Another Artillery Master Model for Perry Miniatures

Here's an 1870 Prussian 6-pounder gun, modelled for casting as part of Michael Perry's 28mm Franco-Prussian War range. It's the fifth and last of the field artillery for the two main forces in that war. Earlier I made a mountain howitzer for Alan Perry's Paraguayan War range, and a couple of years back three masters for  Nick Eyre's North Star 1866 range. If and when Michael gets as far as the 1870 Bavarians I might do a gun for them, otherwise this completes my work on artillery masters for the foreseeable future. 

The best aspect of doing these has been finding my skills develop in a previously unfamiliar area of modelmaking. I am feeling my advanced age just at the moment, so it is reassuring to find I can still learn the odd new trick!

This is the Prussian rifled, breech-loading "6-pounder" gun, specifically the C/67 type, ie "Model 1867", the most common of three slightly different guns of this calibre used by the field artillery in 1870-71. The other two were the original 1861 model, but now on this new carriage, and a smaller number of the 1864 version with a square breach but converted to the plug-closure system. I had the pleasure of researching this aspect in conjunction with Markus Stein, the expert who wrote the German volume of last year's monumental work on uniforms of the Franco-Prussian War, which is Michael's main reference for sculpting the figure range.

Incidentally, those interested in the range will have been wondering what's happening with it, as nothing has actually been released in the last six months. I pressed Michael on this and learned that he has been working on the range. The plastic French infantry are progressing towards release in a few months time. In metal he mentioned he's sculpted French line cavalry, prone Prussian infantry and a Prussian "high command" pack, apparently of Bismarck, Moltke and the king. Any or all of these metals could be released any day soon.

You will perhaps be wondering why this model has some parts in white styrene and some in a beige colour. The answer is that this gun used the exact same wheels and axle-seats as the 4-pounder, which I made last year, so I was able to recycle the relevant cast resin parts from that. The gun barrel and breech were completely different in design, and the carriage was similar but some 15% bigger for this heavier piece. The complete 6-pounder was considered heavy enough to require a drag-brake and chain, which the lighter piece managed without. 

As I've mentioned before, the designation of guns as a "6-pounder" or whatever referred to the weight of solid iron cannonball which a gun of this calibre (91.5mm) could theoretically fire. But they actually fired pointed, impact-fused shells of some 15 pounds weight. They comprised 50% of the Prussian foot artillery in 1870.

This gun's breech closed in a complex but effective way. A plug at the back swung to, slid in and was screwed tight against a second plug which slid in from the side. I wanted to model this because it's interesting, and to enable Michael to sculpt a set of crew in "loading" positions. So I built the whole barrel and breech twice over, with a closed and an open version

I thought it would be interesting to see the model disassembled into it's component parts. You've got the carriage, two wheels, two axle seats, open- and closed-breech barrels, then the trail handle, elevating wheel and drag brake. It would be a lot easier to build the model in a single piece, but it couldn't be moulded and cast like that. The customer will have to get the superglue out and assemble a "kit" of nine parts, but wargames guns usually have a number of bits to glue together. On this model at least the parts all have very positive locating pins and holes where they fit.