Home Guard - Officer & Second Section

"Mr Brown goes off to town on the 8:21,
But he comes home each evening and he’s ready with his gun."

Well, this has taken rather longer than anticipated as life intruded and painting took a back seat for a while.

I have however finally got the boys who will make Mr. Hitler think again finished and off the painting table. The plan this time was to do the second section along with an officer and his assistant and a Home Guard medic to make a playable (albeit small) force. The officer, assistant, and medic are Warlord figures, the rest are Foundry.

The paints used were the same as for the first section, with a bit more time spent on shading faces and some attempt at darkening up around eyes. I'm still not very confident about painting faces (certainly not to the amazing quality I've seen elsewhere) but am trying to improve a little.

All figures primed with Vallejo Leather Brown surface primers.

Then base-coated with a 50:50 mix of VMC English Uniform and Brown Violet. After the base-coat all of the flesh, hair, wood, and leather areas were repainted with the brown primer.

The rest of the blocking was done as for first section with the exception of the officer.

I haven't been able to find a figure I'm completely happy with for use as a Home Guard officer so the platoon have a regular officer on loan in BEF gear.

His outfit is English Uniform serge rather than the greener Home Guard denim and his webbing is Green Ochre rather then German Camo Beige.

His assistant is Home Guard and is having a cup of char while he waits for the Rupert to decide where they're gong.

The second section is also joined by a fairly mature Home Guard medic, who is probably a local GP, a reserved (or scheduled) occupation. (Though if they're less luck he might be a Veterinary surgeon.)

The section NCO has a Thompson SMG (with what appears to be a muzzle brake), the rest of the section have rifles (a mix of 303 and red banded 30-06).

Finally the section gets some fire support in the form of a Browning Automatic Rifle.

And the Corporal's (unofficial) loader.

BAR don't have loaders as such in Bolt Action, but this rifleman is carrying a spare magazine for the Corporal.

So, they're finally off the bench.  I still have an MMG team, a Northover projector, and some "old soldiers" (BEF figures) to do, but I think I'll switch to something else for a bit and see if I can rekindle some enthusiasm and get a bit more done.

11-11-1918

Home Guard - First Section

 "So who do you think you are kidding Mr. Hitler..."

I've been planning to build small Bolt Action forces of various sorts, mostly associated in some loose fashion with the 2nd NZ Division in WWII.

The NZ 5th Infantry Brigade, the second of the three echelons of the Division, was diverted to England in June 1940 instead of joining the first echelon outside of Cairo. The final third of the Division also ended up in Egypt in September, but the 5th Brigade remained in England as part of the anti-invasion forces until January 1941.

When Warlord released their Operation Sea Lion book I picked it up thinking that I might build an NZ 5th Brigade force, perhaps in conjunction with a Home Guard platoon.Growing up in the '70s Dad's Army still conjures considerable nostalgia and the theme tune evokes childhood memories.

I initially picked up some of Warlord's Sea Lion offerings, along with a BEF section, but after a bit of to and fro purchased some Home Guard figures from Foundry. A packet each with helmet and field caps, along with their heavy weapons provided sufficient figures for two sections with some left over to accompany officers.

Using Vallejo paints I primed the figures with a Leather Brown, and then base-coated them all over with a 50:50 mix of English Uniform and Brown Violet, which despite its name is greenish. The Home Guard denim uniforms were rather more green than British wool serge, and the mix of English Uniform and Brown Violet provided a greener colour that contrasts with the serge field service caps

After the green-brown base-coat all of the flesh, wood, and leather areas were over-painted with the brown primer.

Field caps were painted with unmixed English Uniform, and the webbing and haversacks with German Camo. Beige.

The Brodie helmets were painted UK Bronze Green, and the gaiters either Khaki (for cloth) or a dark brown for leather.

All parts were washed with GW Agrax Earthshade and the highlighted with the base colours. After being sealed with AK Interactive Ultra Matte the bases were decorated with static grass and rubble from Warlord and small Army Painter lowland shrubs.

