Bolt Action: Late War Free French - Le Tricolore on US Gear [How I Paint Things]

[@iangabor6822]

Yay a Free French painting tutorial. I've already painted my Free French but this will be good for others. Couple of fun facts, the first is that the preponderance of Adrian helmets is quite large so the majority of the platoon should be wearing them and the 9th company of the Regiment du Marche du T'Chad was made of Spanish exiles from the Civil War so you had elements of the French army that had almost a decade of combat experience.

[@AnExtrovertPaints]

You would be the first to comment!

[@iangabor6822]

@@AnExtrovertPaints except I wasn't the first comment lol

[@Stormtrooper990]

Lol... I litterally came home from vacation from Normandie in France, with a set of those guys that I bought from the overlord museum, because I got hocked on them while staying. And here you are with a video on how to paint them :D

[@irishtom30]

Any model with a moustache is ok with me. Looking forward to a Magnum P.I. tutorial soon!

[@beaushaver3779]

Fantastic

[@loupiscanis9449]

Thank you , Troy . 🐺

[@timothyyoung2962]

I see Sonic has posted a historical mini painting video I click. Turned out great. Also love that they held on to their old helmets, etc out of pride.

[@joeokabayashi8669]

Excellent figure conversion!

[@JonnyBaggs]

Just pure enjoyment watching you paint and learning something new.

[@SonicSledgehammerStudio]

Happy to hear that!

[@wolfehoffmann2697]

Very nice. I've done a lot of American forces on commission and to sell and was thinking of doing Free French. I was kind of hoping someone would put out decals for the arm patches, but I guess they're easy enough to free hand. I just hate spending that extra time versus cranking out more models. A simple $5 USD decal sheet saves me many hours of my life in the majority of projects and adds well to the over all look.

[@MrCrystalwarrior1]

I just taught a friend about how the French Foreign Legion fought against each other during WW2. One side fought with the Free French forces, and the other with the Vichy French Forces under German Command. Now he is painting up his own opposing forces so he can game some of those battles :-) I love this figure, and how you painted it. Once I've finished my Brazilian expeditionary Force, I'm hoping to start a French force for myself, so seeing this has just made me MUCH more determined to start collecting some soon :-D

[@SonicSledgehammerStudio]

You have to feel for the men of the Legion going up against their comrades. Same too with French troops having to fight Vichy forces - under different circumstances and for the stroke of a pen on the map they'd have been brothers in arms. Makes for an interesting opportunity on the tabletop, at the very least, and a fascinating moment in history.

[@MrCrystalwarrior1]

@@SonicSledgehammerStudio I found a book about the Legion history called "The Damned Die Hard" and it tells how once the Legion fought against itself when French wasn't the language they all spoke in the early days after it formed. Apparently they were all divided into different groups because of their diverse languages, and one day, an Arab ambush patrol crept up on some Legionnaires who were literally fighting each other to the death at an oasis. They were opposing German and Italian speaking troops, and had a falling out, which quickly turned lethal, much to the amusement of the Arabs. This was when the Legion wore Shako style hats and French Line Infantry Napoleonic style uniforms, with just a blue cummerbund to mark them as Foreign Legion. This incident was the turning point for the Legion, language wise, as they then made French the main language to be spoken, and mixed all the troops together so they had to learn French together. I also found a wonderful book called "Our Friends Beneath The Sands" about the Legion, and its history of the desert outposts up to and including the Algerian campaign. Huge book, but written by actual Legion historians, and very hard hitting about life for those who served in those days. I use these types of books to inspire war games for my various Foreign Legion forces throughout history, but the 1st & 2nd World Wars are what fascinate me the most, as many Legionnaires were fighting against their own countrymen at those times, so must have had quite a few issues to deal with, the same as the Americans who fought for Germany during WW2, after Hitler called for all "True Aryans" to return to Germany and fight for the Fatherland. Even some English troops who were captured, went on to create the Britischer Frei Korps (British Free Corps) who fought on the Eastern Front against the Russians, and there were two Irishmen who actually joined the Waffen SS, too. There's so much history that could be used to create games/scenarios, for Bolt Action or any other WW2 game system, that no two battles would be the same :-) Just watching your Chaos Cultist video too, and having ideas for creating a warband/army for WH40k now :-> Keep up the awesome work, and I'll keep on being inspired :-D

[@joee1251]

As usual another great tutorial. And might I add, I really appreciate the little additional historical information with these types of mini's. Thank you!

[@AnExtrovertPaints]

Excellent work as always, Troy!

[@JonJonRon]

What great timing. I've just this second placed an order for some WWII French infantry from Wargames Atlantic as this video got posted. Great job as always I really enjoy the channel

[@brushmans-guild]

This looks smashing, Sledge; I have a very-nearly-complete early-war French force (made up mostly of Wargames Atlantic's stuff) that I've been working on for what feels like an eternity, so the last thing I need once they're finished would be a late-war force as well, but there's something about that Adrian helmet that's making me dangerously tempted to splash out.

[@SonicSledgehammerStudio]

Well, only makes sense, surely! If you've got a late war force, you can include the guys in original French uniforms as FFI units pulled into service and given legacy equipment out of recently recaptured stores... :D

[@joesturn7740]

Is the helmet that comes in the Wargames Atlantic kit an Adrian Helmet or are they a bit different?

[@brushmans-guild]

@@joesturn7740 Yup that's the one; the helmet the chaps in the WW1/2 box set is the Adrian helmet.

[@grantus27]

Sometimes it's like you are reading my mind! Just the other day I was looking at the Adrian helmet heads on Anvil Industries and Mad Robot Miniatures - both sets would just need a small amount of filing to take off the futuristic parts. Mad Robot also have the iconic kepi's as well as soft kepi's with neck covers. I've got left over warlord 8th Army bodies so was thinking I could do Free French/Vichy in North Africa (I think the Perry metals for those forces look fine but scale wise are very slight)

[@nickdavis5420]

Ohhh interesting 🤨 hmmm might make a force of these guys for konflict 47 might also mix more heavily with the les grognards

[@destrancheesauxbarricades6582]

Many thanks for this great tutorial!

[@Marshal976]

Looks great mate, would work equally well for US late war infantry too!

[@nh5316]

Imagine this colour scheme would work well on Imperial Guard too

[@stormy7722]

kinda new to the Bolt action scene. Were/are you a history professor? Your knowledge of minute details is pretty amazing.

[@SonicSledgehammerStudio]

I am not! I swear. 😅 I just do a lot of reading!

[@ml6158]

I think it's "Vive la France"

[@SonicSledgehammerStudio]

Sssh, you ain't seen nothin'. 😅

[@ml6158]

@@SonicSledgehammerStudio hihihi

[@chubaxco]

Yesterday (24th of August) was the anniversary of the Paris Liberation. This was done by the Leclerc Division and the Official Liberation was done by "La Nueve" (Nine in Spanish) that was the 9th Company of the Division mainly composed by Spanish Republicans who fought in the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939) against the Fascist Franco Nationalist. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Nueve