Spanish WIP

Here's my latest project; Spanish line troops. It's a relief to be painting infantry again after all that cavalry. For some reason cavalry becomes so tedious after a while. With Spanish infantry I won't get bored, though: there's so many different uniforms to choose from! (You may have spotted 2 Highlanders on the end of the stick; apparently Highlander regiments had larger numbers than ordinary line battalions, so I'm adding 2 more figures to the Gordons. I'm going to add to my 71st light as well, as they definitely had higher numbers than the line regiments they were brigaded with)

Also, in the background are the buildings I've volunteered to paint for the Aspern-Essling battle.

I've discovered a book from La Trobe University, that Rafa is probably familiar with, which has uniform plates of Spanish units of the Peninsula War, or La Guerra de Indepencia, by Carrera. It's in Spanish, but easy enough to identify units. I've taken a photo of the title page and a page of units that I intend to paint using French line figures. The bottom left and bottom centre figures wear French-style uniforms which will readily translate to painting conversions. I intend to base the division on Zayas' division from Albuera, but will probably throw in a few units, like the Santa Fe regiment, which didn't fight there, just for variation.

So far I've started with the Guardias Real Walonas, or Walloon Guards, the pick of the Spanish army, in their 1808 style uniform. To follow will be the Regimento Irlandais, one of the so-called Irish regiments, then a couple of white uniformed line regiments, Regimento Toledo in their handsome yellow faced brown uniform with bell-topped shako (some conversions required there I think) and the Voluntarios de la Patria, uniformed in a green French-style uniform.

Walloon Guards and Austrian buildings

Walloon Guards

No.s 3 & 4 to be painted up

Title page of useful find