"Need help with Rev. War soldiers below the knee!..." Topic

Hello TMP friends!

This might have been more appropriate to put in the painting guides sections, but here goes.

I have finally dove into the Rev. War, 28mm and have begun an extensive painting project that will involve several hundred miniatures. (no big news there!)

With the limited research I've done I've got the basics down for color schemes as far as jacket/coat colors, coat facings for British regiments matching the color of the field of their regimental flag, waistcoat and breeches, cartridge box, belts, some British regiments went to simpler cut down coats and cocked/slouch hats as opposed to the regimental coat and tricorne, etc.

Where I'm running into confusion is what happens down below the knee.

Rather than going into a long diatribe, I'll simply show one painting example. These are from the Perry Miniatures website:

Can you guys please explain to me what I'm exactly seeing here? Are these soldiers who are using their SOCKS to blouse their breeches? Or are they gaiters or some other form of leggings? That area of the model would be some form of gray or tan in color generally?

And then for the British minis. that I have, there seems to be several variations, some with what appear to be the breeches again tucked into "something", while other appear to have the breeches hanging loose and covering the tops of the shoe/boot. And others have taller boots, etc.

link

Again, same question. What am I looking at here? Are these breeches with gaiters? Is that all just breeches? Are those socks that happen to match the color of the breeches?

I'm just trying to get paint schemes down that I'm confident I know what I'm looking at so I don't keep guessing and stopping as I'm going down a row of these guys!

Most of the figures shown are wearing knee-length breeches; the stockings are showing below the knee, and the men are wearing short ankle-length gaiters over their shoes.

The Rhode Island Regiment man is wearing longer gaiter-trousers that go all the way down to the shoes (and in fact have a strap that passes under the instep).

In the photos above I see 2 variations: 1. Breeches with socks, and gaiters covering the shoes. 2. Long pants on the RI regt. This was more typical in the later war.

The linked page shows breeches with gaiters. AFAIK that was the regulation British line infantry uniform at the beginning of the war (there were long gaiters as well). I recently saw a good video on YT from the 10th regiment of foot reenactment group that may be helpful:

youtu.be/MRyOs9gCIQE

Thanks for the info guys! That Youtube video was extremely helpful in particular! I was thinking of searching on Youtube but wasn't sure what unit or type of vid. I should look at exactly. That 10th Foot looks like they take what they do very seriously and going over each piece of the uniform is invaluable.

There are excellent photographs of painted Imrie/Risley American infantrymen from the War of the Revolution here:

link

American light infantry can be found here:

link

British infantry can be seen here:

link

American infantry in hunting shirts and coveralls are here:

link

The website is here:

irminiatures.com

Imrie/Rislet also produces cavalry and artillery from the Revolution. To my mind they are the finest 54mm figures produced for the War of the Revolution. I've been collecting them since 1967.