British Dragoons for Maurice

I've been thinking of painting up a 2nd Maurice army to serve as a loaner for my friends who game only Ancients.  I'm thinking this might tempt them to game in the Era of Gentlemen and Philosophers, even though these fellows can hardly be mistaken for gentlemen.They're hard-pressed to put on a pair of pants before venturing into public, such is their love for the Gauls. Coarse as they are, my ancients-loving friends might one day be persuaded to serve as bayonet holders for my Ottoman army.

As I was looking at the options for Seven Years War armies, it dawned on me that I'd never painted a tricorn hat.  And wasn't that #22 on my bucket list?  Good lord, time to stop procrastinating and get my lace on! My friend Mark was working on his British-inspired ImagiNation army so I asked if he had any units I could train on, er, paint up.  As luck would have it, he had a dandy SYW British Dragoon unit in the wings.

The beauty of painting outside your comfort zone is that, well, it's outside your comfort zone. The downside is that there are probably ten good reasons why it's outside your comfort zone.  For me, I haven't read much on the Seven Years War and I had no reference material for the armies or era.  I sent Mark a text asking if he had any inspirational material for his British Hussars.  Oooops. Wrong word.  I learned that Hussars and Dragoons don't mix, unless it's on a battlefield.  After a bit of bumbling out of the gate, here are the results:

These Old Glory figs are crisp and loaded of detail. To my surprise, I discovered that each Dragoon carried more gear into battle than paratroopers took into Normandy.  A brace of pistols, a musket, a sword, three separate ammo packs and a bed roll.  They were Death on Hooves. If I do paint up a SYW  army, I'll be ordering it from OG.

Next week, I'll try to turn this mdf board into terrain for Maurice.