Battle of Tacna - next Step

 with the Dioramica at the end of September 2026 comming closer and my plan to put a big diorama at show there, I have to gear up a little bit.

Patrick told me, I can have a table 4x1,75 meters, so enough space to have a good display on show:-)

The landscape is easy to make, it is the Atacama dessert. Especially in the area of Tacna not much vegetation. 

The line of defense is three kilometer long line of sandbags, sand dfences and boxes. Not much fortifications done by the Bolivians and Peruvians. So easy to build.

These photos just as an idea of the barricades. The description of the battlefield is:

The Intiorko plateau is an arid and soft-sloped terrain located a few miles north from Tacna, becoming an excellent shooting ground. It has on the rear of a series of small sand ridges that allowed the concealment of reserve units behind them.

The main assault comes on the allied open left, while the units on the left half of the fortifications were held in check by a frontal assault. The Chilenians and Peruavians send reinforcements from the reserves to plug the gap on the left. This will be the phase of the battle, I want to show.

A moving firefight on the defenders flank and a holding battle in the front. 

See here some photos of the Chilenians who take on the front

At the open flank, it is a gentle slope without cover. So it is an exchange of fire like in 18th century warfare and sometimes it comes to close combat. Here I need more lively poses.

Well, the last one is pure Bolivian propaganda:-) I am wondering if they really fought this way in the time of breech loading guns....

So what poses do I need? I already had "our" 3D-artist producer some nice Bolivians and Chilenians. The latter in three versions. 

You can see the figures and the poses in our shop. 

Now I need the Peruvians, infantry and artillery. The Peruvian army used the Gatling Modell 1874. So I asked my friend Peter (Compagnie d'Elite) to create me one.

Ok, without the bottle, I would need some of them myself when working with a lot of sand:-)

Comming to the uniforms. The Cilenian army is much more colorful, then you think. We have the regular uniform blue and red

At Tacna, we had some other units too

I am not sure, if the Valparaiso was this militia unit, or the regular one. Have to check it more closely.

The Peruvians are easy to paint, mostly a white summer uniform

The Bolivians are more colorful and it makes fun, painting the figures in different colors.

The last unit here is Batallion Sucre, they were shot to pieces, because they hold their ground when other units were pushed back. It will be an interesting scenario.

Talking about casualties, here the latest figures in our range. Casualties for the attackers. 

The same poses will come for the Bolivians. Afterwards we will go for the Peruvians. 

If any hobbyfriends from South-America reading this post, can someone tell me, which kind of plants these black ones are, which I can see everywhere from photos of this area?

I would have to think about how to create it on the diorama.