"dismounted British cavalry figures" Topic

Strange request I know, but can anyone tell me if any manufacturers do 28mm dismounted Napoleonic British cavalry figures.

Short answer: no.

I've been pestering the Perrys for years for some. Would love to see running Scots Greys/heavy dragoons etc (trying to get back to their lines at Waterloo!)
Some light dragoons and hussars standing around would also be nice(perhaps holding the bridle of a standing horse?)

The Foundry British staff set contains a wonderful old Perry sculp, one of my favourite ever, of a pointing Heavy Dragoon officer in a cape.
I stopped looking at the increasingly hilarious Foundry website (hilarious when compared in price and quality to Perrys/Calpe/Victrix) but I imagine that figure can still be picked up for under £100.00 GBP

Personally, the solution I favour, is to make your own figs by cannibalising legs from Perry plastic infantry, body/heads from Perry hussars etc but this will only suffice for light cavalry.

Redoubt have dismounted hussars…..

link

Scroll down….last 5 figs
Bc1745

Thanks guys, at least that's the Hussars sorted. Just Life Guards and Dragoons to find. I saw that lovely figure on the Foundry website, not paying that for it though.

Redoubt figs can be on the tall side……..at least their Zulu British are…..don't have any of their Naps though……

Give Trevor a call and I am sure he will be able to help

I too have been looking for dismounted dragoons for the British as these are allowed in Column Line and Square but intended for the French. Would be a nice touch for the British so the dragoons could move ahead to occupy houses and bad going positions.

Steve Barber makes a very nice Russian dismounted dragoon, but too big to fit in with my old MiniFig 25mm figs

link

Maybe useful with British dragoon head transplant and proper painting.

I'll be honest, I have never played a wargame, but I would love to see dismounted British cavalry figures. Indeed of any nation! But I want them at rest, drinking, wenching or tending to their horses…for dioramas.

I suspect that their lack is because they simply were not often employed as combat troops on foot. This is not ACW with a horse holder and firearms that can kill at long range, for his four mates to use. After all you have spent on these chaps, to mount them, how often did they then march around on foot as infantry, in reality?

I love Perry French dragoons on foot, in plastic, for their potential. I have many conversions now. Artillery train, Gendarme d'Elite, Louis XVIII Household, Napoleon postillion etc. But how often did post Bardin dragoons march and fight on foot, in those heavy boots, on a formal battlefield?

Deadhead has nailed it methinks: Our wargames rules are hardly treatises of military history…

Though intended as mounted infantry in their distant past, dragoons of all armies soon aspired to become 'proper' cavalry, and by the mid-to late 1700s had largely forgotten about their original role. All cavalrymen drilled on foot at first before they were trusted to get on a horse, so in theory all would have been able to fight on foot, but the very few anecdotes of such actions essentially concern skirmishes, and have come down to us precisely because they were remarkable exceptions.

The confusion in some Napoleonic rules may stem from the brief existence of French 'dragons à pied', but that was an administrative expedient to use the manpower until sufficient horses could be procured, not a tactical option.

in 15mm I found French Dragoons from Minifigs (2nd gen) and Russians (Jacobite like 20-30 years ago). I painted regular infantry for Prussians and Austrians. Never bothered with British dismounted as they didn't seem to have enough cav to spare.

Historical or not, in a recent CLS game (games are just "what-ifs" aren't they) the British player had a regiment of Scots Grays -- 27 figures. He arrived at a village to occupy but unlike the French had no figures to allow for dismounting.

So, how CLOSE to a Scots Gray is a British guard with bearskin or Fusilier with fur hat??

With just painting conversion could I get a passable dismounted dragoon with one of these? Not try to pass muster with the Iron Duke, just getting a war-game figure.

What nobody has mentioned is that there is a very good reason why nobody makes British "heavy" dragoons skirmishing on foot: they didn't do it.

Since at least the SYW, and quite possibly – bar perhaps the Jacobite Rebellions – the WSS, British dragoons did not do the dismounty-fighty-on-footy-without-gee-gees stuff, unlike their French counterparts. They were very definitely part of the "heavy" cavalry and, as such, their role was to engage the enemy on horseback, not in piddly little exchanges on foot. Hence they were invariably held in reserve and were never wasted on outpost work (on foot or on horseback), any more than cuirassiers and carabiniers in the French army, or the cuirassiers and dragoons in the Austrian army. During the SYW, troops of "light dragoons" were formed and attached to the heavy cavalry – dragoon guards and dragoons – specifically to take on outpost work; these were eventually removed and reformed into light dragoon regiments, in part because they spent so little time with their parent regiments.

Also, British cavalry generally had, by the time of the French Revolution, moved to short-barrelled firearms, primarily designed for skirmishing on horseback.

As far as your specific scenario is concerned, you could literally not have picked a more inappropriate regiment to depict in this way. Between a charge at Tournai in May 1794 (in which they destroyed 3 French squares in conjunction with the 2nd Dragoon Guards and 6th Dragoons) and that at Waterloo, they spent 21 years in barracks. Other than chasing a few smugglers or confronting rioters, they did absolutely nothing combative in that time, and the only occasion on which that particular uniform was worn on a battlefield was 18 June 1815.

Yeah. Heavies never fought on foot id go as far to say. Unless bar brawls count.

