Holiday" gunfighter figure from somewhere, anyway he had the appropriate head ware!

    The Footsore figures represent the unit at the start of the conflict in civvies dress, although with his royal influence Farrar-Foxley was able to gain access to army equipment very quickly and later they adopted a more quasi army look. However the suits were typically from Marks and Spencer and very hard wearing so remained popular as a uniform throughout. I included the Footsore fictional "Bertie Wooster" figure with a few small adjustments and painted to fit in with the overall DFF unit look.

As mentioned the DFF's did have a terrible and incompetent military record. This is typified by the units destruction, hit in a friendly fire incident from its own mortar section during the Wimbledon Common skirmish. Still great to see more modern revisionist accounts stressing the value the unit had as a symbol of conservative English fightback.

Hopefully more to come next week .........

All the best Jez

AdamC: USS Chesapeake

Here is the USS Chesapeake one of the first US Navy ships built in what would become the Norfolk Navy Yard (called Gossport at the time). Originally she was planned as a 44 gun frigate at Washington’s requests (he wanted one of the big ships built in Virginia) budget and supply issues had her rerated as a 38 gun frigate.

 

Sometimes Chesapeake was rated as a 36 gun frigate and seems to have been the smallest of the original Six frigates.

Her stern is quite handsome.  Chesapeake had one capture in the Quasi-war taking the Le Jeune Creole (16 guns) after a chasse lasing 50 hours!  That was probably both epic and boring.

The huge eagle of figure head is also quite striking she makes a beautiful ship. Chesapeake active during the Barbary war but is most famous for her actions relating to the War of 1812. She had the misfortune to be involved on the receiving end of the Chesapeake-Leopard affair taking fire unawares from a British 4th Rate and then submitting to having her crew mustered as if she were a British merchant. 

Chesapeake made a cruise in 1812 but only captured some 5 British merchants and she did not have any opportunity to engage a ship of equal force. In 1813 she sailed out of Boston under the command of Captain Lawrence to challenge the HMS Shannon to combat. Lawrence had every opportunity to avoid combat and slip away as a raider but chose not to.

He also refused to maneuver for advantage while closing with the Shannon and chose to fight Nelson's in Nelson's fashion and "Lay your ship close alongside the enemy." As everyone knows the Shannon won the battle (though not without some hard knocks) and Lawrence expired with the words "Don't give up the ship." He uttered these words as the ship was being given up and I have always been puzzled by hero worship that Surrounds Lawrence. He is of the Heroic captains you can take in Black seas but Isaac Hull and others who won battles are ignored. English writers probably like him because he was brave and got defeated in a satisfactory manner.

From SanderS: Calling a Balloon to Fran's Ford! (5 points)

Hoi,

In my Quest to complete the Challenge Island tour, I now need another Balloon trip to Fran's Ford.

Since a female figure is needed to pay for this trip (not my most PC remarks ever I know), I have finally found time to paint Footsore Miniatures brilliant Guinevere figure.

I am very happy with my colourscheme and the execution except for the shield design, I might re-paint that somewhere in the future.


This very nice figure allows me to add another 5 points to the tally as well as going to Fran's Ford. Now on to look for some 15mm figures among the unpainted lead pile.

From Curt: Siege of Malta, 1565 - Barbary Corsair Spearmen and a Archer Command Stand

Switching tack from the Grim Dark Future to the sun-kissed Middle Sea, I thought I'd finish off a few more figures for my 1565 Malta project which have been sitting half done since the winter Challenge.

Here are half a dozen spearmen to add to Turgut Reis' slowly growing contingent of fierce Barbary corsairs.

These are from Footsore Miniatures' excellent Caliphate range. Similar to my other efforts, I've had fun using a lot of colour with these guys. I may get another pack later to bulk-up the unit, but this group will stand as a good start.

The full unit of spearmen.

I also did up a command stand for one of my corsair archer units which was bereft of one. 

The piper and standard bearer are from Brigade Games, while the leader is a Footsore model. I did a small modification to have him holding a crossbow along with a small targe, just to make him a little more distinct from his bow-armed comrades. 

The archers with their new leader.

At first I just had the three figures on the base, but for a bit of additional colour, I decided to give them a banner as well (I figure you can't have enough flags on the tabletop).

These 9 models will give me another 45 points, for a grand total of 135.

Thanks for popping in for a visit!

-Curt

From NoelW: Post 1: Zulus, crusaders, civvies and Frank

So here we go again!

As the idea for this Challenge is to finish hobby projects, Curt’s ruling that we can submit figures that have already been started is great for me, as much of my lead pile is half-finished. I’ve this horrible habit of priming new figures, painting their flesh and a colour or two, then putting them in a drawer and moving on to another shiny prospect. As a result, I’ve probably hundreds of figures begun but sadly languishing, which couldn’t be used in the Painting Challenge. So I’m going to use this opportunity to complete some of these guilty secrets.

However, that also feels a bit like cheating. Some of the languishing figures only need shields, so they'll only take a couple of hours. In fact, I could probably spend the whole Quarantine Challenge just doing such things. But that feels like setting the bar too low. Curt, in his (what-might-perhaps-be-called-by-some,-especially-Curt), "infinite wisdom" suggested that I should set myself a personal challenge to make Quarantine more interesting for me and my posts potentially more interesting for you. What a sensible guy!

