Thursday 1 September 2011

Liberators!


I mentioned a while back that I had been painting some 15mm figures, but then didn't post about them. That was because I was trying to think of the best way to do so, and in fact I may yet start a separate blog about this project. For those who don't know, "Liberators!" is the name of a series of sourcebooks and associated figures designed for wargaming the wars of liberation fought by the Spanish colonies in Latin America between 1810 and 1830. This drive to increase wargamers' awareness of a rather obscure period of history is almost entirely the work of John Fletcher (I say "almost entirely" because the figures are sculpted by Alan Marsh). John runs a blog and a yahoo group as well as the Grenadier Productions website that sell "Liberators!" products. The reason for this post is that John is running a 25% sale over the next few days, so now is a perfect time to jump into this period.


My first serious wargaming began with 15mm Napoleonics, first Essex and Tabletop Games figures and then Battle Honours when they came out in the late 1980s. Whilst I painted a fair few 15mm Napoleonics over the years I realised that I much preferred 25mm figures and my 15mm collection never progressed much beyond a handful of painted figures and a reasonably large lead-pile. John's original "Liberators!" sourcebook came out a few years ago and since then I have periodically thought about investigating further as the period is exactly the sort of thing I look for: colourful uniforms, foreign auxiliary forces, small numbers of troops, exotic locations, larger-than-life personalities (e.g. Bolivar and San Martin) and something that's a little bit different. Most important of all, there is the Grenadier range of figures and excellent support on the blog and yahoo group, the latter of which receives contributions from a large number of enthusiasts (such as the chaps who put on the rather cool Maipo demo game at Salute a few years back: see here).


I won't go into any historical background now; as I say, I'm trying to think of the best way to take this project forward. But here are some photos of the first unit I painted up, the First Chilean Infantry Regiment, circa 1818 (a patriot regiment). I'll post better photos in due course. These are based for the "General de Brigade" Napoleonic rules. It's worth also mentioning that Simon at Parkfield Miniatures is sculpting a 25mm line that is shaping up very nicely.




8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Giles, I think that these may have been sculptured by mike broadbent, not Allan, but very nice work regardless. :)
Cheers
John B

AJ (Allan) Wright said...

Lovely stuff. Just the right balance of attention to detail and shading without doing more than is prudent for the scale.

Mike said...

More very good figures, well done. This period does hold a lot of potential, however, at least for today, I will not start a new project, but will enjoy watching your progress.

Willie Anderson said...

Very nice Giles well done!

Christopher(aka Axebreaker) said...

Not surprising Giles you paint your 15's as well as your 28's which is ....excellent!!!!
Like you, I primarily paint in 28mm, but occasionally do 15's as well with FOW and OG and now some of the excellent Legio Heroica.

Cheers
Christopher

Ray Rousell said...

Beautifully painted, I'd like to do this period, I just like the different coloured uniforms, they'll be a pleasure to paint, I'm sure!!
Ray

Joel said...

Hi, I came across your site and wasn’t able to get an email address to contact you. Would you please consider adding a link to my website on your page. Please email me back and we'll talk about it.

Thanks!

Joel Houston
JHouston791@gmail.com

Happy Wanderer said...

Hi Giles,

How is your Liberator project going?

The first group of figures were lovely.

Looking forward to seeing what you paint up next for the wonderful period.

Happy Wanderer