More Musketeers for the king

 I decided to paint some more figures for PML using sets by RedBox only. First I used the "Guards of Cardinal Richelieu" [1]. There is even a figure for the "men from Meung" in the set. As the Plastic Soldier Review mentioned it, the cross on all of the cassocks is wrong. We find a very simple cross on the only contemporary painting of that unit from the 1620s [2]. Maybe RedBox relied on photos from TV or cinema productions. Although in the most recent movie we see no cassocks for those guards at all [3]. I just ignored the crosses on the figures and painted as I wished. The arquebuses of the set are looking very short compared with the weapons on the painting.

The guards of Richelieu mostly have nice marching poses. One of them has very simple clothes and a long cloak for some reasons. Maybe he has to attack one of D'Artagnan's friends in a narrow street? (photo: F. Hanselmann)

Maybe the guy in the black cloak is one of those poor scoundrels from the novel. The other prominent figure maybe is the comte de Rochefort? (photo: F. Hanselmann)

The Musketeers of the Royal Guard are sculpted with more elaborated details. All of the horses have 2 pistols hanging from the saddles and have very relaxed poses. I decided that these poses are better for escorting the king or a very important commander. (photo: F. Hanselmann)

After these figures, I tried to paint more Musketeers of the famous Guard under the comte de Tréville (1598-1672) - although he was not Capitaine-Lieutenant in 1627 during the siege of La Rochelle [4]. Some of them are on horseback and therefore I had to use the Mounted Musketeers of the king of France [5] however the muskets are looking much too short and they even miss the forked rest. That's very strange because the companions on foot do have them and it's not plausible at all why they should lose them on horse. I asked myself how to use them in the skirmish games because the musketeers on their horses would fight like trotters, maybe using their pistols because you surely can't use your musket shooting from the saddle. In a very interesting documentary by arte you can see the real muskets from the period [6]. These weapons are not only too heavy but too long too. The historian presented a very elaborated model - but maybe these guns were very much decorated because all of the guards were aristocrats such as the famous d'Artagnan himself [7].

Unfortunately riders by RedBox and Strelets mostly don't fit on the somehow fat horses. But the beards are very nicely done. (photo: A. Hanselmann)

Maybe here you can see how I tried to paint most of them very individual clothes, because they are nobles. I didn't cut the feathers as I normally do for that period. (photo: A. Hanselmann)

I have no idea how the flag of the musketeers was looking. Therefore I painted one of them as a normal infantry flag with a with cross on a white field. (photo: A. Hanselmann)

Finally you can see 12 musketeers on foot from the sets "Musketeers of the king of France" [8] and "Guards of Cardinal Richelieu". It was not a real problem to mix figures from both sets because the cross on the cassocks is looking the same and even the muskets of the musketeers are very much the same size as the arquebuses of Richelieu's guards although the rifle butts are looking different. But if you compare different black powder weapons from the period you can notice such differences in style [9].

Different muskets on the castle in Nuremberg. (photo: C. Hanselmann)

 

Text: André Hanselmann

Photos: Ferdinand Hanselmann, Cecilia Hanselmann, André Hanselmann 

 

Notes: 

1) RedBox Set 72147 

2) Nicolas Prévost: "Réduction de Montauban par le cardinal de Richelieu, le 21 août 1629"

3) https://wackershofenannodomini.blogspot.com/2023/04/les-trois-mousquetaires-dartagnan-2023.html 

4) Naturally that was no problem for Alexandre Dumas to include him very prominently in his famous novel nevertheless. 

5) RedBox Set 72146 

6) "La véritable histoire de d’Artagnan" France, 2020

7) Just notice how long the musketeers tried to get a lot of money to buy their equipment for the campaign at La Rochelle in the novel! Maybe there is a grain of salt there as they were too proud to buy cheap weapons of normal soldiers. Just compare the weapons in the documentary with the weapons on our events! 

8) RedBox set 72145 

9) In Germany I would recommend to visit the collections in Nuremberg.