"Royal artillery wagons and guns" Topic

So I am in the process of painting up some artillery wagons (Blue Moon) for the upcoming convention.

I had been painting the ready boxes and wagon covers an oxide red, per what they did at Fort Ligonier. I also noticed that the iron work on the Fort Ligonier artillery is largely painted gray, same as the carriages, with the exception of the wheel rims. So that go thinking, what was this based upon?

I did the usual scan of Troiani artwork and noticed his wagons were all painted gray, but his buns were a mixed lot on the iron paint.

So next I went to the Morrier painting of Royal Artillery – granted, done prior to the SYWs. What I saw there was that indeed the iron details on the guns were largely painted gray, with the exception of the wheel rims.

In the background I spotted the artillery wagons. All of the larger four wheeled wagons were shown in gray painted tops, while a smaller two wheeled cart had a dark red/oxide top.

Then I looked at the Warley Camp paintings. The iron details seemed to be painted in black, from what I could tell. Again, hard to say.

From a practicality standpoint, I can see paining the entire gun in the same paint, though not sure why the wheels would get black paint.

So I was curious what research others might have found on the subject of Royal Artillery wagons and guns, in regards to painting.

I'm afraid I cannot point to a particular source, but over the years I have always come back to the same formula of grey wood, black metal and brass barrel (although I understand this could also be painted). I came to the conclusion that it was near enough on accuracy to please the button counters and looked good into the bargain.

Coincidentally, I received two Hinchliffe 6pdrs in the post today and that is exactly how I will paint them.

Hope this helps!

What Jeffers said.

I'm reminded of a story someone told about visiting Chelsea barracks. Outside were a couple of old artillery pieces, possibly Napoleonic, painted green. Our visitor asked why they were green when he would have expected them to be grey. He was told "the Navy has nicked all the grey paint. We are the army, we paint stuff green".

Moral of the story – you can't rely on old stuff to still look the same as it was originally…

Here are some links to the Morier painting of artillery in the low countries -

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Note that most of the iron work is painted gray. If you get the full painting, download it and zoom in on the wagons on the background and look at how they are painted.

Warley Camps

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I painted the British wagons as they were on the Perry website.

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Interesting as Perry shows them with the oxide red tops, like at Fort Ligonier. But the Morier painting only shows the two wheeled cart with a red top. No ammo wagons shown in the painting that I saw, but I'll look again.

Though one of his earlier ammo carts and the ready boxes appear to have black tops. Hmmmm. The plot thickens. :-)

I wonder if the red waggon tops were treated similarly to Thames barge sails:

The typical, rusty-red colour of the flax sails was due to the dressing used to treat the sails that were permanently aloft (traditionally made from red ochre, cod oil, urine and seawater). The red ochre was there to block the ultra-violet in the sunlight from degrading the sails (much as lamp-black was used in the sail dressing for the Norfolk wherries)

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Wow. Good find. I just assumed that any red used was red oxide paint, commonly used in the period. You may be on to something.

Still, those larger wagons in the back of the Morier painting seem to have gray tops, not red, though the two wheeled cart in front does have red.

Is anyone aware of any period documentation or other painting of British artillery wagons from the period?

Since we're talking wagons and baggage trains here, I was wondering did the armies of this period have ALL their baggage wagons painted the same color? I know the artillery train, limbers, and caissons, etc. were all painted in a specific color, i.e. Prussian-blue, Austrian-yellow/ochre, and so forth. But what about the general supply wagons, were they also subject to this color scheme?