In search of Marlborough

John Churchill the Duke of Marlborough, probably Britain's greatest General. I know he is my favourite, so with the chance to paint up the English and Scottish regiments for Ramilles I had the chance to paint up the great man himself to lead them. Finding a suitable figure has proved slightly problematic. There is a particular figure in the Generals pack from Essex that looks suitable, but I dislike ordering single packs due to postage costs. I do know that Mini Figs do a figure for Marlborough, but there are no pictures on their site, a shame these days. So trawling the Internet I remembered Irregular do a range of serviceable figures. So I decided to order a couple of their Generals and an artillery battery to justify the postage costs.

So far I have done 2 versions. The first is accompanied by a spare kettle drummer I had, while the other is with a Cornet, took inspiration from the old Osprey cover of Marlborough's army.

As can be seen the Irregular figure is a little rough but paints up okay. Now I can't decide which I like best . So here are a few extra pictures of each.

Now the more I look at these, I'm happy enough with them, but....they are not quite right for me. I think will continue my search, these chaps look like they will be getting relegated to the role of Divisional commanders. Also I would like to try and get a figure to represent one of Marlboroughs' runners, though not sure if anyone out there makes one, may have to try a conversion, but I hate doing that with 15mm figures.

As an aside I did manage to paint up the artillery as well. My only complaint was one of the gunners snapped at the ankles when I removed him from the painting stick. Luckily I had a spare Roundway figure to press into service.