Russian Up-Date

Okay, I have finally made headway on my OG Russians.

The unit will be based on the I Battalion of the Simbirsk Musketeer Regiment.

The Simbirsk Musketeer Regiment came from the Simbirsk area within the Middle Volga region. It is located along the Volga River and is about 554 miles east of Moscow.

The citizens of Simbirsk took an active part in the 1812 Patriotic War. The Simbirsk Infantry Regiment performed many heroic feats and distinguished itself in some critical battles.

During the Battle of Borodino, the Simbirsk Musketeer Regiment was a part of the 27th Infantry Division, commanded by Maj. Gen. Neverovsky and attached to the VIII Infantry Corps commanded by Lt. Gen. Mikhail Mikhailovich Borozdin. The VIII Infantry Corps was part of Prince Peter (Ivanovich) Bagration's Second Western Army. During the battle the Regiment was commanded by Capt. R. Baykovsky.

The Simbirsk Musketeer Regiment was virtually wiped out during the fighting against Marshal Davout at the fleches at Borodino.

This would be the standards carried by the I Battalion




Before we get to the pictures it might be worth noting the following.

In the I battalion the Grenadiers had solid red cockades tall black plumes; the Strelki had solid yellow cockades with tall black plumes and the Musketeers had white cockades with green center. The shoulder straps were green with red ends except for the Grenadiers who wore solid red ones.

This should give you a general idea of what the shoulder strap would look like.



Anyway, here are some pics for you to look at.

Just your typical 'before' picture.

Behind the Russian unit is the British Peninsular Line unit I want to get started on as well.

The tubs with blue lids are various other units.

You can also see a couple of canoes for the F&IW as well as an elephant.

An here is an 'after' pic of today's work.

Now that you've seen the whole group, let's see a few close-ups. Again, please forgive the photo quality.

Before we get to those let me show you the following picture.

This is a sampling of the greens I considered for the Russian uniforms. I have never been too good at picking the proper colors but I wanted something that was as dark as the original green the Russians used, but still green enough you could tell it was green. Does that make sense?

As you can see I started with 9 possibilities.

I decided on Vellejo Model Color 3980 Dark Green.

I hope the color comes through in the pics, but I just don't think they did. Oh well, maybe the next time I get pictures it'll show up better.

Anyway, here they are.

This is just a general picture of what I got painted so far.

I have blocked in most of the black items, the white breeches and of course the green jacket.

I do not bother being too neat at this point.

For those of you interested...the hideous wallpaper in the background is from the mid 50s. I know one of the guys who helped hang it while he was in high school.

Here is a closer picture. I think you can see the green a bit better.

I noticed that the digital camera picked up some spots that didn't quite get paint on them. OY!!

Hopefully tomorrow I'll get to start on the flesh and adding a few more colors.

Before I call it quits for the night, let me show you a couple more pics.

Here are a handful of Front Rank Russian horses that I've primed.

I'm going to practice a few horse painting techniques on these. I'll let you know how it goes.

This is just one of those 'interesting' pictures.

In case you are wondering why I'd be showing a picture of my paint rag - there's a good reason. I have had this rag since the summer of '76. It's got paint on it from every project I've ever worked on. Believe it or not, I even have the same little, folding, card table I used back then as a painting table!

Well, that's enough for now.

Till next time...

Cheers!
Larry