Monday, February 1, 2021

Banner Blunder!

Good morning and happy February!   I hope this finds you and those you love well and healthy, and that we all get good news from the groundhog tomorrow (is there a COVID groundhog, I wonder?).   In January, my main effort at the Mad Padre’s painting chapel has been finishing a box of Perry Miniatures plastic Union Infantry Skirmishing.  They are finished and just waiting the final touches in the Basing Barracks before they muster into service, but I wanted to share a small tale of woe with you.

Notice anything wrong?

Probably shouldn’t have put the regimental banner on dark and early after only half a cup of coffee.   Looks like the Union is in trouble!   Good thing I got the national flag right.   A great pity, as these banners were included with the figures in the box, and the print and paper quality were sufficiently high that I was quite happy using them to make this a new unit of US Regulars.  Alas, trying to get the regimental flag off the pole intact proved impossible and it had to be sacrificed.

Fortunately I spoke to the War Department and we agreed to muster this unit into the Irish Brigade as the 116th PA, as I fortunately had the GMB Designs flag set for that unit in my stores.   This will allow me to bring the strength of the Brigade up to three regiments, which is quite respectable on a 28mm table.   Col. Meagher will be quite pleased.

Morale of the story, go slow and drink lots of coffee!   I won’t mention the slight damage I did to myself with a new Olfa blade when I finally decided to remove the old flag - that’s another story, but these chaps now march on a bloody battlefield.

Cheers and blessings,

MP+

12 comments:

  1. Been there, made the blood sacrifices to the hobby gods. End result looks great.

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    1. Thanks, I was saving the GMB flags for some of Steve Barber's figures with Irish Brigade heads but there is still a fourth IB regiment to go, I believe.

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  2. I thought it was an optical illusion caused by how vigorously he was waving the flag. Yup.
    Ah well, all's well as ends well.

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    Replies
    1. He's shaking that flag to ward off the bullets!

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  3. That was a close call. Nice recovery. You could have kept it 'as is' and if anyone asked, you could say the regiment was being disciplined for poor battlefield performance.

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    Replies
    1. They still have their first battle to look forward to, so I'm not expecting great performance!

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  4. Happy ending and lesson learned - could be much worse. And the bleeding stopped. Nice mini too.

    I recall studying my proud new blog post pics of a Napoleonic battle a few years ago, when I learned that my 5th battalion of the KGL line infantry had been carrying their flag upside down for about 10 years. Ouch. It's OK. Every day we get better.

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    Replies
    1. Amish ladies are said to make a deliberate mistake in every quilt, as a remedy against excessive pride. Maybe I should have left it the way it was.

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  5. Irish? In Pennsylvania?
    I should know! There's a doggerel supposedly from the AWI:
    "Here's to the Irish! We're not very much!
    But a damn sight better than the Pennsylvania Dutch!"
    (I didn't write it. Blame history."

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    Replies
    1. 116th PA were mostly Irish immigrants recruited in Philadelphia.

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  6. Its easily done - I have a unit of 15mm T34 tanks with the tracks on back to front - as they are metal fixed to resin with epoxy glue, I did not attempt to remove them - no one has ever noticed except my mate who gave me the wrong info about which way to put them on in the first place!

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