Tuesday, June 20, 2023

Piedmont Artillery 1740s

After knocking out Piedmont Regiment La Marina (see previous post), I pressed on by pushing Piedmontese artillery into the painting queue.  With lighter demands over the holiday weekend and no immediate game to plan, I sat down to the painting desk to enjoy a couple of meaningful painting sessions.
The results of this concentration are six guns and crew.  Figures are Old Glory.

I wrestled with indecision on the Piedmontese gun carriage color scheme.  I have seen and read a number of contrasting and contradictory options.  In the end, I went with gray as seen in the plate available from the NYPL Digital Collection.
Source: NYPL Digital Collection
Next off the painting desk I expect to see SYW Hanoverians begin to trickle out although I may slip in a unit of crossbowmen for the Reconquista project.

Young's Branch (First Manassas) remains out on the gaming table with the expectation of a few more playings before I pack it away and move on to another ACW battle.  The last engagement, which has not been chronicled, offered a chance to rethink ranges and the differences between smoothbore and rifles.  My thoughts on those topics I save for another time.   

39 comments:

  1. Good to see you putting your non gaming time to good use! Lovely job you’ve made of that lot.

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    1. More gaming coming up. I may actually have a F2F on Wednesday. A rare occurrence, for sure! Glad you like the artillery.

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  2. Pictorial evidence of grey (guns) … that would do for me :-)

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  3. Fine artillery there Jon. I tend to go with a gun carriage that works well with the uniforms of the crew, often a contrast too. But then mine tend to be ImagiNations but based upon actual armies etc. As Norm has said, the pictorial evidence would tip the scales for me if there was conflicting evidence.

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    1. Thank you! I appreciate another validation of gun carriage color choice.

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  4. Great artillery, Jonathan! Six guns of the Piedmontese army! A big project is planned... I like it when the artillery crew is at least four soldiers.

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    1. Thank you, Valentine! I prefer four-crew batteries but have never fielded more than four crew per gun.

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  5. Smashing guns and crews Jonathan.

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  6. Artillery looks nice, gray is my favorite color. 6 guns is a very decent group. 😀

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    1. Thanks! Six guns and 24 crew come in one bag. One bag is not too tough to crank through. Gray is your favorite color?

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    2. “Yeah well you know gray is my favorite color.
      I felt so symbolic yesterday.
      If I knew Picasso,
      I would buy myself a gray guitar and play.”

      (Random song that popped into my head)
      But yes, gray is my favorite color. My oldest son is named Grayson even. 😀

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  7. They look great Jon and the grey gun carriages are an attractive option.

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  8. Lovely guns and crew Jonathan…
    Grey is always a safe option for carriage colours…

    All the best. Aly

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    1. Much appreciated, Aly! Good to know that grey is a safe color.

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  9. Fine work Jonathan, the grey compliments the blue uniforms nicely that would do for me🙂

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    1. Thank you, Phil! So far, no objections to grey. Brilliant!

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    1. Thank you, Neil! A half dozen Spanish artillery and crew are on deck.

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  11. Lovely work and grey seems to be the best way to have gone based upon the NYPL plate, besides which it complements the blue coated artillery crew very nicely.

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    1. Thanks, Lawrence! So far, no complaints about grey gun carriages.

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  12. "weathered" grey gun carriages look great to me! well done :o)

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  13. In my opinion the cuffs of the artillery were blue. http://www.bandieresabaude.it/Bandiere031.html They had blue waistcoats and breeches. The laces on the cuffs were yellow (maybe gold). http://www.bandieresabaude.it/Bandiere0301.html

    I first painted my artillery with black cuffs etc. as I saw them painted by another wargamer. But the black cuffs were introduced after the 1740s and therefor I changed all of my figures following the contemporary pictures.

    Cheers!

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    1. Thanks, André. I am familiar with the Piedmont link but chose to follow the NYPL plate. Besides, don't you think the blue with red cuffs is a more handsome option? No comment on the gun carriage color choice?

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    2. I think that I once had the chance to read about the colour of the guns.

      I'm just very much used to (maybe because I'm in Living History too) to chose the contemporary sources which are sometimes hard to find. I think that there are many uniforms with these red cuffs combined with blue uniforms and therefor I feel that the Piedmont artillery is looking somehow different with the very simple uniform especially to tell them apart from French and Spanish artillery which have red cuffs and blue coats too.

      I have the impression that contemporary leaders had no problem to chose the same colors again and again.

      After 5 or 6 years I even changed all my Austrian artillery with normal crew from brown to grey uniforms, when I learned that these brown coats were not in use for ordinary artillerymen during my 1730s to 1740s period. Now I love my Austrian artillery because it's looking even more interesting.

      I think that your output is outstanding and I see why you stay by your choice and I hope that your artillery will do a great job against French, Spaniards or even Austrians. There are so many interesting battles in Italy! Good luck!

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    3. Thanks, André! My SYW Austrian gunners are in Wolf's Grey coats too. Interesting that the Austrians went from Wolf's Grey to Tobacco Brown from SYW to Napoleonic times.

      I have some Spanish guns and gunners coming up soon.

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  14. The uniform and carraige colors are good choices, you do such nice work on such small figures! ! Looking forward to your thoughts on the next couple ACW outings.

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    1. Joe, you are very kind. Still collecting my thoughts and have another replay to test the latest ideas soon.

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  15. Crackin work Jon. They look great!

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  16. Fine looking guns Jon. Bonaparte would say you have six new lovely ‘daughters’

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  17. Nice grey gun carriages, not quite with Stew about it being my favourite colour, surely it's a tone and therefore not a colour? I like the way you've done the cuffs too, I'm still plodding through a pack of old glory artillery myself, hopefully finish soon!
    Best Iain

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    1. Thanks, Iain! you will finish your pack of Old Glory artillery in no time. Back to the painting table for me as well.

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  18. Lovely looking artillery Jon 👍 mixing holidays , cycling and aiming here in lovely summer weather

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