33rd Virginia

 

As it's Independence Day, and because I promised David Bickley, I thought I'd interrupt the War of the Triple Alliance to post some ACW.  This is the 33rd Virginia Volunteer Infantry Regiment, which was raised in April 1861, largely from men in and around the Shenandoah Valley and was one of the original members of the "Stonewall Brigade" that won praise and respect at the battle of Bull Run/First Manassas.  The regiment then travelled with the brigade to the Shenandoah Valley, where it participated in Jackson's campaign.  In June 1862 Jackson marches his command to join up with General Lee, and the 33rd Virginia saw action at Gaines' Mill and Cedar Mountain.  The exploits of the Stonewall Brigade are well know, so I won't repeat them in detail here.  Suffice to say that the 33rd Virginia was engaged in the major engagements of Second Bull Run/Second Manassas, Antietam, Chancellorsville and participated in Pickett's Charge at Gettysburg.  The regiment suffered badly in the Wilderness campaign of May 1864 and by the time that Lee surrendered a year later the regiment fielded fewer than 20 men.

When I started painting historicals again last August, I looked at what painted Dixons I had left from the last time I was painting ACW (back in 2013 - see here) and decided to build out a couple of units using those and unpainted figures I had left over.  It turned out that I only had around ten painted figures, in a variety of poses, and so in the usual way I put in an order to Dixon to fill out a couple of regiments, and that led to buying a couple of Union regiments, which in turn led me to paint up all my outstanding Rebels, which then required more figures to be bought top finish off various units etc.  So this is the first of several units I've been working on since last Autumn.  I've spent most of this year working on this ACW collection and the Great Paraguayan War (with the odd foray into Warhammer 40K to keep the boys quiet).

Whilst I painted up a couple of First Bull Run units using the Perry Miniatures early war figures just for fun, my ACW ambitions are very limited (and clearly very slow-burning) - basically just Jackson's Valley Campaign of 1862.  In Paul Stevenson's "Stonewall" scenario book, the 33rd appears as 16 figures for First Winchester and 14 figures for Kernstown.  Normally I'd use a GMB flag, but Dixon figures have "cast-on" flagpoles and given the size of GMB flags you often need to cut the pole in half and insert something else to create more length.  I saw that Dixon themselves sold flag sheets which were stated as being designed for their figures and I thought I'd give these a go. The flag is quite a bit smaller than GMB, but perhaps more akin to the size of Confederate flags that one sees in Don Troiani's paintings, for example. 

16 figures.  Painted July 2012 and August 2020.  Flag from Dixon Miniatures.

   

The end of American Civil War week

So it turned out to be a month with a missing 4 weeks in the middle, but that was ACW week here at Tarleton's Quarter.  I wouldn't say that the ACW bug has necessarily been caught, but I enjoyed inspecting these units again and I am working on another regiment of Dixon Virginians.  I still have plenty of Dixons in the leadpile, so I will return to the period at some stage.  For the immediate future, however, I'm back at work on AWI stuff, and I'll post about some of that towards the end of the week.  To the left are some Dixon Miniatures casualty figures, one of which was painted back in 1998 and the others in 2013.  Something else I've been working on is a command stand for Jackson himself.  The photo below shows where things are at the moment.  Jackson himself isn't quite finished, and I keep changing my mind about who else to put on the stand - whether a mounted standard bearer, for example, or the foot figures I have here.  My thinking behind the latter is that the cheering figures would represent Jackson's popularity with his troops while the chaplain would represent his commitment to the Presbyterian faith.  I was intending to add a standard bearer with a Virginia flag as well.  Any ideas or comments welcome as I really can't make my mind up!  

Bull Run Confederates (2)

Picking up as if nothing has happened....this is my second unit of 1861 Rebs, again intended as part of the Stonewall Brigade.  The figures are from the same Perry Miniatures packs as my previous unit, but with the other half of the figures from the command pack. The Perries are releasing more ACW packs now, after a bit of a hiatus.  I recall them announcing some time ago that more "Bull Run" packs were in the works, and they have just released Rebs in frock coats and hats.  So maybe I'll get around to painting some of those figures at some stage.   


 Apologies for the delay of 5 weeks since my last post.  Various things pretty much "fell off a cliff", to be honest (including the obvious recent events).  However, I'll post more regularly now and I have some interesting AWI things to follow my final ACW post which I'll add tomorrow.  Happy Independence Day, everyone!

 16 figures. Painted December 2012-January 2013. Flag by GMB.

Bull Run Confederates (1)

There's a reason for the lack of any unit designation for this post - I don't have one.  For reasons I can't quite now remember, I bought some packs of Perry "early Confederates" and painted them up with an eye on the Jackson Bull Run scenario in the "Guns at Gettysburg" "Stonewall" scenario book.  I suppose my rather crazy idea is to do Bull Run/First Manassas using Perry Miniatures figures and everything else ACW using Dixon Miniatures figures.  That, at least, is the general plan.  So this is the first unit of 1861 Rebs, aimed at being part of the Stonewall Brigade.  However, I will happily acknowledge that I know next to nothing about the ACW and I really don't know if these figures, and indeed the way I've painted them, work for Jackson's command.  The figures themselves, and the way I've painted them, seem influenced by Don Troiani's painting "Drive them to Washington!", which portrays Jackson leading his brigade at Bull Run.  Most of the troops are in shirtsleeves or "battle shirts", wearing kepis (with or without havelocks), caps and "Garibaldi caps".  But whether any of the particular regiments that made up the Stonewall Brigade wore other dress is something I just don't know as yet.  A lot of these 1861 volunteer units had companies drawn from the pre-war militia, which may well have still worn their antebellum uniforms at Bull Run.  So I need to do some research before alighting on a precise designation for this unit.   Any help and suggestions from readers would be most welcome.

