Tuesday 26 December 2017

Field Bakery









These lovely figures are from the extensive range of SYW 25mm civilians from Black Hussar. They show the production of bread from grain to the finished loaf. I am unsure about two things: 1) are the barrels where the grain sacks are stored or are the barrels just receptacles of water or are they nothing to do with bread making? Also, the oven itself: what was it make from? I have no idea although an iron one would have been very heavy. Frederick captured the Austrian bakery the day before Leuthen and this was considered noteworthy by contemporaries. Eighteenth century armies liked fresh bread every day!
The bread sure looks good enough to eat! Happy New Year!



7 comments:

  1. Wonderful to see these figures given your usual artful brushwork! I have been aware of these figures for some time but have yet to purchase and add them to my own collection.

    Happy Feast of Stephen,

    Stokes

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  2. A set of fascinating vignettes. So much going in each section.
    Nice composition!

    Happy New Year!

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  3. Superb, evocative and spendid vignettes!

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  4. Beautifully done!

    My best guess would be:

    Flower comes in flower barrels filled at closest flower mill (which may not be close at all).

    Water in buckets or half barrels acquired locally.

    Sacks contain salt, and other things used to make bread such as yeast or baking powder or??? (I'm obviously not a baker!)

    Oven most likely made of mud covered bricks. If you google 18th century portable bread oven, there are quite a few images for this.

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  5. Thanks for your comments. Salt, yes I agree. I think there is one open sack and I painted the contents as white, so salt.
    The oven was tricky as there was no indication of what it was made from..............thanks again!

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  6. The ovens were made of brick. The army carried the metal braces and bits with them and constructed the ovens on site with locally procured bricks or ones that they made themselves.

    The Prussian bakers went on strike several times during the SYW and they sort of had Frederick over a barrel since skilled bakers were hard to find.

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  7. DAF, I had assumed that the ovens were made of brick. But the model supplied is not made of brick (the rounded top for example) so that is why it was a dilemma to paint.

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