Expanding my Early War Polish army (Sailors 4/11)

[Anatoli]

The Polish navy had a substantial reserve of sailors stationed in Gdynia prior to the outbreak of the war, and while drafting everyone who could fight Colonel Dąbek who was in command of the defense asked the navy commander if he would be willing to organize these sailors into a battalion which would boost the land forces. And so it happened, no exact information about this unit is available but the sailors fought and died like everyone else on the Oksywie heights - fighting in their sailor uniforms. Some of the officers and soldiers received Polish standard issue helmets as their only additional equipment.

This makes for a great modeling opportunity and a way of boosting your Polish Early War collection with another distinct unit to spice things up. Now sources tell that sailors fought near Gdynia and in some capacity at the Hel Peninsula - but you could also field them in small numbers as part of the "River Flotilla" stationed near Pinsk and the Pripyat marshes as those units fought alongside the Polish independent operational group "Polesie". Even though this last option would be a bit "forced" since those sailors swapped their navy uniform for regular Polish infantry uniforms (some junior officers retained their sailor caps, the rest of the personnel just swapped the Army eagle on the field caps for the Navy eagle.

To field Polish sailors in your Early War army the best option is to go for the Soviet Navy infantry from Battlefront. First of all, this manufacturer has the most amount of rifles per SMG ratio in the blister - and you are only interested in Pistols, Rifles and LMG gunners, so this will be the least wasteful purchase. Second of all the models on this scale look fairly close. The main uniform difference is the "tail" on the sailor hats - the Polish sailor hat does not have them. And also the Soviet navy infantry minis lack the "flap" or whatever it is called behind the neck. Neither error is something that you'll see from tabletop distance anyway. You can convert the LMG into a BAR by chopping the round magazine from the sides and trim the top, and add a clip underneath the gun to make it look more like BAR.

More pictures and additional info on navy infantry can be found over at my blog:

http://anatolisgameroom.blogspot.se/2012/10/polish-sailors-1939-test-stand-and.html

[Helen]

Nice work on the miniatures. Thanks for the Polish Navy history too.

Cheers,

Helen

[Anatoli]

No problem Helen, glad you found it interesting 

[Anatoli]

Painted up a second platoon of cavalry to boost my cavalry company a little (because having painted 120 cavalrymen for "By Fire & Sword" wasn't enough to fully break me). Having 2 mounted platoons is pretty much the optimal choice as 1 is both too weak to do anything on the offensive, and too small to use for defending anything. 2 platoons should be able to maneuver well enough on the battlefield, as 3 platoons would be extremely cumbersome with those huge cavalry bases.

More pictures on the blog:

http://anatolisgameroom.blogspot.se/2012/10/second-polish-cavalry-platoon-forged-in.html

[Poiter50]

Very nice, almost tempting! 

[Anatoli]

Earlier this week I finished painting my Polish sailor platoon, 12 rifle teams and command team to match the size of my other infantry platoons. The miniatures are Battlefront Soviet Navy infantry, which I modified slightly (mainly using a knife). I also made a couple of headswaps to have a few sailors in the Polish army helmet. Wish I had more leftover infantry to perform more headswaps but this will have to do for now.  The paintjob isn't my best effort, the platoons was pretty much speed painted. The reason is the very dark blue color of the uniform which would need to be painted with lighter highlights to look somewhat interesting. But that would screw up the supposed dark uniform. And since I knew soft highlights would not be distinguishable I put most effort into the details like the hats and ammo belts.

More pictures on the blog:

http://anatolisgameroom.blogspot.se/2012/11/polish-sailor-platoon-finished.html

[Calimero]

Very nice work!

I had a look thru your various threads and was wondering, in your opinion, which company offer the best quality vs. price for 15mm WWII figures between Forge in Battle and Flames of War?

[Anatoli]

I think Forged in Battle are the cheapest and best quality out there at the moment - for Early War Poles. They do not however have everything you need. Battlefront still has very good vehicles (7TP and Tankettes) and the artillery is actually quite nice if you can look past the very thick metal bases on all infantry which I tend to either cut away or trim heavily. So FiB infantry and cavalry, Battlefront vehicles and guns is my main choice. Of course Peter Pig has some nice and cheap vehicles as well which the Poles get to use so I've bought stuff from there as well.

FiB are slowly expanding their range, and have released stuff that really rivals other manufacturers, the 10th motorized from FiB are the best looking on the market imo, and their imminent release of the dismounted cavalry is something I really look forward to as those models are gorgeous.

But playing with Poles in 15mm at the moment forces you to buy models from various sources.

My army comes from the following places:

90% of all infantry = Forged in Battle
1 HMG platoon = Battlefront
AT guns and artillery = Battlefront
Tankettes and 7TP tanks ) = Battlefront
Armoured train = Battlefront
FT-17 and R35 tanks = Peter Pig
Some infantry and 1 cavalry platoon = True North/Old Glory
Karas PZL.27 light bomber = Armaments in Minature


What really kills me is that no one makes good and detailed looking cavalry Taczankas, Fiat 508 Taczankas, Vickers E type A and B tanks and a few other minor things like AA machineguns, crewed Bofors guns. There are manufacturers out there who make some of the above mentioned models but they are just simply not good enough imo...

The FiB infantry is cheap, but you really have to add a bit to the cost when you take separate bases into account. I still use Battlefront original bases since that is what I started with for this army. Though I have recommended http://warbases.co.uk/ for cheap bases (and it's the source from where I buy bases for my By Fire & Sword project).

[Rob_bresnen]

Very nice idea, and very well executed. Well done.

[Calimero]

Thanks for the info, Anatoli, much appreciated

[fastolfrus]

Have you looked at the Peter Pig sailors?

http://www.peterpig.co.uk/Russian%20naval%20infnatry%20with%20rifles.jpg

[Anatoli]

Have you looked at the Peter Pig sailors?

http://www.peterpig.co.uk/Russian%20naval%20infnatry%20with%20rifles.jpg

I did, they did not fit the part as there were a lot of miniatures like the ones with grenades that would not work out as "Polish equipped" Sailors. The ratio of useful miniatures was not as good as the Battlefront Sailors. I really looked on all available WW2 Soviet sailors in 15mm lines and counted rifles.
The surplus SMGs, LMGs and officers that I had left over from making the sailor platoon I sold to my friend David who in turn is going to make headswaps and use them as Italian sailors IIRC.

[Helen]

Lovely work, well done.

Cheers,

Helen

[fastolfrus]

The ratio of useful miniatures was not as good as the Battlefront Sailors.

Although Peter Pig will sell packs that are not random - so you could specify "all rifles no grenades" if you wanted.