And now something of completely different...

After a long absence (the real life, so bad...) no pictures: not yet.. I want to tell about my beginning with this hobby: it was in the early ’70. In my city there was a section of the italian branch of IPMS were I learnt the basics of static modelling. My first model was a Frog FW-190 A in 1:72 (an interesting kind of model: nice decals, well documented and correct colour schemes and the landing gear sink totally absent!). Then I switched to german tanks in 1:72 and 1:35 and finally to 1:72 plastic soldiers.

Lead miniatures a rare bird: you need to order them from Great Britain, paying them in Pounds with an International Money Order and waiting for the Custom bureucracy peculiar notion of time.
The only resources at hand were the readily available and cheap Airfix 1:72 plastic napoleonic soldiers: French and British line infantry, Prussian Landwher, French Cuirassiers and Artillery, British Hussars and Royal Horse Artillery.
My collection grew up (with substantial reinforcements from some Minifigs cavalry, bought in the most expensive model shop in Florence) until I moved to Rome to begin my Academic career. No soldiers were painted until 1995, when I took the brushes from the closet and started the Torgau Project.

In 2001 the Napoleonic plastic collection underwent a major disaster in the hands of my 2 y.o. son: the unfortunate survivors, lead and plastic intermingled, were sent to garrison a forgotten plastic bag. In the meantime the rate of growth of Torgau project was as unsteady as possible until 2005 when finally I decided to finish the project, and my interest in plastic soldiers revamped in the form of Strelets Swedish and Russians of Great Northern War.

Finally, a couple of years ago the Napoleonic plastic heroes emerged from their resting place just in time to be fully restored and rebased: this concided with massive investiments in plastic soldiers. Now I have more than 150 boxes ranging from Thirty Years War to Napoleonics, all of them waiting for painting….
In the future posts I’ll mix the Torgau project pictures with those from the “Holowczin Project”, another Volley and Bayonet project, and those from the “Napoleonic DB-Hx Project”, so stay tuned…

Lacy corps

The Lacy Corps was placed between Zinna and the Grosserr Teich: it faced for almost all the day the stranded Zeiten Corps. Lacy was subsequently blamed for not being capable to stop the redeployment of Zeiten towards Suptitz.



The von Goesnitz Saxon cavalry Brigade under F.M.L. Zeschwitz:





Right: the Saxon redeployed. Bottom: the Kaiser hussars, in front of dragoons and cuirassiers and the croats, whose 3 pdr. light battalion guns fixed Zeiten attention until late in the afternoon.




Lacy infantry: the Buttler and Meyern divisions




A close up of the pink faced Ligne regiment (IR 38):




Lacy and his staff: uniquely in my collection, they are Baccus.

Another map

This is one of the maps from my personal collection. It is from the late XVIII century. Interestingly enough the left side legend is very detailed and describes very well the various phases of the battle.



The letter (a) denotes the Prussian camp whereas the initial Austrian position is denoted with (b). The three Prussian column are denote respectively (c) (d) and (e). The Austrian grenadier corps which was displaced by the advancing Prussian is indicted by (f), whereas in (g) there are the "Batyanischen Dragoner und ein Regiment Infanterie". (h) And (i) are the Prussian infantry and cavalry attacks, (k) the new Austrian position facing these attacks. The Zieten attacks is (l) and (m) are the croats on his tracks. The final attack on the causeway is indicated with the letter (n) and finally (o) and (p) denote the main army and Lacy's corp paths of retreat respectively.

I'll try to post on Kronoskaf a better resolution map in the next few days.

More whitecoats...

