The Grand Duchy of Stollen

  T o U.S. citizens everywhere, Happy Thanksgiving 2023!    No toy soldiering today since I will be helping in the kitchen and setting the table, but I plan to touch up some river sections if/when  the time presents itself.  Tomorrow (Friday), the table and troops will be laid out, and the Combat at Spargelzeit (Zinna refight) game kicks off on Saturday with a possible finish Sunday.  A solo affair this time unless the Young Master decides he wants to join me.  Looking very forward to beholding my troops and terrain as I maneuver them around the table.  Stay tuned! -- Stokes

  M essing around this evening with Fotor, my online photo editor of choice.  Lots of AI help and other features there to present pictures of our collections as advantageously as possible. Looking again, I have spotted a few very tiny imperfections, but in the interest of preserving the smidgen of sanity left to me, we'll call 'em done.  It's time to move on.   Time and the paintbrushes wait for no one.  Besides, I've got Saxon cuirassiers and Hanoverian hussars waiting for me. -- Stokes

  A bit delayed today, but my stock of pebbles was depleted, so I had to remedy that after another round of leaf duty, in the front yard/garden this time.  Almost finished with that for the season.  Whew! -- Stokes

  The tabletop troops in question.  I took this photograph with my iPhone.  Other than some brightening and cropping in Fotor, it provides a good representation of the (almost) finished company,  The fetching Grand Duchess gave these Fife & Drum Hessians to me for Christmas 2022. L ong overdue greetings everyone!  The generic company of Frei-Infanterie shown above, based on the von Hordt regiment, is finished and glossed.  Finally.  Not quite as spectacular as their companion company of Anspach-Beyreuth jaegers showcased in August, but handsome in any case.   The 30 figures together make up  the light infantry contingent for the Grand Duchy of Stollen whose small army is based very loosely on those of ol' Frederic's Prussia and its neighboring allies.  But less ably led and with lower morale in general. It has been slow going with the paint brush these last couple of months due to usual cocktail of life and work, but here we are...

  The shoulder insignia of my later maternal; grandfather's outfit, the 13th Airborned Division, for part of his service during 1942-1946, T hinking today of my late maternal grandfather, David Lewis Stokes from Lexington, North Carolina, who answered the call like so many others more than 80 years ago following the attack on Pearl Harbor.  Initially anti-aircraft personnel in a Pennsylvania-German National Guard unit, he later served as glider infantry before taking the opportunity to train as a paratrooper ahead of the planned invasion of France.   Miraculously, he, along with his two older brothers and three brothers-in-law (Uncles Baxter, Jack, Sid, Charlie, and Bob) all managed to come home and lead relatively normal lives for many decades afterwards.  Since so many others did not, I have always wondered how our family was so fortunate given the sheer magnitude of the 1939-45 war. Likewise, a special mention of the only First World War veteran I k...