Guys,

I'm starting a figure of an Officer, Scots Fusilier Guards, battle of the Alma, Crimea. This is not a period I'm very familiar with. Unfortunately, there is no box-art with this figure and I've never seen one painted. Any uniform references would be very helpful and appreciated, as I want to get the uniform and accessories right. Particularly the back of the uniform, but again, anything is helpful. Thanks,

Jason

P.S. I've checked Google images, etc and found some useful pics, but nothing outstanding and nothing showing the back of the uniform.

Jason

Hi Does this help.

Scarlet coat with blue collar and cuffs with white lining and turnbacks. The collar has gold embroidery extending round the side of the neck. There are four raised gold lozenge shapes on each side with a silver thistle badge between them. Down the front are 18 gilt buttons in two rows and spaced in threes. The cuff flap is of scarlet cloth with three buttons and gold lace decoration, the whole thing is at right angles to the plain blue round cuff.
At the back, the tails have false vertical pockets with similar decoration to the cuff flaps but with more space between the gold lace. There are two buttons at waist level in the middle of the back. The base of the tails have gold butterfly-shaped ornaments with a silver thistle badge. The epaulettes are missing from this coat so we cannot tell which company the wearer was in. This style of coat was worn in full dress and on campaign in the Crimea; it lasted, with slight changes, from 1830 until 1854.




The rolled blanket had to be carried like this by officers because they did not have knapsack straps like their men. This illustration by Pierre Turner shows clearly the silver thistle badge on the gold collar and the red stripe down the trousers. The stripe was 1.5 inches wide and the trousers were Oxford mixture, not blue.
Guards officers would have looked like this from their landing at Kalamita Bay on 14th September until the Battle of the Alma on 20th. The white trousers normally worn up until 14th October were left behind in Varna and dark winter trousers worn. The battle of
Inkerman was fought on a foggy night in November so greatcoats were worn.

Mick

Wow, Mick! You are the man! That’s VERY helpful. One question: I thought the trousers were dark blue, but above it says the trousers are Oxford mixture and not blue. What is oxford mixture?

Also, it looks like the rolled blanket is dark blue. Is that correct?

Hi Jason.
THe trousers were Oxford Blue during the Crimean War Definitely. They were changed to a dark Prussian Blue on there return in eithr 1856 with the New tunics or maybe 1861. Cant be sure of the date as I dont have my Ref books to hand.
Re the blanket I think what you are seeing in the pic above is the blanket rolled up inside his overcoat. which will be a dark Blue/Grey. Reason being you dont want to get under a wet blanket when your trying to get your head down.
One last thing to remember SFG's had no plume on the bearskin.
All the best
Mick

OK. Thank you very much sir! Very helpful.

Jason

Great advices. I paint the Scots Fusilier Guards colour bearer from "Stormtroopers" at the moment.The color I choose for the oxfordblue is Dark Sea Blue and Black from Vallejo brand.I think it works...

Humbrol 104 is 'Oxford Blue' matt.
From experience, the first coat always looks crap, but it gets better with further coats.

Cheers,
Andrew