Saturday, February 24, 2024

Armies in Boxes - Napoleonic Austrians

Whilst the Sengoku narrative is in the pipeline, and having done most of the 'finishing work' (flocking bases mainly) for my Napoleonic Austrians, methought it meet that (a) I house the troops properly and in a more accessible fashion, (b) take some pictures, and (c) fill the 'blank air' space with this posting. This is my Austrian Army for my projected - I was going to say 'planned', but that would be an exaggeration - War of the Nations.

In the following the figures and artillery are Minifigs except where otherwise stated. 

Minifigs: Horse, Foot and Guns.

I Army Corps:

  • Corps Commander with 1 figure
  • Staff/ Aide-de-camp with 1 figure
  • 3 Fusilier Divisions @ 24 figures = 72 figures (14,400)
  • 1 Jager Formation with 24 figures (4800)
  • 1 Light Horse (Uhlan) Brigade with 12 figures (2400)
  • Artillery Park of 2 pieces (64 cannon) and 8 figures (1600)
Total strength 118 figures (including command), 2 cannon (23,200 men and 64 cannon)





Hinchliffe Grenadiers (I think) but can't 
place the line infantry. The rest are Minifigs.
The extra guns (with limbers) belong to IV and V Corps
II (Hungarian) Army Corps:
  • Corps Commander with 1 figure
  • Staff/ Aide-de-camp with 1 figure
  • 1 Grenadier Division with 24 figures (4800) (Hinchliffe)
  • 2 Fusilier Divisions @ 24 figures = 48 figures (9600) (Provenance unknown)
  • 1 Semi-Regular Freikorps Formation with 18 figures (3600) (Minifigs)
  • 1 Light Horse (Hussar) Brigade with 12 figures (2400) (Minifigs)
  • Artillery Park of 2 pieces (64 cannon) and 8 figures (1600) (Minifigs)
Total strength 112 figures (including command), 2 cannon (22,000 men and 64 cannon)

All Minifigs

III Army Corps:
  • Corps Commander with 1 figure
  • Staff/ Aide-de-camp with 1 figure
  • 3 Fusilier Divisions @ 24 figures = 72 figures (14,400)
  • 1 Grenze Formation with 24 figures (4800)
  • 1 Light Horse (Hussar) Brigade with 16 figures (2400)
  • Artillery Park of 2 pieces (64 cannon) and 8 figures (1600)
Total strength 122 figures (including command), 2 cannon (24,000 men and 64 cannon)

IV and V Army Corps: 
As smaller formations, these have been accommodated in one tray, minus their cannon. All these were obtained long ago when one could eke out Minifigs figures reasonably cheaply with figures of other manufacture. I don't know all of these.

An eclectic collection of Warrior and (I think)
Hinton-Hunt knock-offs, and Italieri and HaT 
plastics. I don't know what manufacture is the 
line of metal chevauxlegers on the right
IV Army Corps:
  • Corps commander with 1 figure (Plastic - Italieri, I think)
  • Aide de camp/ Staff with 1 figure (Ditto)
  • 1 Grenadier Formation with 16 figures (3200) (Warrior)
  • 1 Fusilier Formation with 18 figures (3600) (Warrior)
  • 1 Fusilier Formation with 20 figures (4000) (Warrior)
  • 1 Grenzer Formation with 24 figures (4800) (HaT plastics)
  • 1 Chevauleger Brigade with 8 figures (1600) (Unknown, metals)
  • 1 Artillery Park with 1 piece (32 cannon) and 4 figures (800) (Minifigs)
Total strength: 92 figures including command, 1 cannon (18,000 men and 32 cannon)

The Warrior figures don't really 'go' with the Minifigs, being smaller, and stylistically different in appearance. But they do make a fine formation of their own. One problem with them, though, is that their muskets are very fragile.
V Army Corps:
  • Corps Commander with 1 figure (Plastic, probably Italieri)
  • Aide-de-camp/ Staff with 1 figure (Ditto)
  • 2 Fusilier Divisions @ 24 figures = 48 figures (9600) (Hinton-Hunt - mostly very badly pirated, bought cheap, but some work actually made them into vaguely presentable figures)
  • 1 Grenzer Formation with 24 figures (4800) (HaT plastics)
  • 1 Hussar Brigade with 16 figures (3200) (Italieri plastic)
  • Artillery Park with 1 piece (32 cannon) and 4 figures (800) (Minifigs)
Total Strength: 94 figures including command, 1 cannon (18,400 men and 32 cannon)

I admit to planning to retire the plastic Hessen-Homburg Hussars, replacing them with metal Hessen-Homberg Hussars, but, come the sticking point, didn't have the heart. There is no real point, I have decided, to replace the plastics with metals, as they are fairly compatible in appearance with the metal figures - 'Hinton Hunts' especially. So the metal Hussars were painted as other units. The same could be said of the plastic grenzers. As this box is pretty crowded, the IV and V Corps artillery parks are in the II Corps box.

