The Boxer Rebellion Project, Part 10: Generic 8 Nations Field Forces of General Gaselee's Relief Force

For my first 8 Nations Alliance Field Force to use with The Men Who Would be Kings, I'm focusing on General Sir Alfred Gaselee, GCB, GCIE, second relief expedition. Why? All of the 8 Nations Alliance forces provide variety and color, but I choose this because I already had some figures for the force though I painted some more to add the color and historical makeup of the Alliance.

In the summer of 1900, when the Boxer Uprising in China was at its height, Gaselee was chosen to command the British element in the international expeditionary force, and on 3 July 1900 promoted to major-general. Gaselee was nominally put in charge of the Second Expedition because the Eight-Nation Alliance refused to the allow the Japanese general Yamaguchi Motomi to lead it, even though he was the highest-ranking officer present. As a reward for his services, he was created Knight Grand Commander of the Order of the Indian Empire (GCIE) on 24 July 1901.

Here are some of my "generic Field Forces" I'm going to use first with a 24 point limit: 

1. Japanese Infantry Unit.

    Regular Infantry: 6 points.

    

    Total: 6 points.

The Japanese had the largest contribution to the 8 Nations Alliance; plus the new Crusader Miniatures look cool.

2. Indian Infantry Unit.

    Regular Infantry: 6 points.

    Total: 6 points.

The British were strapped for manpower with the Boer War. Most of the British troops came from India including the 1st Indian Brigade which consisted of the 1st Sikh Infantry Punjab Frontier Force, 24th Punjab Infantry, and the 7th Rajput Infantry. 

3. Austrian-Hungarian Naval Brigade.

    Regular Infantry: 6 points.

    Total: 6 points.

Come on! You knew von Trapp and company would be included!

Gun and crew from Tsuba Miniatures.

4. Russian Artillery.

    Well Drilled Crew: 6 points.

    Total: 6 points.

The above is actually an Imperial Russian Putilov M1902 76mm quick firing gun which was first used in the Russo-Japanese War in 1905. Close enough for now until I get an older gun.

Total points: 24.

Or . . . 

1. Japanese Infantry Unit.

    Regular Infantry: 6 points.

    

    Total: 6 points.

Figures from Copplestone Castings.

2. Russian Infantry Unit.

    Regular Infantry: 6 points.

    Poor Shots: -1 point. Russian firing doctrine emphasized volley fire and not individual marksmanship.

    Unenthusiastic: -1 point. Infantry were conscripts from the East Siberian Regiment and were not quite up to Western (and Japanese) standards.

    Total: 4 points.

The above is my version of the The Izmaylovsky Lifeguards Regiment circa 1905. Evantually I will get some earlier Russian infantry for the Boxer Rebellion.

3. Austrian-Hungarian Naval Brigade.

    Regular Infantry: 6 points.

    Total: 6 points.

4. 1st Bengal Lancers.

    Regular Cavalry: 6 points.

    Lancers: +2 points.

Total: 8 points.

The 8 Nations Alliance did not have a lot of cavalry and the 1st Bengal Lancers did yeoman service. The above are Perry Miniatures painted as the The 10th (The Duke of Cambridge's) Bengal Lancers (Hodson's Horse) and they will do the trick.

Total points: 24.

So far that's what I'm doing though eventually I will have some troops for Admiral Seymour's relief attempt, the follow-up expeditions after Peking was captured, and the Legation defense.

The Boxer Rebellion Project, Part 9: 1st Sikh Regiment, Punjab Frontier Force

The former 1st Sikhs, Punjab Frontier Force in 1905. They were redesignated the 51st Sikhs (Frontier Force) in 1903. Note the different ethnic groups by turban; the name of a regiment was the recruiting area (usually) and did not designate the ethnicity of the unit. Ethnicity was usually by company to facilitate logistically the food rations.

I received a three way bonus with this unit! 

1. They fought in the Northwest Frontier Uprisings of 1897 to 1898 - a conflict I already game.

2. They fought in the Boxer Rebellion.

3. The unit has a piper (HUZZAH!).

1st Sikhs, Punjab Frontier Force. Figures by Perry Miniatures.

