Saturday, August 3, 2013

6 (Nederlandse) Huzaren Regiment

One of my largest cavalry Regiments is the four-squadron 6 (Nederlandse) Huzaren Regiment. The Regiment fielded 641 troopers and officers at Quatre Bras. This equates to 32 figures on 11 bases per General de Brigade rules.

The 6 Huzaren served in the 2e Nederlandse Cavalerie Divisie in the 3rd (Lichte) Nederlandse-Belgische Brigade of Majoor-Generaal Jean Baptise Baron van Merlen. The Regiment's CO was Luitenant-Kolonel Willem François Boreel.

The figures are by Perry, painted for me by Leuthen Studios. I handled the basing.

6 (Nederlandse) Huzaren Regiment
1e Escadron
6 (Nederlandse) Huzaren Regiment
4 Squadrons Deployed
1e & 2e Escadron
Luitenant-Kolonel Willem François Boreel



This is the only unit I have ever asked to be repainted. The original painting was as beautiful as this revised version you see here. The problem was mine and caused by faulty research. The figures you see here now follow closely the Brigade-Uniformtafel Nr. 194 by Peter Bunde which shows every possible detail of the dress, campaign and undress uniforms. In my original research I had followed the plates contained in Andre Dellevoet's " The Dutch-Belgian Cavalry at Waterloo". I enjoyed the text and maps very much, and the exclusive focus on the Dutch-Belgian Cavalry gave me a whole new appreciation of the actions along the French border and of course a very detailed account of Quatre Bras and Waterloo. I'm not concerned with the author's bias as I really wanted to get a different nation's "take" on the Campaign.

My mistake was using only the very nice original artwork in the book as the sole source of my instructions to the artist. The biggest problem was that the basic uniform colour was rendered in the book as a violet blue. As I did more research, after the fact, every other source showed variations on a pale sky blue. The illustrator also had various important uniform details which differed from other sources. So with deference to M. Andre, I decided to bite the bullet and request a very significant retrofitting. My advise: be sure of your research!



I am very pleased with the final result and the 6 Huzaren is as accurate as I have been able to make it.


Squadron Trumpeter
Cavalry-Captain Jan van de Poll, 3e Escadron


Troop Sergeant
Trooper

Trooper