Tel El Kebir

Let us stay a little bit with Colonial warfare. Beside increasing the Zulu diorama and working on my French army for Indochina I painted several figures for a Tel El Kebir diorama. This battle has its fascination for me, because it is colonial in one way - but on the other hand the Egyptian army was not this tribal army than others. Modern weapons, uniform etc. made them much more "European" and this is what is interesting for me.  The uniform is easy to paint, so it will make not as much work than for example a 1870 Franco-Prussian war diorama.

See here what I wanted to use as a plan for the diorama.

As for the uniforms see here some plates from my archive:

Figures are available from Waterloo 1815. This set is a mixture of the old 1884 uniform and the later 1890 campaign version. But we don't have many useful poses here.This set has a price wich is still good value for money. As for the latest sets of Waterloo we get less figures from set to set for a higher price. The same policy goes for Caesar and Italeri. Not really funny for a collector...
Ok, back from politics to the fun of the hobby.

We can convert figures like this!








I guess Duncan has something to say to it too:-))  Have a look at his blog and some great postings there http://osborneradloff.blogspot.com/search/label/Egyptian%20and%20Sudanese%20Army%201882%20to1898

Beside plastics there are some metals available from Ral Partha, Scruby and Hinton Hunt. Ral Partha are little bit bigger, more like Zvezda in height, Scruby and Hinton Hunt more on the Airfix-size. The later are more for the nostalgic collector like me too and don't have the standard of todays figures.  Here a photo of a Ral Partha unit (not my collection).

To safe me to convert hundreds of figures I also thought about converting my Turkish Crimean infantry into Egyptians. Remove the coat, sculpting it new and give them gaiters and the right equipment. Beside the loading one, very pose could be useful..

Maybe some of you have other ideas for a conversion. I would be glad to hear them.