Y ddraig goch: The 53rd Welsh Division, part 2 (finished)

This part wraps up my 53rd Welsh Division for Bolt Action. At least, for the time being. The Division had quite a few toys to play with during the liberation of ‘s-Hertogenbosch, so don’t be surprised if I add a Cromwell, M10 Tank Destroyer or a Churchill Crocodile at some point...

No late-war British army is complete without a couple of Universal Carriers, so my army has two. These ones are by Warlord Games. The kits go together very easily and there is just enough stowage on the sprues to make each look a little different. Bit of a letdown, however, is that three of the four crew members come with the same head sculpt. As I had some spare heads from the infantry box, I added in a couple of those.

Quite a few divisions are represented on the decal sheet that comes with the vehicles, but the 53rd Welsh Division isn’t one of them. Luckily, the red crown used by the division is pretty simple to paint on by hand.

And then it was a matter of painting up the infantry. There are 33 figures in total: an officer with revolver and binoculars, a two-man PIAT team, three Bren gunners, six Sten gunners and 21 soldiers with rifles.

Warlord sells separate decal sheets with shoulder patches for the 53rd Welsh Division. Two sets gave me enough patches for all figures including those in the Universal Carriers and my Ram Kangaroo, plus plenty of spares for when I inevitably lost or broke one. I think I damaged least five or six in the end. But with a bit of patience, some mild cursing and lots of Micro Sol the decals eventually went on just fine.

Colours used:

Uniform: English uniform 70.921, highlighted with Green Brown 70.879, Webbing: Russian Uniform 70.924, Helmet: Refractive Green 70.890, Boots: Black 70.950, Metal: Metal Grey 70.863, Mugs: White 70.951 with Medium Blue 70.963, Wood: Flat Brown 70.984.

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