I'll be the first to admit, this unit (except for the piper) was a rush job. I painted them quickly so I could move onto the Chinese Imperial Army figures I recently purchased from Wargames Foundry. In reviewing the pictures, and as I was painting, I realized that I would need to go back a few touch ups and highlighting to bring them up to my (ahem) gaming distance standards. I love the size of 12 figure Regular Infantry for The Men Who Would be Kings; the game rules I pretty much use exclusively for my Colonial gaming.

British and Sikh officer.

The regiment was raised on 10 December 1846 at Hoshiarpur as the 1st Regiment of Infantry, The Frontier Brigade by Major JS Hodgson. It was composed of Sikhs, Punjabi Muslims, Pathans and Dogras, mostly recruited from the disbanded regiments of the Sikh Empire following the First Anglo-Sikh War. In 1847, it was designated 1st Regiment of Sikh Local Infantry, becoming the 1st Regiment of Sikh Infantry in 1857. 

Havildars (Sergeants) to steady the line.

I need to repaint the chevrons.

In 1851, the regiment became part of the Punjab Irregular Force, which later became famous as the Punjab Frontier Force (PFF) or The Piffers. The Piffers consisted of five regiments of cavalry, eleven regiments of infantry and five batteries of artillery besides the Corps of Guides. Their mission was to maintain order on the Punjab Frontier; a task they performed with great aplomb. The 1st Sikh Infantry took part in numerous frontier operations besides the Second Sikh War of 1848–49 and the Great Indian Mutiny of 1857–58, when it fought in Rohilkhand and Oudh in North India. During the Second Afghan War of 1878–80, the regiment took part in the capture of Ali Masjid and the advance to Jalalabad. It also performed operations during the NW Frontier uprising in 1897-1898. In 1900, it went to China to suppress the Boxer Rebellion.

Piper Khan.

The British (you know I mean the Scottish Regiments!) used bagpipes in their army bands and  introduced the instrument to India in the 19th century. The Indian military style of bagpipe-playing, which is sonorous and set to Scottish tunes, draws directly from this tradition.

"Frontier Force". Left to right: 59th Scinde Rifles, Piper of 51st Sikhs (1st Sikhs of our period) and 56th Punjabi Rifles. Watercolour by Major AC Lovett, 1910. Even though the bagpipe illustrated is green, I decided to give mine a tartan pattern.

Bugler. Yep, I need to clean up the figures a bit.

When the Boxer Rebellion broke out in 1900, the British, as part of the 8 Nations Alliance, was hard pressed to provide troops as it was heavily committed to the Boer War in South Africa. As a result, the overwhelming majority of troops came from the Indian Army, including the 1st Sikhs, PFF. On the tabletop, the Khaki uniforms will look great alongside the blue of Japan, the white of sailors, US Marines and US Army, etc.

Sepoys.

"Looking a bit sloppy Major!"

The above officer figure will be perfect for The Men Who Would be Kings. Leadership and Leadership Traits are rolled for each officer and if the Leadership Traits "Drunkard" or "The gentleman has a bottle" is rolled, this will be the officer figure used as a reminder. Believe it or not, he is holding a canteen which definitely needs to be repainted! Not only that, I forgot to paint his mustache. Quite.

 

The Boxer Rebellion Project, Part 8: A Generic Imperial Chinese Field Force

 Now that I have more than a start on the 8 Nations Alliance for the Boxer Rebellion, it's time to turn my attention to the Imperial Chinese Army and the Boxers. I'm a great fan of The Men Who Would be Kings which is my kind of Colonial Colonial Gaming. In researching my army, I'm also going to give a nod to making the Field Force as colorful and with as many flags as possible. My army will be semi-historical with an eye to gaming and having fun.

Right now I'm focusing on forces during the Second Relief Force when the 8 Nations Alliance forces under Lt. General Sir Alfred Gaselee marched on Peking to relieve the Internation Legaitions. Once the Taku Forts were taken, the Imperial Chinese, which had forces actively fighting the Boxers, viewed the action as a declaration of war and the Boxers started to take a back seat to the Imperial Army. But hey, we are going to have lots of Boxers for the Imperial Chinese commander as cannon fodder, um, ahem, as loyal citizens helping the Qing Dynasty.

A nice photo from the National Army Museum in the UK picturing Manchu hat wearing Imperial infantry.

Imperial Chinese Infantry Unit #1 (they'll get names later) from Wargames Foundry's the Taiping Rebellion in China 1851-66 range sculpted by Michael and Alan Perry.

1. Chinese Imperial Infantry Unit.

    Irregular Infantry: 4 points.