I Reserve Corps:
  • Corps Commander with 1 figure
  • Aide-de-camp with 1 figure
  • 2 Grenadier Divisions @ 24 figures = 48 figures (9600)
  • 2 Cuirassier Brigades @ 12 figures = 24 figures (4800)
  • 1 Dragoon Brigade (attached) with 12 figures (2400)
  • 1 Chevauxleger Brigade (attached) with 12 figures (2400)
  • Artillery Park of 2 heavy pieces (64 cannon) and 8 figures (1600)
Total Strength: 106 figures including command, 2 cannon (20,800 men with 64 cannon)


The Dragoons and Chevauxlegers are not organic to this formation, but are liable to be attached to other Corps where they might have need for extra horsed troops. The grenadiers and cuirassiers are, as you can imagine, elite formations. In this box the Army Commander in Chief, Archduke Charles might be discernable on the left behind the guns. The guns themselves are scratch-builds, as I wanted a couple of 12pr pieces, which Minifigs don't do for Austrians. The guns themselves are metal, as are the wheels on one of the guns. The gun carriage itself is balsa wood, with a skewer or matchstick axle tree; the balance achieved by gluing a steel nut under the end of the trial to offset the weight of the metal gun.


Army totals: 
  • 14 Command and staffs
  • 112 Horse (22,400)
  • 480 Foot (96,000)
  • 40 Gunners (8000) with 10 guns (320 cannon)
  • 646 Total (126,400 with 320 cannon)
The cavalry are rather over-represented in this army, and the artillery rather under-represented. But I'm not too fussed. The cavalry are over-represented in my French and Prussian armies as well. I find that with some rule sets, the armies are rather dominated by artillery, if not in practical strength on the table, at least in numbers. If I have a quibble about the Age of Eagles rule set, it is in that regard. I prefer the artillery to have a powerful presence in themselves, but not in numbers such as to dominate the entire battlefield.  I have seen that happen! 

18 comments:

  1. D*mn you, Sir. You are tempting me into building a Napoleonic Austrian army. Admittedly it’s only likely in 2mm scale, but still…
    Cheers,
    Geoff

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. With such armies in 2mm, Geoff, you could do a whole campaign on your kitchen table! The white coats would help make the units stand out from the background terrain.
      Cheers,
      Ion

      Delete
  2. A splendid array of Austrians.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. My favourite Napoleonic Army, with the possible exception of the French!
      Cheers,
      Ion

      Delete
  3. Replies
    1. White is such a martial colour, is it not? The only colour to rival it for military appearance is red. Stand-out colours. The odd colourful unit, like the hussars and grenzers, add a counterpoint to the uniform overall white.
      Cheers,
      Ion

      Delete
  4. Lovely collection and I really enjoyed seeing them in their Corps, some great figures on show.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you, Donnie. There are prettier and bigger Austrians around, but I'm pretty happy with this lot. And the stately Minifigs figures are my favourites for a number of reasons.
      Cheers,
      Ion

      Delete
  5. Great to see the whole Austrian force arrayed like that, which is very impressive to see.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Steve -
      I didn't really plan on building an Austrian army quite so large, but now that I have, it, along with the much less numerous Prussian and Russian Allies, I have a formidable force for my French to tangle with. My French army is bigger than my Austrian, but not by very much!
      Cheers,
      Ion

      Delete
  6. Good Lord! Are you sure you have enough Austrians there? I think you've got more in 20mm than I have in 6mm! What an impressive collection.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Martin -
      Yeah - I reckon I have enough for my purposes. Just...
      But I know of at least one collection far larger than mine (all 28mm plastics, and some of which featured in a recent club game:
      https://archdukepiccolo.blogspot.com/2024/01/hot-action-at-woolston-club.html). That game featured some of my French.

      My original plan was to create 4 Army Corps plus a Cavalry Corps - rather in the manner suggested by Paddy Griffith in his 'Napoleonic Wargaming for Fun' book. It all got slightly changed over time.
      Cheers,
      Ion

      Delete
  7. Archduke Piccolo,

    That is quite some collection and I am truly envious.

    All the best,

    Bob

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Bob -
      I was pretty impressed with the way you organised your own Napoleonics, with similar army- or theatre-level operations in mind.

      Of course, like you, I have retained the flexibility to use these forces for Portable Wargames and Map Games.
      Cheers,
      Ion

      Delete
  8. Wow! Magnificent collection! How long did it take you to complete it?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Decades, Mark: decades! I think I started this army in about 1980. For a long time it was based on III Corps in the 1809 campaign, with 27-figure infantry units. In a 1990 campaign it still comprised only 160-odd figures. At some point about 20-30 years ago I bought the Warrior and Freikorps/ Hinton Hunt figures to eke out the numbers. I think the last figures I bought were the Minifigs Hungarian figures that I painted up as Grenzers, some artillery and the big Hussar unit. That would have been a year or two ago.

      Now I regard this army as complete. Just by the way, because my Russians (bought second hand) are a different make, I bought a unit last year of Perry uhlans to add some light horse. Although plastic, the style goes fairly well with the rest of the army. This army is a deal smaller than the Austrian. More of them later on.
      Cheers,
      Ion

      Delete
  9. You can't beat a bit of logistics. Well done on organising it! It's not enough to have the toy soldiers, one also has to be able to get at them.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Conrad:
      Yeah, now that you mention it! I've been having problems in that regard, especially as, dilettante that I am, I have so many projects ongoing, and wondering why the motivation is wanting. Access is the key. But I'm working on it.

      I've just the ack emma hoiked out my unpainted unorganised 30YW stuff - didn't realise how much I HADN'T done, considering the Imperialists were near-on complete. Access - sitting in chocolate boxes, almost - but not quite - forgotten.

      See next posting...
      Cheers,
      Ion

      Delete