Interwar Highlanders and Armed Sailors

 Here is the start to another force for Chain of Command or possibly another game at a similar scale.  The armed sailors will add to the ones I did a couple of years ago, so that now there are 10 of them.  I'm more excited, however, about the Highlanders!  My goal is to build them up to a full platoon for the 1940 Battle of France, or a fictitious campaign such as Operation Sea Lion or the Very British Civil War.  It will depend on what my local gamers are willing to support, so I'll see if these troops can fit in to campaigns they have under way!  All of these figures are from Pulp Figures.

I have around half a platoon's worth of Highlanders.  In a pinch, I could add a section of RN armed sailors to pad out their numbers (however it's more likely that I'd make up the numbers with the late WWI Great War Miniatures Highlanders that I prepared years ago).  For now, the sailors will be available for guarding coastal installations or whatever similar role they might be assigned.

Here are the sailors.  Nice and tidy, and ready aye ready for action!

In the Battle of France, only one battalion of Highlanders actually wore kilts into action, the Queen's Own Cameron Highlanders.  Apparently they "didn't receive" the orders telling them to deploy in battledress.  Rather than attempt to replicate Cameron of Erracht tartan, I've decided to depict a fictitious regiment, the MacLaren Highlanders, from an out-of-print historical romance series written in the 1970s by C.L.Skelton.  Skelton's series only progressed to WWI, so that leaves me free to speculate on the MacLarens in either WWII or in the VBCW.  Using a fictional regiment lets me send them wherever I want and in whatever uniform I choose!

These are the Highlanders' "special weapons":  a Boys anti-tank rifle, a Lewis LMG and a Bren LMG, plus two Thompson submachine guns.  

Here are the riflemen.

These are the command figures, three officers, an NCO and a piper.  I originally painted them several years ago, but I touched them up a bit and converted them to MacLaren tartan so they'd match the rest of the platoon.

Here's the current force.  I've been carefully pouring over the army lists in the Chain of Command Blitzkrieg handbook.  I'm going to need many more riflemen, at least one more LMG (or two if I want each section to have a Bren), and a 2" mortar team.  And then I'll need to start adding the support options!  I've already decided that the piper could stand in for the Drinks Cabinet ;^)  but they will still need some better anti-tank options than the Boys rifle.  However, there will be plenty of time to figure out support after I get the platoon itself up to strength!