    Poor Shots: - 1 point.

    Total: 3 points.

I've been looking at uniform references for my Manchu hat wearing infantry and I'm leaning toward painting the unit as one of the two above.

Chinese Ever Victorious Army from the Taiping Rebellion range that will be later Chinese Imperial Infantry. The figures from the range make great proxies for the Boxer Rebellion in 28mm.

2. Chinese Imperial Infantry Unit.

    Irregular Infantry: 4 points.

    Poor Shots: - 1 point.

    Total: 3 points.

I wanted one unit with Manchu hats and one with turbans. My unit with turbans will have a dark blue uniform with black turbans.

3. Chinese Imperial Infantry Unit: The Kansu Braves. How can you not have a Chinese army without the Kansu Braves!

    Irregular Infantry: 4 points.

    Poor Shots: - 1 point.

    Veteran: +1 point.

I'm going to use the Kansu Braves from Crusader Miniatures - pictures from Crusader Miniatures website.

I gave the Kansu Braves veteran status as they had pretty good staying power during the Boxer Rebellion.

4. Chinese Boxers x 2.

    Tribal Infantry: 3 points.

    Fierce: 1 point.

    Total: 4 points.

My Boxers will be hard plastics from Wargames Atlantic with a few metal figures thrown in.

Photo from the Wargames Atlantic Website.

5. Imperial Chinese Artillery.

    Well drilled: 6 points.

    Total: 6 points.

Figures again from Wargames foundry and the man in charge of the gun is going to wear his fancy armor!

Looks like some of the artillery was at least average in performance though further research is warranted. I'll probably paint them in the famous, classic uniform from the cigar box cards.

To recap my generic Imperial Chinese Field Force for The Men Who Would be Kings:

1. Chinese Imperial Infantry Unit # 1 (Irregular Infantry, Poor Shots): 3 points.

2. Chinese Imperial Infantry Unit #2 (Irregular Infantry, Poor Shots): 3 points.

3. Kansu Braves (Irregular Infantry, Poor Shots, Veterans): 4 points.

4. Boxer Unit #1 (Tribal Infantry, Fierce): 4 points.

5. Boxer Unit #2 (Tribal Infantry, Fierce): 4 points.

6. Chinese Artillery (Well Drilled): 6 points.

Total: 24 points.

72 figures and 1 gun.

    

The Boxer Rebellion Project, Part 7: We Need a Flag?

Hey! I made another flag. Yeah . . . about that.

I used the same technique that I did with the Austro-Hungarian Naval Ensign. I was, how would you say, sloppy on this flag. First of all, with the black fringe seen in many contemporary paintings it initially made the red on the flag look darker. Hey I will just lighten up the red! Ooops, I spilled the white paint.

Oh well, I guess it won't look too bad at gaming distance. Then I carefully folded the flag together with some white glue and yep, I forgot to pre-fold the flag before the glue. It did not match up at all. After some serious folding, and repainting the edge and trying to get the creases out . . . well you can see the result.

Then: Surprise! When I went to glue the wire staff to the figure I had forgotten to check the fit before I added the super glue. Of course I got super glue on my fingers and messed up the staff under the flag with super glue. That's what I get for not taking a deep breath and giving a day.

"Look Mom! No hands!"

Okay. Maybe I'll pretend it is battle damage. I paint for gaming distance, and at gaming distance it doesn't look too bad. I'll have to decide later if I'll use one of the excellent flags from Flags of War and get a staff from Tsuba Miniatures. Plus I'll file the palms of the hand!

Group shot! It doesn't look too bad at gaming distance.

 

The Boxer Rebellion Project, Part 7: The Austrian-Hungarian Naval Ground Contingent

 So why do the smallest contingent of the 8 Nations Alliance? I blame the von Trapp Family Singers.

As regular readers of my blog know, while recovering from foot surgery (hmmm . . . how long was I in the infantry?) I watched the movie The von Trapp Family: A Life of Music based on Agathe von Trapp's memoir (the oldest daughter), Memories Before and After The Sound of Music. Researching Captain von Trapp's military career I discovered: HOLY COW!!! HE WAS DECORATED FOR BRAVERY AS A NAVAL CADET DURING THE BOXER REBELLION! Thus a project was born.

The complete, 12 figure unit to use with The Men Who Would be Kings.

