Big Spanish Civil War Project Part 5: Milicianas

When people think of the Spanish Civil War, milicianas must surely be one of the most common images that come to mind. On the outbreak of the Nationalist rebellion, thousands of women in Republican Spain took up arms as members of trade union and party militias. Despite the Republic's reputation for being progressive, milicianas faced opposition from their leadership. They were mostly confined to special units, and efforts were made to move them away from the fronts as soon as possible.

The A World Aflame Jarama scenario I'm working towards requires some militia. I chose to paint these as belonging to the POUM (Partido Obrero de Unificación Marxista). George Orwell fought with this party, and documented his experiences in "Homage to Catalonia". 

The POUM was completely opposed to Stalinist Russia. As the USSR was the only major power supporting the Spanish Republic, the party was seen by some as a threat to the unity of the Republic. During the "May Days" of 1937, the POUM and the anarchists came into open conflict with The Republic. Many political intrigues followed, resulting in the repression of the party. 

The whole squad/platoon (depending on ruleset). By the time of the battle at Jarama, I highly doubt militia still wore civilian clothes! Still, I like the look and it could give me the freedom to use them for other parties, as they aren't tied to a specific uniform. 

Unfortunately Peter Pig don't make female command,  so I had to use the chap in the beret instead. 

 ¡A las barricadas! 

This base was a lot of fun to make. I just epoxied some gravel together. The sandbags were made using TheTerrainTutor's mass production method. 

I never want to paint dots in 15mm ever again! 

A command stand for the whole company.

At the start of this project, I bought a Really Useful Box and magnetised it. It's really fun to see it slowly filling up! I made a second layer for this box, but I'm still not sure if it will be enough to hold the entire project! 

Big Spanish Civil War Project Part 4: Nationalist Infantry

 Just finished most of a Nationalist Infantry Company. They haven't got a command stand or individually based officers yet.

I've had a few problems with this part of the project. I had intended to paint a company of Foreign Legion for the "A World Aflame" Jarama scenario, but bought the wrong models. I suppose these will give me more flexibility in the games I play in future - I'm not going to stop as soon as I've done the Jarama game.

The uniforms took me three tries to get the right shade. Frustrating, but I'm happy with them now. 

Another use for these guys could be as the Irish Brigade , made up of volunteers from the Blueshirts (arguably a Fascist, or Fascist - influenced organisation). They're often said to be the only army in history that "returned with more soldiers than when they left". Their discipline was very poor, and the Nationalists sent them home during the Battle of Jarama without actually seeing combat. It would make an interesting "what if" game to have them face the Irish International Brigade volunteers, much as they had done in the Dublin street fights some years prior. 

Some secondary sources show them as wearing the same olive green coats as other Nationalist Infantry. Some photos from the time show them wearing darker uniforms, though. I'm going to make an extra command stand for this company to allow me to "morph" them.

Group photo of the rifles.

Each group of 3 bases can be a squad or platoon depending on the ruleset. 

I've tried to go with more of a scenic look for these bases, hence the sandbags. I made them using TheTerrainTutor's sandbag maker.

Two LMG teams and some individuals. 

The lad carrying the boxes is going to be a "Runner" in A World Aflame. He'll bring orders from HQ to individual units. The officer on the right will likely be a PO in Crossfire. 

The Crew of the Fenian Ram

 When I was but a lad of 12, I saw an ad for a new set of rules in Wargames Illustrated, by the name of "In Her Majesty's Name". A bit of research revealed that it was the type of game which really appealed to me. A narrative Victorian Sci-fi skirmish game? Yes please!

IHMN allows players to build "adventuring companies" of between 5 and 20 figures. The rules encourage narrative play, with many colourful characters. The factions in the core rules are varied and really interesting, ranging from London anarchists to the Prussian military's secret occult weapons department. The best part of the rules in my opinion is the ability to make entirely new factions. The rules provide points costs for every statistic, weapon and talent, so it's easy to modify existing companies or create entirely new ones!

This year saw the release of the second edition of IHMN. And it is good. Very good. The new rules provide even more customisation with the introduction of yet more talents, companies and weird science. My favourite of these additions must be the new vehicles. Ships and aircraft allow games to be played in the sky or on the sea.

