Starting a New Minden French Army

Regiment Orleans - click to enlarge the picture.

I have decided that it is time for me to begin building French and British/Hanoverian armies with the Minden Miniatures range of figures. I have enough Austrians and Prussians to suit most of my needs so I need a new project and the SYW in Western Germany is it.

For my French army, I think that I will be able to use all of the RSM French cavalry that is already in my collection and concentrate my build on the infantry and artillery, using Minden French figures and equipment.

I thought that I would treat myself to some special figures, so I commissioned Leuthen Studios to paint the two battalions, Orleans and Diesbach, that you see on this page. The German regiment Royal Pologne will be the next addition to my French army.

Independently of this, I plan on painting the Grenadiers de France and a couple white-coated regiments so that I ultimately have 8 battalions organized into brigades of four battalions.

I had the Orleans flags from GMB Designs on hand so I was able to flag that regiment. I don't have the Diesbach Swiss flag so that unit will have to wait for its flags and basing. I want to attach the Diesbach flags to the poles before I glue the figures onto the base and start terraining it with Spackle compound. Otherwise it would be very difficult to attach the flag into a confined space without being able to shift and move the standard bearer.

Swiss Regiment Diesbach

My French and British battalions will use the 32-figure, closely spaced, basing system from the start so I will not have to change the basing in the future. Check the blog link  Here for a description of the basing system that I will be using.