1962; American Civil War Union Infantry, S12 / 01712 / 01712-9 - HO/OO

Like the preceding 'S10' (Foreign Legion), this was a great favourite when we were kids, and with most of the poses based-on (or giving rise to?) the FFL poses, pretty interchangeable. Also like the Legion's link with Beau Geste, this set came amidst such films as The Raid, The Good, The Bad and The Ugly, The Red Badge of Courage, Gone with the Wind, the one with the train...loads of them!

So with our heads full of the blue and the grey, we would have hours of fun with these. At school we would pool our resources and have one colour storm the trenches of the other colour under the rhododendrons by the swimming pool (outdoor, unheated, this was the early 70's mind!), parrot-guns with the defenders, the uphill assaults usually descended into a chaos of flung gravel, clouds of dust and arguments about who's figures were who's as the end-of break bell went. Casualties were decided by marble, which favoured the entrenched side.

A full set, the real disappointment with this set was the 10 (a quarter of the contents - near as dammit) figures on their belly! A realistic set of WWII or modern troops should really include all prone, kneeling, squatting or other ground-hugging poses, but rarely does 9and wouldn't have as much play value if it did!), but ACW? We'd seen the telly...we knew it was long lines of brave Oakies, Yankees and Johnny Reb's walking toward each-other's murderous fire...not lying in the dirt!

Colour variation, not as marked as the Legion (see above), but this may be because I haven't found a really bright or pale set yet, however with the numbers I've handled over the years I think they missed the batch of plastic that produced the brightest blue of the FFL. Likewise they seem to have avoided the very dark batch which both the US Cavalry and the Foreign Legion got.

These early sets by Nibblet were reused as much as possible, and in these comparisons we can see the similarities between the Union Infantry and the Confederates, the Foreign Legion and the crawling cowboy. The real reason why the large number of prone poses was such a pain is also revealed, the 'Rebs' get a second officer, lots of extra standing, advancing and trench-fighting poses AND a whole new pose, gutting if your Gran, gave him the Confederates and you the Union!

Montaplex issued several ACW sets, and the two above both have copies of the Union Infantry in them, not sure what they would have made of a Willys Jeep though, especially one with a radar dish! The Gettysburg (Gettisburg!) set seems to reverse the order of the day, with Union attacking and rebels defending.

Other Bugger's Efforts, if you are of a curtain age these should bring back a few memories (and if you recognise your work - let me know for a full tribute), if you're a youngster you brain's probably forming an unspoken WTF!

Here's the deal for you youngsters...we were given a pack of soldiers by some well meaning relative, sometimes they would give us two or three paints (whatever the storekeeper was keen to offload) as well, along with a dodgy 'craft' brush and a tube of UHU.

If no paint, Mum or Dad would see what was in the garage or could be found under the sink and you MADE DO! There was no 30 shades of Vallejo flesh, there were no Army Painter dips, even the Humbrol Authentic Colour range didn't strike until the 70's and was outside the purchasing-power of most kids and a lot of their parents.

And - believe me - the above are not the worst...a lot of us, looking at the paint selection before us, would simply decide to use them for a James Bond 'baddie' army, and proceed to paint Paratroops, WWI Germans and ACW in the same apple-green and yellow uniform with black hats!

A few conversions - dismounted Cavalry with shortened muskets for carbines at the top, some French Napoleonic guards below them. The bottom row are a right mix, with a kneeling WWI Allied conversion who's lost his head, so we can only guess which unit/army he joined? the dismounted dragoon/cuirassier type deserves to be finished and one day I'll have a go, despite someone else starting him off. Finally; in disgust at their number building in the tin, I threw-out my burgeoning collection of prone figures, but cut the weapons off to make stacks of muskets for camps.

Scanned from old photographs, so low-definition, this is my old 'standard' Union uniform, I used to use Rotring mapping pens to do the overlaps on the belts and the 'U.S.' on the water-bottles and bread-bags.

One of my specific regiments, this almost certainly came from the Blandford uniforms series American Civil War edition, as it was in the local library when it wasn't on semi-permanent loan to me!

Quick reference shot/guide for a full set.

Thanks to Kostas from Greece, we have the 1975 catalogue to plunder for box-art and blurb, this was a particularly well though-out 'pair' as the confederate box (see 'older post' below once I've uploaded it!) has them on the other side of the creek!

Matchbox/Airfix comparison

Links

PSR Union Infantry Page
My Old 'war games' Army

1962; American Civil War Confederate Infantry, S13 / 01713 / 01713-2 - HO/OO

Another old favourite, not as favourite as "one of my favourites" of which we've had a few already, but definitely containing one of my favourite poses.