I decided I wanted to make myself a new company. The late 19th century is a fantastic era for inspiration. I remembered a bit of fairly obscure Irish history that I thought would be perfect for an adventuring company.

The "Fenian Ram" was built in 1881 under the design of John Philip Holland, an Irish engineer. It was commissioned by the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB, Fenians). Disputes over funding meant Holland refused to teach the Fenians how to pilot the Ram, and it never saw action against British ships.

What if the Ram had been built in a Victorian Science Fiction universe, though?? 

I thought it would be perfect for IHMN. 

In my alternate history, the Ram was built to sink British merchant vessels which were constantly exporting food from Ireland. This was a problem for Ireland, as in 1879 there were fears that famine could strike as it had in 1845. Armed with anger and funds from the Irish National Land League, the Fenians set to work on the Ram's construction... 

I've wanted to get some Lead Adventure steampunk miniatures for ages now. I love their style, every model looks like an individual with an interesting background. They're a little more expensive than some other 28mm figures, but they are really good value. The details are excellent, as is the casting.

This is the first crew member I finished. Like all the others, she doesn't have a name yet, but I have ideas for who she'll be. I've painted her with the "Irish" tartan pattern, indicative of the Celtic Revival romanticism of the era (Ireland doesn't actually have any tartan). This model took ages to finish (about 20 hours), mostly because of the tartan and the white shirt.

This character will probably be the engineer of the crew. She has some kind of steam powered hammer that could be for riveting metal onto the submarine. I painted it as copper with a heavy patina, as if it's been used underwater a lot. I do quite like painting copper, if you haven't noticed yet. 

I really like the weird bits of tech she's wearing. It's very hard to pick a favourite out of these models, but if I had to, this one would probably be it.

I think this guy will turn out to be some kind of explosives specialist. Maybe that rocket over his arm is a torpedo from the Ram. Again I really like the tech he's carrying, the cables are an opportunity to add some more colour. I like the gas mask and bowler hat, it's a bit quirky that someone would care so much about their appearance while wearing overalls and a breath preserver!

He has a little Gal Gréine ("sun banner") embroidered on his shoulder. This is a very old Irish flag. 

I painted this chap to look a little more gentlemanly. Maybe he's an aristocrat by day, undersea rebel by night. I think his face is full of character, and it was my favourite part to paint. I like the can of "CO2" on his belt which powers the hook-gun! 

I tried out a purple-yellow colour contrast (coincidentally the colours of my county). The purple took many tries. It's a very challenging colour to highlight without bleaching it or creating harsh transitions. I'm happy enough with the result, but still learning. 

His base was particularly fun to make. It features a gutter filled with some kind of greenish liquid. Yuck. 

The Ship's Boy. Very hard to photograph, because he's facing the ground. I think it adds a lot to his character though, it's as if he doesn't want to make eye contact with the viewer.

In IHMN he will probably accompany the captain, as two people are required to load and fire a flamethrower. 

The captain. A diver armed with a flamethrower. Not many things more VSF than that.

I think I'll make these into quite an elite company, with a lower than average number of figures. Every model in the Lead Adventure range is a character in itself. In addition, the crew of a submarine shouldn't be that large anyway, although I'm considering adding some local sympathisers to the company.

The company needs a Fenian Ram, of course. I'm definitely going to scratch build one! 

Big Spanish Civil War Project Part 2: Dinamiteros

I finished these off ages ago, but only got around to writing them up now. They're very characterful figures from Peter Pig. 

Dinamiteros were militia who fought using nothing but homemade explosives and slings, the most simple of all ranged weapons. I have had trouble finding many primary sources, but this article provides a lot of information. Time Article

I've read secondary sources which claim Dinamiteros were also used by the Nationalist faction, but can't find any evidence to support this.

The claim that captured Dinamiteros were executed immediately by the Nationalists does not seem particularly unusual to me. This level of aggression towards captured Republicans seems to be fairly universal. Hugh Thomas argues that both leaders and rank and file Republicans were executed without much thought in "The Spanish Civil War", (1986). He uses an acvount in which Franco was said to have ordered three ordinary militiawomen to be shot as an example of this brutality. 

Many sources I've read strongly associate Dinamiteros with Asturias, a region notable in this period for its mines and unionised workers. The mines were a ready source of explosives.

