4th (Queen's Own) Regiment of Dragoons

Next up in the continuing Peninsular War project are the 4th (Queen's Own) Regiment of Dragoons. This regiment formed half of Brigadier General Henry Fane's heavy cavalry brigade at Talavera along with the 3rd Dragoon Guards Regiment. According to Oman they mustered around 545 personnel on the day.

For this unit I chose Front Rank miniatures as they have fore and aft bicorns, which is how I believe they would have been worn on campaign. Warlord plastic figures are totally wrong for the early part of the Peninsular War as the torsos are wearing post 1812 jackets, even if you do stick the bicorn or watering cap head on them. If I lived in North America I would probably have gone for the Brigade Games miniatures. Eagle Figures do an early war dragoon too but with the bicorn worn side to side.

After the very minimal amount of clean up required for Front Rank castings, a gentle bit of force was applied to a few heads and sword arms to get some more variation in pose.

Uniform distinctions were green/blue green facings with silver lace for the officers and white for the other ranks.

For more information on this unit see Jonathan Jones' blog post at  JJ's Wargames (seems silly to post the same info again)

First six mounted on rods and primed

I started by drilling a hole under each figure and mounted them onto some rod for painting. They were then brush primed with Vallejo Grey Primer.

Reds and facings done.

Once again I used Vallejo paints. The colours I used this time were:

• Scarlet (817), officer's Jacket.
• Vermillion (909), other ranks' jackets and all valises.
• Dark Vermillion (947), cloaks.
• Military Green (975), facings  , although I'm undecided if this is too dark and bugle cords.
• White Grey (993), breeches.
• Buff (976), officers gauntlets, haversacks and saddle bags.
• Ivory (918), other rank's gauntlets.
• Off White (820), sword belt, sword knot, carbine and cartridge box strap.
• Black (950), cartridge box, bicorns, boots, small box on rear of valise.
• Gunmetal (863), scabbards, sword hilts, carbine barrels, stirrups, buttons and some buckles.
• Brass (801), chin scales, carbine butts, bugle and some buckles.
• Oily Steel (865), sword blades.
• Black Grey (862), carbine lock cover.
• Leather Brown (871), canteen strap, saddle equipment securing straps.
• Saddle Brown (940), saddle and stirrup straps.
• Silver (997), officers lace.
• White (951), other ranks lace (a drip or two of silver mixed in).
• Flat Brown (984), carbine wood.
• Flat Flesh (955), flesh.
• Pastel Blue (901), canteen.
• Red (926), officer's sash.

Just the washes to go.

Officer.

Sergeant.

             

 A wash of Citadel Agrax Earthshade and they were done.

The first thing I did with the horses was to trim the tails to give the nag-tailed look of British dragoon mounts. The horses were then spray primed with Army Painter Fur Brown (CP3016), left over from another project. They are then base coated using Coat d'Arms horse tones, in this case

• Horse-tone Chestnut (223)
• Horse-tone Bay (224)
• Horse-tone Brown (235)
• Horse-tone Grey (236)

As "all other regiments of heavy cavalry on the British establishment are to be mounted on nag-tailed horses of the colours of bay, brown, and chestnut." and the 4th fall into this category.

Manes, tails, sometimes noses and fetlock areas are then painted in contrasting colours using an image I found online as a reference. I use Off White (820) for the white markings. I paint hooves using a mix of Black Grey (862) and any flesh colour to give the grey a little warmth in tone.

Horse colour guide

All tack was painted thus

• Leather Brown (871), leather straps
• Gunmetal (863), bit
• Brass (801), buckles

All horses then received a wash of Citadel Agrax Earthshade, except the grey which got a wash of Citadel Nuln Oil, while the tack is washed in Citadel Agrax Earthshade too.

The riders were then removed from their painting sticks and superglued to their mounts after first scraping the contact points of paint to get a better surface for glue adhesion.

The first six completed on their bases. Basing material to be added after the second six join them.

First six completed.

Once again just after completing these six I read that Horseguards had issued an order several years previously to stop buglers being mounted on greys, oops!

"The custom of mounting trumpeters on grey horses is to be discontinued, and they are in future to be mounted on horses of the colour or colours prescribed for the regiments to which they belong.

Harvey Calvert,
Adjutant-General.
Horse Guards
10th August, 1799."

not repainting it now. The horses eyes I paint in after varnishing, using Glossy Black (861).

The whole unit awaits basing materials.

The second six were then done in the same manor and based ready for the texturing to be done. At this point I realised I had attached the second batch to their group bases before painting the buckles and bits on the horses tack, Doh! Then to make it worse I realised I'd done the tack on the first six horses in Saddle Brown not Leather Brown. Having decided I preferred the Leather Brown look, more repainting was required.

All this and basing was completed an hour before the end of 2018, result.

Post basing and touch ups and corrections.

With their casualty counter

And that was that, finished. Well I did paint in the horses eyes after varnishing as previously mentioned. Next a Perry RHA 6pdr and the Perry Portuguese telegraph station

Tony.