There are cases I believe of small number of light Dragoons dismounting ting and using carbines, but only in small skirmishes. I'd like a few figures though for 1:1 skirmish games though as it's fun to have dismounted cavalry men trying to make it off the board.

Thanks guys, I have been a bad boy, doing things in games that did not happen in history. I did not know that all things in war games had to follow what happened in history, I happen to have a regiment of Scots Greys so they turn up in a number of British commands in various Napoleonic battles. In 25mm I cannot afford to muster all possible British dragoon regiments, so one has to suffice for all :)

I don't think it's too much of a hardship for wargamers to limit themselves to the actual historical tactical use of the units they're representing on the tabletop.
True, it's only a game, but so is chess, and can you imagine if someone suddenly decided to move pawns like knights… it wouldn't be right, that's not what they do.
In a similar way, if British Heavy cavalry fought exclusively on horseback, employed in shock action on the field of battle, then that should be the limit of their tabletop use too.
Send in the British Rifles, or the 52nd Foot, to root out the dismounted French Dragoons, skirmishing in a village, rather than the Scots Greys. Let the Greys ride down the dismounted Dragoons, after the Rifles have ousted them from the buildings.

I have to agree- instances of dismounted British Dragoons in the Napoleonic period were such a rarity as to really rule it out for wargame purposes. IIRC, a few dismounted troopers from one of the heavy regts (?6th DGs) were sent with the Buenos Aires expedition in 1806 in the vain hope they could find some horses, but that's about it.

Generally speaking the British Dragoon and Dragoon Guard (no practical difference by this period) regiments were proper heavy battle cavalry- bigger men mounted on larger and more powerful horses than many of the Cuirassier regiments of continental armies.

Conversion job on the Boot Hill Mexican dismounted dragoons
link

Thanks guys, I have been a bad boy……

No, you haven't really. You've just been guilty of buying one of those iconic Napoleonic units that everyone just has to collect. At one point in the late 70s, I had the RSG in 54mm and 30mm (can't recall the manufacturer as they were Xmas gifts), 25mm (Hinchliffe and Minifigs), 15mm (Minifigs – both strips and the later individual figures) and 12mm (Hinchliffe) – all as a result of seeing that blasted film!

We've all wargamed on a budget at some point in our hobby lives, so no harm, no foul. If you're not in a rush, the new Perry "Early Napoleonic British" range will cover Egypt, where Light Dragoons fought dismounted, so it's quite possible some will turn up in that range in due course. If you have to buy new figures right now, why not try the dismounted 16th LD from the Perry AWI range? The coats are wrong (lapels instead of hussar-type braided jackets), but they are no worse than using French grenadiers as dismounted RSG and they are dismounted British cavalry skirmishing – just a thought.

Sorry, the original post wasn't meant to sound judgmental, just putting the record straight on why manufacturers haven't made the figures you want.

RSG? RNDB, OK? (and other such text speak used by younger folk)

Interesting the contrast I mentioned earlier by time of ACW. By then cavalry were far more seen as highly mobile light infantry, surely reflecting the greater killing power/range/rate of fire of their firearms. Still expensive to rig out, but better at getting there "firstest with the mostest"!

Yep, Scots Greys and Old Guard – we have all been there

And SM – your second post +1 – funny how on the web comments ca come across "odd", so that rescued the first and so was a lot more helpful I reckon. I think us English have a dry sense of humour etc, so our posts can me misinterpreted…

And DH – come on man, enough of this "I'm not a wargamer" – your figures are too nice not to see action

I was introduced to Napoleonics in the 70's by a man who would "only play with the best", so his "army" was the Old Guard. He then doctored the rules so they were undefeatable, telling us they never lost and we could modify the victory conditions (so if we only lost by a little we could consider it a win). Fortunately I met a CLS player and Old Guard dies from musket fire just like everyone else. It did put me off from the Old Guard so long it wasn't until last fall I painted a regiment after getting the figs on the cheap.

Marc, after all the work that went into the lace of my Saxon Garde du Corps shabraques, do you think I would send them uphill against entrenched Russian artillery, in a redoubt, in a mad charge? No one in his right mind would do that………..would he? Only a wargamer would do that surely…..seriously tho' thanks. My figures would be useless for wargames. I have more Gendarmes d'Elite than cuirassiers…….

Now years ago I had a WW1 trench system with hundreds of figures for solo gaming, but never really got going. Then came my 1/300 Airborne unit with gliders, tows, troops, A/T, etc but their only opponents were an SS Panzer unit with Tigers and Jagdpanthers. You can guess the outcome. I used to use my Finnish aircraft collection as a chat up line for student nurses in the late 70's. Never seemed to work…. strangely

RNBD I meant of course. The whole point is that Light cavalry did scout and recce and might well dismount in a small built up area. Hard to get a horse into a cottage garden, let alone the cottage. RNBD and the rest of Ponsonby and Somerset's lads were for line of battle. Shock and charge. Not for dismounted action unless the horse is dead and God help you then

So DH, you have accuartely recreated Napoleon's cavalry at the end of Waterloo (more GdeE than Cuirassier )

And remember, the better painted they are, the worse they fare, so perhaps buy some older figures and try the dip.

But seriously, I meant it – I love seeing pics of your figures, and always enjoy reading your contributions – you normally get the tone spot on (unlike me and my sarcasm, which gets me into trouble far too often).