Retreat From Moscow

A trio of cavalry from the Grande Armee. A very characterful set of figures from the Perry’s Retreat from Moscow range, comprising of a Polish Lancer of the Guard, a Curassier and a Chasseur à Cheval. These compliment some of the dismounted cavalry I painted an age ago at the start of this project, so great for the Silver Bayonet or any other system that allows for cavalry to dismount in game.

The latest supplement to The Silver Bayonet has just been released. As suggested by the name, The Shades of Calabria has an undead focus, and North Star have again made a nice set of figures to accompany the expansion.

Whilst I think the new book is probably the best one yet, I am probably just going to adapt the campaign to the 1812 Retreat from Moscow. The French were forced to march back over their initial invasion route, revisiting Borodino amonst other locations and all the dead that they left behind as they pursued the Russians towards Moscow. It seems fitting to adapt a campaign based around bandits and unquiet dead to the retreat of the Grande Armee, harassed by Russian peasantry and cossacks as they try to escape back to friendly territory.

This set of spectral soldiers were very quickly painted using a few different layers of drybrushing over a dark base coat.

Considering the less than impressive start to summer this year, it felt appropriate to add a few more figures to this project. These six figures are all Paul Hicks sculpts, sold by Brigade Games as a single pack, and are a great bunch of Napoleonic characters for The Silver Bayonet or other skirmish games. There’s a simple great coated infantryman, an Old Guard veteran, a Mameluke wishing for warmer climes, an elite Hussar of the 6th regiment sadly bemoaning the loss of his mount, a Vivandiere carrying the last reserves of brandy, and an Officer.

I was relatively loose with the uniform colours. The Old Guard and Hussar follow proper patterns, whilst I played around with a more blue-grey greatcoat for the infantryman. The Vivandiere was inspired by a picture of a painted 75mm model sold by First Legion, as I really liked the yellow coat.

The Mameluk followed a picture in one of reference books, although I added the white cuffs. The Officer was a complete mix, not really following any real reference. The cloak is essentially a that of a French surgeon, a blue coat is a fairly obvious choice, and the rest was just made up.

Very happy how these all turned out.

Back when the Carpathians was released, North Star did a limited time offer allowing people to grab individual characters from their boxed units. I took the chance to pick up the Veteran Monster Hunter from the first French unit, and the Supernatural Investigator from the first Russian unit.

I really like these two models, partly because they have a lot of scope for being something beyond their description. The monster hunter (clearly inspired by the Brotherhood of the Wolf) could easily be a bandit or highwayman, and the supernatural investigator is essentially all Baba Yaga witch vibes. Both models can therefore fit easily into a unit fighting against the beasts and monsters, or could easily be some of the foes facing them. Whilst there’s a very nice Forest Witch sculpt by North Star, I intend to use use this model instead.

A few more monsters done, this time a handful of ghouls. Like the hounds, these were released by North Star to accompany the release of the Carpathians supplement.

I struggled a bit to get the skin tones as I wanted, but I think it worked out in the end. I am quite happy with the tricolour striped trousers on one of them, which I decided to do as a nod to the period.

It’s spooky season, so a perfect time to paint up a few monsters for Silver Bayonet.

The Bloodless Hounds were released alongside the Carpathians supplement a few months ago. I really liked these undead hounds, so had to grab a couple. Painting these was quite free-form. I had a few browns, reds and greens on my wet palette after painting some Dark Age Saxons, so I mixed up various shades of greenish-browns. Pretty happy how they turned out.