Thanks again to Kostas for scanning the 1975 catalogue, enabling me to knock-up these collages when my catalogues are in storage. The funny thing was/is; when I did the WWI sets back at the beginning of this blog, I went through all the catalogues, scanned the necessary pages, cropped-out the images I needed and didn't keep copies of the un-cropped scans! but it will all happen eventually...

...yet I did manage to file away this image from the 1980 catalogue?

These are mostly old film photographs, scanned-in and therefore low resolution I'm afraid. nearly all from my old 'war games' army (I never really gamed with it...some simple solo 'rules') and all following the Terrance Wise school of army building with pins, paint, cartridge-paper and a sharp knife!

Top left is an unfinished Union Iron Brigade flag bearer - with far too many stars! To be fair, I don't think there are even 50 either, I just did yellow dots 'till the red field was full! To his right is the only OBE, a 'Stars and Bars', then two more of mine (straight from Terry's book I think?), North Carolina (they need a new seamstress...what is that star all about!) and a Texan with a burnt corner.

Just before I left home to go off and do my bit in Berlin (and sunny Tidworth!) the Esci sets started to become available and I added a few officers, standard bearers and buglers to the two sides...I didn't like them because they had too much detail!!!! [I've got over that...it's progress - I know!] There's also a straight paint-conversion of a cowboy into a company runner/messenger.

Bottom left are my Iron Brigade, again a straight paint-job, with my little half-company made from my favourite pose. it's not that good a pose, but with only three per box and none in the Union Infantry set, it was hard to come-by so I sort of grew found of it!? I paired all the figures with two singles for casualties and the two command figures also individually based. With the half-company there were only the two singles and one was supposed to be an NCO with a crudely cut kepi

Fine detail and eyes were drawn/dotted-in with mapping pens and all uniform colour schemes were taken from the Blandford books or a couple of the early Men at Arms series...this was the late 1970's with the Esci's painted around 1982, which is 3 years earlier than PSR lists them as having been first issued?

Returning to the middle-shot for a moment, it's taken me 30-odd years (and I've had the photographs for more than ten) to notice the leg of the middle chap is covered in flocked green paint! I used to cover the base in thick paint, dip it in the flock, and then turn it upside-down to tap the loose flock off, it must have run down then!

OBE's - none of them are from my hand, if you recognise your work let us know; Above left are the same unit looked at in the Union post above, they are confederates, but with the floppy had cut to a stiff 'French officers' kepi, any ideas? There's another shot of them bottom-left.

Top-right are painted-up to represent revolution era French Line Infantry, or AWI (?) with a sort of bicorn-hat, while below them are later guards (I never know the difference between Young, Line and Imperial with these Wellintonians) waiting for the return of their heads.

Some more serious attempts at conversion (including a Roman - 3rd from the right!) above and various paint treatments/styles below, the paucity of money and supplies in the South, allows for greater variation, although I wonder if a lot of that isn't myth, or history being written by the victors, I bet there were threadbare Northern units and well-dressed Rebel outfits. I rather like the Indian Mutiny figure forth from the right on the top row and what looks like the beginnings of a pirate with pink trousers bottom left!

You only have to look how a body recently found in an English municipal car park is going to lead to the re-writing of the entire History of King Richard The Third! Not short, not stooped, no twisted spine and he went down fighting a dozen or so of the usurper's bully-boys, so no coward either. He wasn't dragged through the streets by a cart, nor were his ground-down remains burnt, fed to pigs, dogs, or thrown in a river!

Favourite pose, man on a mission! Don'cha'just love that 70's charm, more gloss than matt, gloss yellow leggings? All-over gloss green? Can't get enough of these, me!

The sample I'm working from with these images, the large bag at the top is 'unpainted, unsorted', the big square one nestling below it to the left is 'painted unsorted' (now I've put the OBE's up here, they'll get a paint-stripping session), with the smaller bag to its right holding all the broken, chewed, converted and otherwise damaged figures and part-figures.

The rest are complete sets (boxed and 'sprued' ended up in storage), with a single war gamer's collection to the right, another guy's to the left, unpainted sets in the middle and a few stand-alone sets in the corners.

Three of the painted sets; from the big collection to the right, the smaller collection to the left and a mixed set in the middle (it's got a few of the paint-conversion nappies in it if you look closely!). one day I hope to base, touch-up and matt all of them...or that's what I tell myself to justify the plastic mountain!