So I thought again about returning to Challenge Island, and travelling it for a third time, but there are four or five locations that I’d find very difficult to complete a third time, and several of them would shift me a long way from my work in progress, so that feels overall too much like hard work. So I thought again about returning to Challenge Island.

Instead I’ve decided on my own “Challenge Island”: a series of tasks that have to be executed by June 20th. My plan is not as interesting as Curt’s, but, as Curt’s did, it will both challenge and motivate me. It consists of one “location” for each of the projects I’d like to see progress. And, as with that fabulous Island now of legendary status alongside Ultima Thule and Atlantis, I aim to visit each location twice. 

When I listed them, I found I'd quite a lot of projects. What a surprise! 23, in fact. So my personal Quarantine Challenge is now to complete (at least) one “new” and one “old” task for one or more of these projects each week. And, as the Challenge lasts 12 weeks, and I'm challenging myself to complete 46 tasks altogether, that means ideally 4 tasks a week, leaving a couple to spare. An "old" task is one that I’ve already started, but never completed. A "new" task is one that has gone no further than the preparation stage, i.e. it follows the same rules as for the Painting Challenge.  I’ll aim to have both a new and an old task completed each week of the Challenge, at the very least, though not necessarily both from the same project. Ideally there'll be two of each, each week. Exceptionally, perhaps, more.

In this way, I hope that the variety will, like the Squirrel side challenge in Challenge IX, and Challenge Island in Challenge X, keep me on my toes and lead to at least some of the posts that will interest you. Most of the tasks have to be small, of course, just a few figures here and there, but in some cases I've quite a few figures just waiting for relatively simple work.

Some of the new tasks will also fit a couple of the side challenges: Benito’s “Infamy! Infamy!” ancients challenge and StuartL’s “Bolt Action Brush Battle” (is that happening, Stuart?). For these, of course, I’ll only be submitting new tasks, I’ve minis currently unbegun.

So here are my two old tasks for this week. Firstly, Frankie goes to Frostgrave:

He's a Wargames Foundry figure, whom I began for Challenge IX, but didn't quite finish. Now he's done:

He's intended for general fantasy use, though he's most likely to appear first in Frostgrave.

And here are three civilians for him to irritate, though I intend them for my Walmington-on-Sea/Sealion project.

These are Footsore Miniatures, from their inter-war VBCW range. I'd progressed these quite far during Challenge X, but failed to highlight, base, varnish etc  And the little girl doing her "we're off to see the wizard" act, I found particularly hard to get right, as her expression is quite peculiar. I repainted aspects of her three times before deciding enough was enough. I think she's probably simply possessed.

For my "new" work, here's six Natal Native Infantry for the Zulu Wars. Perry Figures, relatively simple painting, apart from shields with a life of their own. 

My main projects here are, of course, Isandlwana and Rorke's Drift. One of the things that interests me is the "what if"s of these battles. What if Chelmsford hadn't split his force, for example, or had returned to Isandlwana before the zulus had overrun the field?

And finally a command base for the Crusades. I'm sticking with my desire to create as many vignettes/command bases as I can, to enhance my battlefields because I love to see them, even if they have no game function, and they potentially make more interesting viewing for you, too.

They are manufactured by Crusader Miniatures but, perversely, are not intended for the Crusades but the Reconquista, being Pedro Bermudez and King Alfonso from their El Cid range. I'm using them as "generic" Frankish/Crusader leaders, so have not painted any particular livery and the flag, which is currently a Templar one (hand painted) is detachable, so I can have a range of different commanders. (I've documented the detachable flag mechanism in a previous challenge.)

I'm rather pleased with these figures, but I have to acknowledge the influence of DarellH's Reconquista project in Challenge X. Whilst I'm not able to replicate the stunning quality of his figures, I was definitely painting with them in mind, and consequently very happy with the results. Thanks, Darell.

So what are my 23 projects, I don’t hear you cry? Here you go, you not very curious people, you:

Project	New Task	‘Points’	Old Task	‘Points’
Agincourt
AWI
Black Seas (1/700th)
British in Egypt: 1801
Cape Wars
Carthaginians
Crusades	Command group	20
ECW
French in Egypt: 1801
Frostgrave/fantasy			Frankie	5
Italian Wars
Lord of the Rings
Minden (15mm)
Ottoman
Peninsular War
Republican Romans
Sikh/Afghan Wars
1860s British IF
1880s, the Sudan
Walmington/Sealion			Civvies	15
Waterloo
WW2 Desert
Zulu War	NNI	30

I'll update that table each week, as I'm going to keep a note of the notional points for my own gratification. I'm going to guess that most tasks will probably be under 50 points, so my target would be 2400 for the 12 weeks, 1200 each for "old" and "new" tasks. As always, I'd hope to exceed this, but we'll see. Only 70 pts this week, so already I'm slipping!

BTW: if anyone wants to adopt a similar approach so we can compare notes, it might be an interesting exercise. On the other hand, most people have more worthwhile things to do with their time!