My (Semi) Historical Late 19th Century Indian Army (Part Four)

 

"True to his salt."

The Corps of Guides was raised at Peshawar on 14 December 1846 by Lieutenant Harry Burnett Lumsden on the orders of Sir Henry Lawrence, the British Resident at Lahore, capital of the Sikh Empire. Initially composed of a troop of cavalry and two companies of infantry mounted on camels, the Guides were organized as a highly mobile force. The corps was ordered to recruit: 

" . . . trustworthy men, who could, at a moment's notice, act as guides to troops in the field; men capable, too, of collecting trustworthy intelligence beyond, as well as within, our borders; and, in addition to all this, men, ready to give and take hard blows, whether on the frontier or in a wider field."

The Queens Own Guides, Infantry, Punjab Frontier Force was my next infantry addition to my British Indian Army that I game using the rules The Men Who Would be Kings. The figures are all by Artizan Designs and this unit was the first unit that I tried to use mostly Games Workshops Contrast Paints. Contrast Paints are not for everyone; you have to paint faster than I am used to doing. Also, the recommended time for drying is 30 minutes before using another color.

There are many tutorials on YouTube and I have discovered, within reason (mine that is) that there are some advantages to using Contrast Paints when you are used to a different style of painting.  In addition, the Contrast Paints cost more and I noticed that you tend to use quite a lot! Still, I am happy with the results for my Guides. The Guides were perfect as they are primarily khaki with various browns. Here are the paints I used:

Uniform and Pagri (turban): Contrast Skeleton Horde (BWAH HAH HAH!).

Kulla (the pointed skull cap): Vallejo Flat Red. I painted the tip Vallejo Gold for the tip to denote the officers.

Poshteen: Contrast Nazdreg Yellow.

Fur Trim on Poshteen and boots:  Contrast Cygor Brown.

Skin: Contrast Snake Bite Leather. By varying the amount of the paint on the brush you can make the skin lighter or darker.

Webbing: Contrast Gore Grunta Fur. I have recently discovered that a Gore Grunta is a large Ork War Boar.

Haversack and Puttees: I painted Vallejo Ochre Green over the Contrast Skeleton Horde  (BWAH HAH HAH!).

Rifle: Wood Vallejo Mahogany Brown. The metal parts are Vallejo Gun Metal dry brushed with Vallejo Silver.

Bayonet Scabbard and Hair: Contrast Chaos Black.

Jemadar (Captain). Note the gold tip on his red kulla which denotes commissioned rank. He would also have his rank insignia on his shoulder epaulets but these are hidden by the poshteen.

Next unit up for my Indian Army for The Men Who Would be Kings is the 20th (Duke of Cambridge's Own) (Punjab) Regiment of Bengal Native Infantry with all figures from Artizan Designs (UK/EU link and US Link). I feel I have my "speed painting" method down using GW Skeleton Horde Contrast for the khaki uniforms. As you can see above, for this unit I went with the alternative basing of "3", "2", "1". Of course they can be used for other popular Colonial rules.

One of my favorite figures from the Artizan Designs 2nd Afghan War range.

There were two reasons I choose to paint this unit: (1) They played a significant role during the Frontier Uprisings of '97 - '98 and (2) they have green kullas on their turbans to add color to the waves of khaki.

After my first game of The Men Who Would be Kings, it became apparent to me that it was time to paint the Indian Army Maxim Gun based on the devastating performance of the Imperial Russian machine gun. Not only did the Russian Maxim perform historically, it was extremely effective due to its high rate of fire of causing casualties amongst infantry that had cover bonuses from Hard Terrain. Yikes! I decided to paint them as a detachment from the 20th Punjabis.

"Whatever happens, we have got The Maxim gun, and they have not." - Hilaire Belloc in the words of the figure "Blood" in his poem "The Modern Traveler".

My Indian Army Maxim machine gun is another blister pack from Copplestone Castings' Back of Beyond Range. In fact, the pack comes with two machine guns: one Sikh and one Indian Muslim. When purchasing, since I live in the USA, my go to for Copplestone is either eBay or Brigade Miniatures (no Lon Weiss did not pay me to write that!). If you are in the States, Brigade Miniatures has inexpensive and fast shipping - I highly recommend the store.

That's my Indian Army for now. In the future I plan to add the Gordon Highlanders, a Sikh unit, a Ghurka unit, a regular British Infantry unit and some Mountain Artillery.