The content of one of the bags from the larger collection displaying the contents of a complete box. So much more useful without all the prone figures of the Union set.

Colour variation, there are warm 'pink' greys and cold 'blue' greys in there and a slight loss of detail or increased flash as the glossier figures come-in in the late 1970's. note the flap of flash on the back of the figure top right (three in), caused by an ill-fitting mould - he's a late figure.

Why the Confederate Infantry is ten times (or ten figures!) better play-value than the Union Infantry set. If you go back to the top of the post and read the blurb from the catalogue though....close one huh? Quote; "crawling", that blurb is unchanged from earlier editions, and clearly someone was going to make the two sets even more similar?

Finally - for now - a comparison with the French Foreign Legion set, also sculpted by Nibblet, and using most of the poses from the ACW sets, with a few more besides, the similar ones illustrated above.

The only accessory issued for the wild west was a very useful log-fort, and while its walls were impossibly thin, more garden shed than defensive frontier barrier, it looks good enough when you're a kid!

A scan of an old photograph of the same conversions shown above, even the officer has had the hat treatment, any ideas as to nation depicted? War or campaign?

Matchbox/Airfix comparison


Links

PSR's Confederate Page
My Old 'war games' Army

1962; American Civil War Artillery, S14 / 01714 / 01714-5 - HO/OO

One of my all time favorite sets, the elder brother of a friend had the blue version of these in a little tobacco-box and when he went off to boarding school, his younger brother and I split them between us!

I think I probably still have one or two in my complete loose blue set. I can't remember the Guy's names...how shocking is that, old age creeping-up! They lived at the top of the hill in Guildford as you head out to the Hog's Back, yes - the 'posh' houses, or they were in 1969!! Was it you, do we still owe your bro?

Two mint in box first version sets, the Blue is the earlier, unmarked box (see below) while the 'neutral' Wild West brown would soon replace it, as kids didn't 'get' the two sets of figures all being in blue. The Union got to star on the front of the box.

Also this was around the time 'Spaghetti-westerns' started to ease the crusading Wayne's out a bit at the box office, and making them in brown meant you could give a gun-team to your 'Mexicans' or Indian allies!!

Upper is the early blue figures box, lower is the brown figures with the US price code in cents ($0.50 - don't know the ASCI for cents here at the library!!). The blue aren't that uncommon; about 10% of the total production, so some would probably have made it into cent-boxes, but I've never seen them in blue-boxes, and if I found one now would assume a dealer had put them there.

By having the Confederates portrayed, the reverse tried to get the both 'sides' message across, but most of us had ripped the box, getting the figures out...after all we were going to keep them in the Havana Cigar box, what did we want a hollow cardboard box for!

The Montaplex pirate's with associated equipment. I'm guessing - from the wing markings - the two union crews are for the bomber, while the two Confederate crews use the guns, the set translating as 'Confederate Artillery Unit'. That is - of course - following the 1950-70's 1st rule of playing ACW;

"All Federals have Kepis, all Rebels have 'Cowboy' hats!

And if you think the Bomber is a bit unfair...wait 'till I post the infantry, they get jeeps with twin-automatic cannon mounted on the back, no doubt heading for Tripoli. [this is a topical joke Circa Autumn 2011, that several years from now with be lost on new visitors]

Side-by-side close-up to show the poor quality of the blatant copies next to the originals, I don't suppose the activities of Montaplex contributed greatly to the demise of Airfix, but it was a part of a market denied to them which must have been annoying, especially as it was on the doorstep, but there was nothing they could do with a fascist dictator in charge of Spain's economic activity!

And it gives collectors an alternate version to look-out for...bargain!

My collection has suffered from a post-1995 surfeit of new-releases which leave me with holes in my knowledge, therefore while I think the gun top-right is Eagle Games, I'm not sure, the others are - from the left; Airfix blue gun, Hong Kong gun of about 1:48th scale which I think came with some CTS or BMC (Americana) bagged rack-toy packs? With the Atlantic Gatling-gun as final member of the line-up.

The Gatling and presumed Eagle Games (?) have nicer carriages than the Airfix, but need work elsewhere, the Gatling could use bigger wheels.

Below them are annother shot/close-up of the Montaplex copy and a Bachmann HO model from the Train sets, the Confederate one was the same but with grey figures (the 2nd rule of playing ACW

OBEs, in this case full gun-crews, clockwise from the simple; blue trousers, through the classic 1970's look; semi-gloss 'toy soldier' finish, to a fully-painted set of confederates in matt finish with a few touches of 'Artilley Yellow'.

