Some odd and ends from the painting table today.

First, a field forge model which I have had for more years than I can remember, so I do not know where it came from! The horse team, though, is made up of Colonel Bill's ever useful models which I bought at SELWG 2021 with the intention of using them with the field forge - good value draught horses and easy to paint. I had to guess how the model went together, there not being any instructions, although a quick search online for a picture gave me a rough idea. Anyway, it looks alright to me and will add an extra interest to my Sun King baggage train.

Next, some more Confederate skirmishers and a mounted orderly for my ACW collection, which is now growing apace. All Perry 28mm hard plastics. I have decided that my early attempts at snake rail fences made the lengths too long and the angles too shallow, so I have made the next batch with shorter lengths of poles and more acute angles. They look more like the ones in the contemporary pictures and photographs.

Two mounted orderlies for carrying messages on the battlefield: Confederate on the left, Union on the right, both Perry 28mm hard plastic cavalry figures.

In the rules I have been using for ACW, an old set from Jacklex Miniatures, units down to three bases count as "Broken" and automatically rout for a turn and are then removed at the start of the next turn. I thought it might be a good idea to replace them with a "Broken Unit" base, so here is my first attempt. Again, Perry figures, fleeing past a homemade tree.

And last of all, my first ACW cavalry unit, Confederate, ten figures, all Perry hard plastic figures. I found them easy to glue together and a pleasure to paint. My enthusiasm for hard plastic figures continues to grow!

And it is the first time I have ever painted a piebald horse. It came out well I think! I do not think they were very common in Europe in the 17th Century, my main period of interest, although Turenne certainly rode one.