16th Light Dragoons (2)

The 16th Light Dragoons was raised in 1759 by John Burgoyne (then a colonel). The regiment became a royal regiment in 1766 following its service against the Spanish. For a few years it was known as the Queen's Dragoons. The regiment was posted to Nova Scotia in October 1776 and immediately joined the main British army in New York. It fought throughout the New York and Philadelphia campaigns. By 1778 the regiment was badly understrength and its men were transferred into the 17th Light Dragoons, the officers returning home. The regiment's modern day successor is the Queen's Royal Lancers.

The 16th tends to appear en masse in the large northern theatre battles: Long Island (12 figures), Brandywine (14 - 6 in Knyphausen's sector and 8 in Cornwallis') and Monmouth (10). So the largest number of figure you need for the regiment is 14 for Brandywine, but in the event that I ever try to stage the whole of that battle myself I'll just add a couple of figures from the Perry skirmishing pack.

Most of these figures were painted in 2005. They appear now because I have been meaning for ages to add another 3 figures to bring the total unit strength up to 12 and finally managed to do so last month. I had planned to paint these extra figures for the 2008 Long Island game, but I ran out of time. My painting style had developed substantially since 2005 and there is much in these figures that I would do differently now; principally the faces (which had a yucky GW flesh wash) and the horses (which are dry-brushed). That said, from "normal wargaming distance" it is probably difficult to spot the new figures and I think the unit gels together ok. In the pics below, the new figures are in the bottom row. The light blue colour on the water bottles is something I took from the Perry Miniatures website. I have since been told that painting water canteens this colour was a Napoleonic practice and would not have been done at the time of the AWI - the canteens would mosy likely be of natural wood or covered with canvas to keep them cool. Another mistake on the Perry website is the dressing of the trumpeter in a coat with reversed colours. The 16th was a Royal regiment and so musicians' coats were not reversed in this way.


12 figures. Painted 2005 and May 2010.