World War 2 Danish bicycle infantry

This is part two of my recently started project of collecting and painting minis for the lesser known armies that faced Nazi Germany in 1940 and that are the subject of the Osprey booklet ‘Hitler's Blitzkrieg Enemies 1940: Denmark, Norway, Netherlands & Belgium’. Next up are the Danes.

Great Escape Games has a nice range of World War 2 Danish troops. Googling around for a bit I had discovered that there is a Danish movie called April 9th which focuses on the actions of a bicycle infantry unit during the German invasion of Denmark. I thought it would be pretty cool to have a little pewter representation of this unit, so I checked if Great Escape Games also does bicycle infantry figures, and they do!

I picked up three 2-figure packs, as well as a copy of the movie for some extra inspiration. The two figures in each pack are very similar, the main difference being that one is looking slightly to the right and carries a back pack and the other is looking straight ahead and has no backpack. So, In essence, I have six nearly identical figures. If the minis had been regular foot infantry, the repetition of poses probably would have looked a little jarring, but these minis look absolutely great together. There’s only so many ways you can sit on a bike, I suppose.

Assembly was a bit tricky. The figures come in three pieces: bicycle, body and head, and arms with handle bars attached. The instructions on the Great Escape Games website suggest gluing the arms to the body first and then bending the handle bars to fit the bike. This worked reasonably well, but I did have to fill in some gaps with a bit of Milliput.

I used Vallejo German Camouflage Orange Ochre for the khaki trousers and overcoats. This colour might be a bit on the light side, but the wash of Army Painter Quickshade at the end of the painting process darkened it just enough.

I painted the bicycles and helmets with Vallejo German fieldgrey. According to the Osprey booklet, the helmets should be the same khaki as the uniforms. The movie April 9th, however, depicts them as being grey. I admit that a movie may not be necessarily the best historical source, but googling WW2 Danish helmets yielded nothing but grey helmets either. In any case, I think the grey adds a bit of visual interest to the figures, which otherwise would be almost entirely monochrome.

All leather parts were painted with Vallejo Game Color Charred Brown and the gun stocks with Vallejo Flat brown. Everything was then given a wash of Army Painter Quickshade followed by two coats of matte varnish.

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