WWI Tommy (1 Viewer)

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Here's another WWI British soldier project. As none of the Scalelink figures had quite the pose I wanted, I selected a figure and snipped off the torso and separated the puttee legs. The legs were then pinned together and glued. A torso was created for this piece. The head is from Hornet and helmet is Airfix.

 

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I gathered and made some accessories for laying barb wire. I also substituted a larger head (Shenandoah) for this figure.

I am trying to model a similar figure to this picture. The soldier is carrying a load of barb wire stakes on his back. I think it is a single strap holding all the stakes together. I am not sure and if anyone has further insight into how these things were carried, I would be grateful.

Rgds Victor

 

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I bulked up the trousers and am finalising the pose. The pic is a little distorted at this close range.

 

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I further bulked up the right thigh. Added the tunic skirts and shoulder pads. A strap was added to the helmet which was fixed to the head. As sculpting on my other WWI Tommy is finishing, I am now focusing more on this piece.

 

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Finalised the pose on this figure. He is part of a trench wiring party and is now running for cover from incoming artillery, holding on to his helmet.

 

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I sculpted the sleeves roughly at first which has to be trimmed down by a combination of incisive filing and scrapping to soften the folds. The shoulder straps, pockets and buttons were also sculpted.

 

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The folds were further refined. A groove was filed around the mid-torso to tie a string twice around the body. This represents the string used to secure the small box respirator bag to the chest. The straps for the water bottle were made from thin metal sheet strips. The straps were carefully added and glued to the figure while holding my breath. Good thing I practised free deep sea diving techniques.... I will add another haversack and strap before I start to paint this figure.

Rgds Victor

 

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These are pics of all the other accessories that I have added or will be adding to the figure. As he is not wearing the standard webbing, I have to check that there are appropriate slings for these items.

 

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The small haversack was pinned to the figure for strength. The sling was made from sheet metal and detailed with buckles.
The rank and service chevrons were sculpted onto the sleeves.

 

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The figure was spray painted with white matt undercoat. Defects were rectified.

 

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The figure was mounted onto the proposed base. The figure was undercoated in enamels prior to oil painting.
I will be painting the figure at this stage before adding other implements.

 

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Starting to move on this piece now. I've decided that the Tommy is a Canadian soldier serving on the Ypres Salient. Hence I've painted the khaki with a slight green hue. The pics were taken while the oil paint is still wet. The last pic shows a batch of figures where I am starting to work on the groundwork.

 

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I added a load of trench wire picket fences to the figure, and also a spool of trench wire. Cotton tape made from metal strips were used to represent path markers through the trench wire.

 

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Resuscitating this piece. I had shelved it for a while whilst awaiting the delivery of a lot of custom bases ordered from Germany.

I thought that the base was too large and had decided to move the piece onto a smaller base. The figure was prised off the old base.

The name plate was carefully removed and placed onto the new base selected to just fit the name plate. Some groundwork was added together with a tree stump.

 

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Epoxied all the parts together and built up the groundwork.

 

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Painted the groundwork.