Zambezi Campaign 25: Heavily armed askaris

These are the 12 heavily armed askaris which I need for my Arab army.  I finished them today, so that gives me all four of the units of firearm-equipped Zanzibari troops I need for the Gary Chalk scenarios.  Wargames Foundry figures, of course.

The Arab force so far: perilously close to an army!

Now all I have to do are complete the sword armed Baluchis, another cannon, plus the leader of the force, and the Arab force will be complete.  Then I will have to move on to the three tribal forces I need which will total 140 figures.  I'm not sure if these are all armed with spears which means painting cursed shields so I will have to check back in the relevant issue of Wargames Illustrated.  A little bit of research has shown that tribesmen in this area would have had Zulu style shields so I will probably have to order them from somewhere.  Empress miniatures do them separately I know.

I'll probably take on the second cannon next.

Zambezi Campaign 24: Third unit of Wangwana

In a burst of activity last week I completed my third unit of 14 Wangwana freedmen for my Arab army.  The final unit of these Zanzibari soldiers will be 12 heavily armed askaris with more modern rifles (Winchesters and such like).  I have already started these.  After these I only have another cannon and crew to do (also started) and the Baluchis with swords which I have also started but which are going to take ages.  

I probably have enough figures now to do an initial skirmish which is not part of the Gary Chalk scenarios.  I'm thinking of sending the Sikhs into the bush to see if they can discover what the Arab slavers are up to.  A nasty discovery would mean the dispatch of the gunboat up river.

Other good news is that I managed to get another Copplestone elephant on eBay as these are far superior to the ones they used in the Gary Chalk article.  Now I can paint them both together.

I'm also contemplating two more forces: German and French.  I already have some of the Foundry Germans although they will need repainting and as for the French I am very tempted by some of Artizan's new French Foreign Legion (especially the ones in sun helmets) and some tirailleurs.  Hmm...

Zambezi Campaign 22: Second unit of Wangwana

Today I finished my second unit of Wangwana for the Arab forces.  I now have one more unit of fourteen of these to paint.  I'm not sure if I actually have the figures available for this.  I found some today but need to have a look in some of my other file boxes.  Frankly, my unpainted figures are in a total mess at present so I need to have a sort out and a bit of an inventory.  I also need to paint a unit of 12 heavily armed askaris and am not sure if I have these either.

Baluchis ready for undercoating

One thing I do have is the 14 Baluchi swordsmen that are needed for one of the other Arab units.  Gary Chalk's scenario is set in 1882 and mine probably ten years later than that.  Baluchi swordsmen like this would probably have disappeared from Africa decades before this but perhaps our Arab warlord has held on to his in his isolated inland enclave.  One thing is for sure they are not going to be as quick to paint as the Wangwana!  I plan to paint them in brighter colours than the Wangwana to reflect their higher status and the saffron coloured clothes that many of them wore.

Zambezi Campaign 14: First unit of Wangwana

Having now finished the British force (except for the gunboat) I have moved on to the Arabs, who are the most numerically large of the various forces needed.  The first unit I have finished is of 14 Wangwana: the freed-men of Zanzibar. 

These Swahili of the East coast of Africa supplied most of the troops for the Arabs from Zanzibar and, indeed, those who had settled further into the interior, like our theoretical slavers in these scenarios.  They also worked for European explorers and this picture of Speke's "faithfulls" gives a good idea of their apperance.

In most pictures I have seen they are shown as wearing white, although they did wear blue and red tradecloth and even some striped material in the later period.  There seems to be a suggestion that they may have saved these brightly coloured clothes for best so, on the whole, I am going to keep them dressed in white.

I need to paint three units of fourteen of these and have already got the second unit based and undercoated and the third unit based.  I will alternate painting them with other figures I have part-painted on the workbench, so I think I will take a break from these for a bit and finish some Zulus that have been sitting around for far too long.

Leading the unit is an Arab from Zanzibar.  In fact many of the "Arabs" at this time had interbred with Africans and, indeed, it was said that they were successful at settling in the interior as they had inherited some resistance to malaria from their African forbears.

These will be useful figures I can use in explorers' forces as well.  I thought they might be a bit boring to paint but found the simple colour scheme quite relaxing!