Also a shot of the ACW gun with the slightly better detailed figures from the Wagon Train set who make a very laid-back crew...

"What? They're going to slowly walk towards us across the floor of the valley over that 3-mile expanse of sun-hardened dirt? Watkins! Canister! As much as we've got, and all the shrapnel...No, no hurry, they'll be out of range for a while yet, and then we'll have them for ten-minutes before they can come back at us, and by then there won't be many of 'em left. Harrison; while you're picking lice, do you want to pack our pipes, this is going to be a long afternoon, might as well have a smoke!"

More Other Buggers Efforts - the gun crews. I just love how people tackled their figures back in the day, for some it was a bit of blue, others went for the 'Full Monty', in between was everything else...check-out the gloss-brown Union chap!

A complete set as issued, there is basicly a full gun team in action and a second, limbered, for either side, with enough figures to crew both (this is - of course - following the 1st rule of early war gaming; all Union have kepis, all Confederates have rimmed hats), but there was only the one shared senior or staff-officer...

...who is seen here in the upper shot - mounted - keeping order between a Confederate 'team' on the left and a Union set-up on the right. Positions are reveresed for the shoot-off in the lower image.

More OBEs, the gun getting any metal going! I'm not sure if the two main protagonists in the Civil War had a formal woodwork paint 'rule' like the Napoleonic armies, but both sides used a range of olive or khaki greens, made by mixing yellow or yellow-ochre with black, giving any one of a number of shades.

So most of the above would pass muster - apart from the unpainted ones - wrong brown for natural or weathered wood, some of which (bare-wood guns) seem to have been employed, and the CSA had a set of 4 guns at Gettsburg (12pdr. 'Napoleon' pieces) which were bright red, that would add a bit of colour to an army! Also - and you never see it on these early painted samples - the seat of the Limber should have a copper finish, as a spark-free waterproofing...and for gunners to polish in barracks!

Bottom left show the ACW wheel sandwiched between the Wagon Train wheels, the only other wheel likely to confuse is the RHA wheel, which - if memory serves - has much finer spokes, but I'll check next time I'm in the WWI box and post similar comparisons sometime.

Bottom right...1:76 scale 'Dimestore' pod-foot!

 

 Ashes to ashes

Dust to dust

If the baby's/dog's/cat's teeth, air-gun, matches, vacuum cleaner, washing machine, spirit-burner, conversion tools or land-fill don't get you...

The free-radicals must!

The later 'blue' boxes, changed the cover-stars to the Confederates, balancing the fact that the Union had been lording it in that position for most of the 1960's! Image here is from the 1975 catalogue and supplied to the blog by Kostas, a follower from Greece.

 Imex Union

 Imex Confederate

 Accessory

 

A similar shot to the one above, but arranged to be easier to compare on modern wide screens, I will reiterate, blue plastic came first, and was quite quickly replaced with the brown plastic, blue continued in shops for a while, and ran alongside brown, where it hadn't sold-out, but brown was the neutral (Wild West coded) answer to issuing a joint set in the Union's colours. Note, one's a darker red print-run.

 

The complicated folding of the insert-cards, which were designed to hold one runner in such a manner as to display one row of figures against a plain backdrop, to show off the contents to their best advantage, the rest being slid behind, keeping the display row tight against the window.

 

The card. I have a pile of these, lose, somewhere, and there were a number of print-variations from all blue to all white, some with blue sections rather than this box. The corners were cut to effect easy sliding into the pack.

 

Again, better shots of those posted above, years ago, these are hi-res scans of a near-mint, first version box, with the comic style artwork, and a list of contents, very useful for us early collectors trying to make up full sets! Union forces on the front, Confederate gun-line on the rear!
 

Comparison in blue!

 

Captain Blue and Lieutenant Green are our interest here, the other two are cowboys! I've had these OBE's for years, and I don't know who to credit, but aren't they fun? Captain Scarlet conversions, mostly a paint-job over some pretty crude knife-smoothing, but at this size very effective!
 

Construction insert, which was only from the 'white boxes' onwards, if I recall correctly, if you had the 1st version, you were trusted to be sufficiently practical, in post-war Britain, to work it out for yourself, while the 'Blue Box' art showed the late baby-boomers how they went together!

 

Artwork from the early AHI catalogues, I think this version appeared in two volumes, then they switched to the 'sunburst' ad' seen elsewhere on this Blog, and the same artwork may have appeared in some British magazine ad's, but - obviously - without the prices in cents.

 

Links

 

Plastic Soldier Review (PSR)

Airfix Tribute Forum

Paul's Bods