The figures are from Copplestone Castings Back of Beyond range and are Russian Naval Command and Russian Navy Sailors.  During this time, depending on the area and the region of service, many naval uniforms were similar and at the 28 mm scale the differences are so minor that it does not even matter. For example, you can use British Naval Brigade with Sennet hats for French Navy during the Seymour Expedition as that is what the French sailors wore. For the Legation defense, specifically the Peitang Cathedral, the French Sailors had the hat (I'll have to look up what it is really called) with the pom-pom on top.

Seekadet Georg Johannes von Trapp (accidentally painted as a Korvettenleutnant - the stripe around the cuffs should end at the loop for Seekadet), Matrose (Seaman) Antoine Antumac and Waffenmatrose Ernest Grbac.

Anyway . . . another reason I did the Austro-Hungarian Naval contingent was because of variety - you have to love having white figures in your force. My initial Field Force for the 8 Nation Alliance will be a generic for with units that will add variety and color to the tabletop.

Quartermaster Carl Raschka.

Seventy-five members of the crew of the SMS Zenta were attached to the Peking Relief Expedition. Later they would be joined by 160 sailors from two other Austro-Hungarian ships. In addition, before hostilities commenced, the captain of the Zenta, Fregattenkapitän (Commander) Eduard Thomann von Montalmar, one officer, 2 cadets and 30 sailors went to help reinforce the Legation Quarter. As the senior allied officer von Montalmar was placed in command. Now we have controversy - either through bad intelligence, a lack of good judgement or cowardice, depending on the source, von Montalmar had all forces fall back on the British Legation which allowed many Legation buildings to be burned and parts of the Legation Quarter to be seized. A counterattack restored the perimeter. He was relived of command. On July 8, 1900, he was mortally wounded by a grenade; some accounts state he recklessly exposed himself in combat to make up for the blow to his honor.

Matrose Joseph Basurina, the photo bomb known as Waffenmatrose Grbac and Matrose Nicolas Hranuelli.

The most famous action of the sailors was the storming of the Taku forts by naval personnel of the Zenta and German marines.

"The Capture of the Forts at Taku", by Fritz Neumann in the Anne S.K. Brown Military Collection, Brown University.

The figures were a blast to paint - nicely sculpted figures make the painting easy! Copplestone is one of my favorites and the figures were a joy to paint. Uniforms that are primarily white can always be a challenge. I primed them with Citadel Wraithbone Grey and then did the highlights of the white uniforms with Vallejo Flat White once or twice. Not bad for a quick and easy paintjob and it follows The Colonel's rule Number 1 of painting: Paint for gaming distance (unless you just have to paint a masterpiece of a special figure).

Matrose's Mathieu Simcic, Joseph Bozikoo and Yure Petrovac.

The valiant crew of the SMS Zenta.

The Boxer Rebellion Project, Part 6: We Need a Flag!

Naval Ensign of the Austrian-Hungarian Navy

I love flags! If I can get them on the Dining Room table (whether they were actually carried or not) I will get them on the table. Fortunately we have evidence that the Naval Ensign (flag) of the Austro-Hungarian ground contingent was carried by the sailors of the SMS Zenta and came from the ship. 

During its existence, Austria-Hungary did not have a common flag – a "national flag" could not exist since the Dual Monarchy consisted of two sovereign states. Until 1918, the War Fleet continued to carry the Austrian ensign it had used since 1786.

Naval ensign 1786–1918.

SMS Zenta in the Boxer Rebellion.

Instead of purchasing a commercial flag, this flag seemed easy to reproduce and paint. I wish I had taken pictures of what I did but I will try to summarize:

1. I used the image above as a guide and grabbed my handy-dandy rule and made a tricolor with an artists graphite pencil on regular printer paper. I did the right side of the flag first and then the left side with a small separation between them for the pole.

2. I sketched out the shield and crown sightly darker with my pencil

3. I mixed about 2/3 Vallejo Flat Red with 1/3 Vallejo Flat White and painted the red portions of the flag. As expected, I could see some of the crown through the paint of the upper portion of the flag.

4. I then used Citadel Yellow for the crown.

5. I went back to the red portions of the flag and painted them again (carefully) with Citadel Contrast Blood Angels Red.

6. After the contrast paint dried, I went back and cleaned up the crowns with the yellow and then added some red dots on the crown.

Note: I made the flag smaller than in real life.

7. Ta-Dah!