However, they seem to have been more widespread than just Asturias. At the 30 second mark of this footage, you can see a group of Dinamiteros fighting at the siege of the Alcazar in Toledo: Footage

In this photo, the banner identifies the Dinamiteros as "Vascos" (Basques). Some appear to be wearing slings tied around their necks. Image here

This photo (and others) by Gerda Taro show Dinamiteros during the Siege of Madrid. Image

Since "dinamitero" means simply "dynamiter", I don't think slings were used by everyone in the above sources. There's no denying that explosive slingers make great gaming units though. 

Enough historical nonsense! On to the models themselves 😊

The whole group. Four bases of two-man teams. 

Some close ups

Big Spanish Civil War Project Part 1: International Brigade

 For several years, I've been really interested in the Spanish Civil War. It's a really interesting era of history, with so many different ideologies and personalities clashing. It's perfect for wargamers, both for these reasons and because of the range of unusual troops players can use.

A few months back, I decided I'd make a Spanish Republican army for Hordes of the Things, as it's my major ruleset. It wasn't long before I had another idea, though. I decided I was going to paint both sides of the war. I'll probably use them for solo games, but not exclusively. The models I'm using are 15mm Peter Pig. 

As a goal, I've decided to paint enough models to fight the example scenario at the end of the Osprey rulebook "A World Aflame". This is the Battle of Jarama, in February 1937. 

The first batch of models I painted was a company of International Brigade troops. These were people who came from all over the world to fight for the Second Spanish Republic against the Nationalist rebellion. They were organised by the Soviet Communist Party, something which would make France and Britain view the Republic in a negative light. They're particularly interesting to me because they represent the British Battalion at the Jarama, which contained many volunteers from my own country, Ireland.

A group picture of the whole company

 

Each group of figures is on a 3cm square base. It's a fairly generic basing scheme, as I'd like to try different rulesets. They are based in the same way as the Balagan Blog recommends for Crossfire. I've also made labels for each base in a style similar to his. Thank you for these ideas 😊

Individually based figures

Since A World Aflame is the ruleset I'm going to try out first, I based some models individually. These are message runners, medics, forward observers (for Crossfire) and squad leaders. 

Company Commander and HMG

Like most of my stuff, I painted the flag on the command stand. I first made the structure of the flag from an aluminium drink can. Then I printed the flag I wanted to replicate, and painted over it to give it a "scale lighting" effect.

Three squads / platoons.

Not much to say about these really. I'm really happy with them.

At the start, I wasn't mad about Peter Pig figures, but as I've painted them I've started to really like them. They are quite small, even for 15mm, but they have excellent detail. The faces are especially good, and are even better on the batch of Nationalists I've just started working on.

In relation to the Spanish Civil War, today is the anniversary of the bombing of the Basque town of Guernica (Gernika). This was an outrage which was unfortunately only the first of many of its kind. 

Conall Beag

 

I just finished painting this miniature from Monkstone Miniatures. They're making a very interesting range of fantasy figures with a unique look. This one is "Rollo the Masterful", but Conall Beag (Conall the Little) is the name that came to me for him. 

I had a lot of fun experimenting with this colour scheme. Purple and turquoise are two of my favourite colours, but I haven't painted many figures with them. I imagine the scheme to be Conall's knightly heraldry. 

The Silver Pinnacle Slayers

I painted this Dwarf Blood Bowl team back around the start of Lockdown, having wanted to start the game for years. I chose Dwarfs as my first team because they are very resilient players who are also well able to dish out damage!

I decided to go with NMM for the metal parts of the figures. I'm very happy with how it turned out. Apologies for the poor quality of the photos. 

A group shot of the whole squad!

My favourite players on the team are the Troll Slayers. These guys are very strong, and are able to hold their own against most other teams. Their main downside is their "Frenzy" special rule, which makes them recklessly pursue their opponents. 

I painted runic tattoos on both of them, although they might not al be visible in the photos. 

Two Blitzers:

The three different poses of Blockers (also referred to as Longbeards). 

Finally, two Runners. These are the "fast" players on the (notoriously slow) Dwarf team. They're great for running into the End Zone for a touchdown. 

I plan on painting up some Star Players and Secret Weapons for this team. Every Dwarf team needs a Deathroller sooner or later!