The Royal Visit, and Coronation Coaches

The day has arrived and Prince Wilhelm and Princess Dragomira are entering the town in their royal carriage. They are escorted by a number of units from their own armed forces, as they are of course visiting a country presently engaged in a civil war. Whilst they are unlikely to come under attack by the Socialist forces, its better to be prepared for all eventualities! 

The Royal family of Albion are hoping to persuade the Bavarian Federation to aid them militarily to shorten the war and lessen the financial damage to the realm!

At this point, I hoped to embed a short video. Unfortunately, the technological gap between me and my computer, has proven too difficult to bridge. Fortunately the Black Country paparazzi took plenty of daguerreotypes and I will let them speak for themselves.

Bavarian Jackboots!

Uhlans

Cuirassiers

On standby in a quiet back street

The Royal reception

I should mention that you might have noticed a few people in the crowd dressed in a very unusual manner, or even from different time periods. I can offer no explanation for this other than to ask you to address such questions to that person known as 'the Doctor' who seems to be a bit of a know it all! As for anthropomorphic characters, I can again respectfully suggest that if you think you have seen any, you cut down on the amount of absinthe you are imbibing!

On a slightly more serious note (although not much more serious!), I am all too aware that the British Coronation Coach with attendant Beefeaters, is not very representative of a travelling coach for a German Prince. I would merely say that this is the only Coach I own and its too beautiful not to make an appearance in my blog!

Finally, all of the above spectacle was put together with HGW's Floor Games very much in mind, and at least I left out the Red Indians and the Zulu's! Either way I hope that you enjoyed the Spectacle as much as I enjoyed setting it all up! 

Waifs and strays....... Coronation Coach and Escort

This is as good an opportunity as ever to talk about this model which I acquired over 12 months ago. It was going very cheaply (£25?) for what it is and I couldn't resist even though I knew it would have very limited uses. It is quite unwieldy when all of the traces are hooked up and some of the horses tended to twist over. Some very minor repairs were needed anyway so I bit the bullet and decided to make it a more practical proposition for the tabletop.

I decided to not link it all together as that would give me some flexibility. An 8 horse team might look good in the display cabinet but the tabletop footprint is huge! I decided to base the horse teams in two separate bases of four. I then had a choice of eight for the display cabinet and four for the tabletop. By fixing them to mdf bases the horse teams also stopped misbehaving and falling over. 

I am still not 100% sure why I bought this one, but I do love to see it in the cabinet. As for my alterations...well I'm afraid this set is as common as they get and value reflects that. Britains sold a ton of these and people treasured them and as a result they survive in large numbers. I don't therefore feel guilty about my alterations. 

I have wanted to use this piece for a while and its given me a lot of pleasure to finally get it out of the cabinet and onto the table.

The six Beefeaters were another of my Ebay 'I can't believe they are going so cheap!' moments. Less than Two pounds each, I partially overpainted them and varnished and based them. Whilst probably for cabinet duties only, they may see action yet in a future scenario. The Captain figure was a separate acquisition, similarly slightly overpainted and useful in many potential roles.

 

I only own one of the Royal footmen and have no particular desire for more, but only recently realised that a senior footman acts as the brakeman on this coach. He therefore now has an important role in my toy world!

Well that's all for this post other than to wish you a happy new year !

Tara a bit!