The Reserve-Korp, commanded by the General der Cavallerie Prinz Christian Phillip von Lowenstein-Wertheim, and the Grenadier Corp, under the command of the Generalfeldwachtmeister Graf Joseph D'Ayasasa, here in a portrait conserved at the Wiener-Neustadt Akademie
According to Duffy they were both capable and competent commander and distinguished themselves at Torgau leading repeated counterattacks. The Grenadiers are in the forefront:

The converged foot grenadiers,


and the converged Karabiniers from the Cuirassiers regiments and the Horse Grenadiers from the Dragoons regiments. At Torgau they were "brigaded" with the foot grenadiers into two units under the command of Ferrari and Von Normann:





The Lowenstein Reserve-Korp: the infantry brigades Daumbach in the first line (IR 41 Bayeruth and the hungarian IR 51 Gyulai) and Bibow (IR 36 Tillier, light-blue facings and IR 40 Jung Colloredo );


The Reserve-Korps cavalry was formed by the Cuirassier Brigade Bettoni (CR 10 Stampach and CR 12 Serbelloni),



and by the unfortunate DR 31 Saint-Ignon (the "blancs-bec" of Kolin memoirs): the regiment was taken between two prussian columns in the wood and annihilated by the Zeiten Hussars in the early stages of the battle. In the picture is followed by Lowenstein, in the words of Daun " a thoroughly bad individual".

ReichsArmee

I have finally finished the V&B rebasing of the ReichsArmee troops I bought in July. This meant painting battalion guns and artillerymen, mounted officiers and some flag bearers, nco and drummers. The original contingent was comprised of 6 infantry and 5 cavalry regiments together with two batteries and a commander. After the rebasing process I was left with enough privates to muster two further regiments. So I painted more battalion guns, mounted officers etc.. This is the final result:





Now, a closer look to each regiment. First of all the Franconian Kreis Infanterie Regiments; Ferentheil, with red facings:



Varell, with yellow facings:



and Cronegk, with white facings:



Next the Blau-Wurzburg regiment:



the Kur-Trier regiment:



and the Hesse-Darmstadt regiment:



The left-overs gave me 20 blue-coated with white facings privates and 20 blue-coated with assorted facings privates. I mustered them (after some facings repainting..) into the Baden-Baden and Baden-Durlach regiments:





The cavalry contingent is formed by the Cuirassiers regiments Hoenzollern, Bayreuth and Kurpfalz, the last with two different coated white uniforms, and by the Wurttemberg and Ansbach Dragoons:









The field artillery was completed with some horses and the to the commander was given a white coated grenadier orderly and the role of General Major Roth:






So I can try to play the Freiberg scenario or better to get some scenarios for the battles of Korbitz and Strehla....

A brief digression: Lobositz

No new pictures and still in vacation. So I decided to upload some pictures taken in a 2006 Lobositz refight (some of them are on the Volley and Bayonet website with an AAR).

The Austrian deployment: in the foreground the Elbe river and the Croats supported by the Grenadiers. Goingto the left Lobositz and the Austrian centre with the Main Army behind the Morellen back. The Prussians are in the background between Homolka and Lobosch hills.



The Austrian center and the Main Army behind the Morellen bach and the Sullowitz Castle, dwarfed by my son's head...



A close-up of Austrian center with the reserve cavalry in the foreground looking towards the sunken road,



and the left wing cuirassiers supported by a dragoon regiment:



The Austrian infantry, looking towards Sullowitz (the picture is out of focus because a Prussian cannonball, not because I am a dummy with taking pictures...)



On the other side of the valley, the cramped Prussian deployment:







After some complicated "deploiren" the bluecoats are ready to attack and after few moves the full battle was joined. The Prussian left wing climbed the Lobosch hill to get rid out of the incoming red cloacks, the center marching towards the sunken road and the cavalry concentrated on the right, ready to exploit every Austrian error...And the error arrived: the gallant cavalry commander forded the Morellen Bach heading towards the Prussians! The whole right wing Prussian cavalry charged the enemies...but the lack of èlan of their commendar ended the charge in a full-scale disaster! (very bad rolls...)







In the meantime the center division closes to kill in the very face of Austrian guns whereas the right wing was busily clearing the vineyards from the croatian rabble...



However, despite the victory on the Lobosch hill, a stalemate insued on the center, with the Austrian steadily shifting regiments after regiments behind the sunken road: with no reserves left and with the cavalry broken and in disarray the Prussian gave up the battle... No pictures are left of the end phases of the battle, certainly put in the fire by the King, under the menaces on the terrified aides: "It will cost your head if anybody shall see these pictures..."