My very first Toy Soldiers… they are more than 65 years old.

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In fact near than 70 years old… The state is original… those are the rests of the original paint… on anything not rigid (or even quite rigid) paint peels off I am afraid. Those three are all what remain of my big box of infancy…

My maternal grandfather used to play with me back then… that been the case it started a life long love for the “Mounties” only slightly superior to my obsession with the French Foreign Legion as a result of been exposed to BEAU GESTE (The book if you please)… and of course the Guards Regiments (Horse and Foot)… my parents always looked North from Spain… anglophiles but also liked France. My father even studied in Liverpool before the Spanish Civil War made a mess of a lot of things…

Lucky me I was born in 1952… so wars were a thing of the past… or in far away exotic places (Korea, Vietnam, Falklands,Iran, Irak, Afghanistan)… not in Europe anymore (well the Balkans)… and mainly USA wars (sometimes with staunch allies at his side)… the XXth Century was the USA Century to be sure…but we lived a long peace.

Enjoy,

RCMP REAMSA rubber/cautxuc soldiers of aprox 45mm scale

John Clarke’s Own

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Expressly built for A GENTLEMAN’S WAR ruleset I guess…

The battle of Dorking (completely fictional) is surely embeded in the mind of a lot of Toy Soldiers Wargamers in 54mm… do not ask me why… a sad depressing book (highly readable though)… shrinks/quack doctors do make a hard cash from it!

Enjoy the model! Ah! incidentally topped 120.000 visitors a couple of days ago, as usual this is popular specially in the USA (It puzzles me because stopping at 1900 it leaves out the US Century… but you’ll never know why at all)

I must confess I have acquired some Prussian Playmobils to play it too but maybe à la Wells.

Another nice piece in gloss this time…

Castings from IMPERIAL/DORSET SOLDIERS.

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Due to the long absence of REPLICA from the market (hopefully available again in January) I checked and ordered some unpainted castings from IMPERIAL/DORSET Miniatures to complete some units. Yes, I will paint them myself and hopefully you will see the results in this webpage in a month or two.

Just writing this lines to praise the understanding and help from my contact (Antony) who delivered precisely what I needed. All this is a suite provoked by the HELP of Paul Watson with another Ensign I sorry missed.

So here you have me, meddling with brush and paints at my age!… LOL… in fact it is perfect for my age… a relaxing hobby if one exists.

More in a few weeks (keep checking).

Lateral view of future Ensigns around 1878
Highlander Bugler (without arms) and two Pipers
Frontal view of the Ensigns to be (I will add right arm with flag myself)
They would look like this once painted…
My pic (and Toy Soldiers) of the 66th (Berkshires) last stand at Maiwand. (The last eleven counting the dog) Those who are also History Buffs will know that in fact there were several last stands that day, and many fugitives that reached Kandahar in a pitiful state.

You usually care about details in Wargames or Toy Soldier Collecting after reading a lot about periods in History. The Second Anglo-Afghan War is well documented. What I do not understand is the obsession with Afghanistan at all in modern times!… but I digress… I stop my wanderings at 1900 for many good reasons and will not comment about later times nor – God forbid!- current events.

Gettysburg wargame in 75mm (PLAYMOBILS)

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I once sold a collection of ACW Playmobils because I did not want my grandchildren to fight brother against brother… LOL… if I had new they will enjoy playing videogames with plenty of shooting and killing with machine/laser/guns… oh dear!… I feel like a Neanderthal sometimes…

Recently have bought Playmobils (AGAIN) Prussians to fight the Brits at Dorking à la Wells… missile launched from canons… hope that the smaller of my grandchildren will appreciate… have my doubts (sometimes he thinks older than me).

Enjoy.

Big Table of course!

See the chairs!… For ONCE! this is not an estatic DIORAMA!… I thought I was the only fool that indulged in that!

Nile Gunboat

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Those asiduous in this webpage will recognise a recurrent theme… a lot of wargamers and modelers actually enjoy doing Nile Gunboats! Even yours truly indulged in scratchbuilding a tiny one in 25mm for my MINIFIGS (LOL) I must look in the vault to see if I found a pic… (a sorry example compared with those in 54mm).

Enjoy!

Very nice model and crew!

54mm Toy Soldiers

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I am currently in the middle of upgrading my units to 12 Infantry to play test AGW in my Table (it was longer than I thought to “clean up” the mess of my office)… Will probably confront my French Foreign Legion DORSET against British India Kakhi REPLICA… quite if the FASHODA incident had happened in Lybia somehow I do not have the heart (and time and money) to build a Prussian Army and “go to Dorking”… if you know what I mean… Now all depends on DORSET and REPLICA whom has to provide the missing minis to get those units to 12 Infantry per unit!. Enjoy

Ever popular scale I guess…