These are lovely Perry sculpts, full of character.  There are two very similar charging pose packs, one with kepis and havelocks and the other with a variety of caps and hats (including the "Garibaldi caps", as can be seen on the guy at the end of the second line in the red shirt).  I wish they'd do a third pack using the same bodies but with kepis without the havelocks - there are lots of soldiers like that in Troiani's painting and it would add more variety for these figures, which I expect would feature a lot in a Bull Run collection.

16 figures. Painted August-December 2012. Flag by GMB.

    

10th Virginia

The 10th Virginia Volunteer Infantry Regiment mustered at Harper's Ferry in May 1861.  Apparently four companies consisted of the 4th Regiment, Virginia Volunteers, a pre-war militia unit. The men were raised in the counties of Shenandoah, Rockingham, Page, and Madison.  The regiment spent its war with the Army of Northern Virginia: Bull Run, Jackson's Valley Campaign, the Seven Days' Battles, Early's Shenandoah Valley operations and finally the Appomattox Campaign.  The regiment suffered heavy casualties at Chancellorsville and Gettysburg, where it joined the 23rd Virginia in Stueart's brigade in Ewell's II Corps.  When the regiment surrendered in April 1865 it had just 2 officers and 43 men.  In the "Guns of Gettysburg" scenarios, the 19th Virginia appears as follows: McDowell (12 figures), First Winchester (20), Port Republic (20). 

This is my last (for now) unit featuring Dixon Miniatures.  There are quite a few of the first figures I painted in 1998 and the balance made up of more recent ones.  I'm not sure the officer in the second rank is necessarily "advancing" rather than "standing", but I think he fits ok.  Tomorrow and Monday I'll post about my two units of Perry figures for Bull Run and then I'll find up with some final thoughts on Tuesday.   

20 figures.  Painted July 1998 and June-July 2012. Flag by GMB.

5th Virginia

The 5th Virginia Volunteer Infantry Regiment follows a similar story to the other regiments I have been featuring this week.  It was formed in May 1861, with men drawn from Augusta and Frederick Counties in the Shenandoah.  Like the 2nd Virginia, it was assigned to what became known as the Stonewall Brigade and fought in the usual campaigns: Bull Run, Jackson's Valley Campaign, the Seven Days' Battle, Early's Shenandoah operations and Appomattox.  The regiment suffered 16% losses at Gettysburg.  In the "Guns of Gettysburg" scenario book that I'm using to build up Jackson's Shenandoah army, the 5th Virginia appears as a 24-figure unit in three scenarios - Kernstown, First Winchester and Port Republic.  For these larger 24-figure units I like to add an additional officer or two at the end of the line.  Something I haven't quite mastered yet is doing the squiggly gold braid that goes up the sleeves of Confederate officers.  That's basically why my Jackson command figures hasn't been finished yet!  

Again, I think these are mostly the later-painted figures.  I see perhaps one that may have been a 1998-er.  The choice of flag was dictated by the short size of the cast-on flag pole

24 figures.  Painted May-July 2012.  Flag by GMB

 

 

 

 

 

 

23rd Virginia

The 23rd Virginia Volunteer Infantry Regiment was formed in May 1861, recruiting in Richmond and surrounding areas.  As with the other units I've been posting about, the 23rd spent most of the war on service with the Army of Northern Virginia, fighting in  Lee's Cheat Mountain Campaign, Jackson's Valley Campaign, the Seven Days' Battles, Early's Shenandoah Valley Campaign and finally ending the war at Appomattox.  The regiment fought at Gettysburg in Steuart's brigade in Johnson's division in Ewell's II Corps.

The 23rd appears in the following Valley Campaign scenarios: McDowell (8 figures), Kernstown (10), First Winchester (24) and Port Republic (24).  I think all these figures were newly painted in 2012.  Despite the rather ginormous right hands, I like the marching Dixon figures as you can achieve huge variety among the same basic couple of poses (if you ignore the fact that everyone seems to have tears in their trousers in the same places).  I suspect the frock-coated chaps with their right left forward are Union figures, but I think they work ok.

24 figures.  Painted May-July 2012. Flag by Adolfo Ramos.

 

 

 

 

 

2nd Virginia

The 2nd Virginia Volunteer Infantry Regiment was raised in Charles Town, West Virginia in April 1861.  It was a founding regiment of the "Stonewall Brigade".  The 2nd Virginia fought at Bull Run and participated in many of the famous engagements of the Army of Northern Virginia: Jackson's Valley Campaign, the Seven Days' Battles, Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, Early's Shenandoah campaign of 1864 and the Appomattox campaign.  At Gettysburg the Stonewall Brigade was in Johnson's division in Ewell's II Corps and attacked Culp's Hill on the second and third days of the battle.  Apparently Private John Wesley Culp was in the 2nd Virginia and he was killed close to his uncle's farm on the hill that bore his family's name.

The 2nd Virginia features in the following "Guns of Gettysburg" Jackson scenarios: Kernstown (16 figures), Port Republic (12), Front Royal (24) and First Winchester (24).  Most, if not all, of these figures are the product of my 2012 Dixon ACW splurge.  I copied a couple of more complicated blanket roll designs from some Don Troiani paintings.  It was while putting this unit together that I realised I was painting too many light blue trousers (or "pants", as I think Americans call them), which I gather weren't actually worn much by Confederate infantry.  I do like the dynamic feel of this unit - the Dixon range at its best.

24 figures.  Painted May-July 2012.  Flag by GMB.