Basecoat Colours

Item	Colour	Paint
Field Service Cap	Khaki	VMC English Uniform 70.921
Brodie Helmet	Green	Vallejo Surface Primer UK Bronze Green 70.607
Denim Uniform	Khaki-Green	50:50 mix of VMC English Uniform 70.921 + VMC Brown Violet 70.887
Webbing, pouches, and haversacks	Beige	VMC German Camo Beige 70.821
Leather Belt	Brown	Vallejo Surface Primer Leather Brown 70.626
Cloth Gaiters	Khaki	VMC Khaki 70.988
Leather Gaiters	Brown	VMC Flat Earth 70.983
Boots - Officers	Brown	VMA US Flat Brown 71.026
Boots - Soldiers	Black	VMA Black Grey 71.056
Gun stocks and handles	Brown	Various browns
Gun Metal	Black/Metal	VMA Black Grey 71.056 lightly dry-brushed with VMC Oily Steel 70.865
Bayonet scabard	Brown	Vallejo Surface Primer Leather Brown 70.626
Skin	Flesh	Reaper Tanned Flesh + Reaper Flesh Wash
Hair	Bown / Grey	Various browns and Reaper Stone Grey

Finished miniatures

 

The section sargent with Tommy gun and private having a sneaky smoke.

Lewis gunner and ammo carrier.

Rifleman showing rear detail and older chap with a Molotov.

More rear detail, helmets, and a red banded 30-06 rifle.

Still to go: second section, old soldier section (using BEF figures), officers and assistants, an MMG team, and a Northover projector... along with some special Dad's Army guest stars.

WIP and Winston Churchill

A work in progress post plus a single completed (sans base) personality figure.

I was unable to resist the urge to get a copy of the Operation Sea Lion book for Bolt Action, and local supplier Mighty Ape (who have a pretty good range of Warlord) also provided the launch figure of Winston Churchill with a tommy gun which provided some fun (and eye-strain) painting up. He still needs a base, which will of course have to be "green and pleasant".

Aside from Winny, I've been working on, but failing to complete some Konflikt '47 US heavy infantry, and two LRDG 30 cwt Chevrolet trucks.

Various home-life related things have meant I haven't had quite the same time or enthusiasm for painting these last couple of weeks, so the US troops are still sitting there waiting for detailing. The basic colours are done, but washes and highlights are needed, and as they are almost small walking vehicles I'm planning to use some armour weathering techniques too.

I did however get enthused to start work on my LRDG patrol, which along with some SAS sections will make a Bolt Action army using the "Behind Enemy Lines" theater selector. The LRDG portion of the army will be using LRDG Chevys from Warlord, Offensive Miniatures, and Company B; starting out with two Warlord trucks that have been waiting for quite a while.  I really like the Warlord LRDG vehicles, but they only have machine guns, the Offensive and Company B trucks will be providing a Breda and 37mm AT gun portee respectively.

The Warlord trucks, and a Jeep that came as part of the same bundle, have resin bodies with metal wheels, bumpers, guns, and crew. The trucks bodies are two part: a common front end, and two different rear sections stuffed with stowage. Each also comes with three crew: a driver that is the same for both, and front and rear gunners that are specific to the variants. The crew all have separate heads, with extras to choose from, so quite a bit of variety is possible.

The trucks went together very easily - one front section had a slightly warped under-carriage, but that was quickly fixed with some hot water while cleaning the pieces.

After assembly all were primed with Stynylrez yellow primer, the wheels were left off and painted separately. (The bumper is missing from the Jeep in this shot - I found it later in the packaging.)

I wasn't sure how best to spray the wheels, so some cocktail forks and a kebab skewer got turned into a makeshift frame with the wheels threaded on. These were first primed grey, and then painted with VMA Panzer Black Grey.

I thought I might try pre-shading the trucks, so sprayed dark (VMA Khaki No. 3) and light (Reaper Splintered Bone) on areas before applying the basecoat. It was a fairly subtle effect but is visible on the models; I still need to work on applying thin coats of paint.

The trucks were given an overall spray of VMA UK Light Stone, and then freehand camouflage patches of light blue and desert pink.  I had a hunt through my paints before settling on VMA Hellblau (RLM65) for the blue, and a 3:1 mix of VGA Pale Flesh and VMA US Desert Sand for the pink.  The first attempt at pink used a 1:1 mix, and looked about where I want the colour to end up, but once weathered would I think have pretty much disappeared, so I over-painted with the more pink mix.

Currently the trucks are getting their crews and all the stowage painted, and I'm waiting on decals from Company B with "T Patrol" markings.