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Saturday 18 August 2018

More on the mystery figure

Thank you to all those who have commented on this Minifigs figure (I am pretty sure it is Minifigs).  I have a copy of the Minifigs 1972/3 catalogue and the personality figures listed are:
I know it is none of the British figures and I am pretty sure that it is none of the French personality figures. So it could be the French ADC, French Marshall or the Prussian, Austrian or Russian general figure. Of course it could be a figure added to the range later as I know there were more personality figures.

The horse, in my view does not help, as these are generic to all figures and all of the horse furniture is on the figure itself.

I have taken some more close up pictures:





What is interesting is that pictures 4 and 5 show what appears to be a frock coat coming down to about knee length. In the same pictures the saddle cloth shape looks non French.

I am still not sure. Could he be Russian?


11 comments:

  1. It "feels" Russian to me (or Austrian :))

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    1. The more I think about it, he seems more Austrian than Russian with that long coat; but that plume is not right to me.

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  2. It’s definitely neither the Austrian or Prussian general - I have both of these figures, and have a photo of the Austrian figure on The Lone S Ranger blog. The long plume is probably the distinctive thing to identifying the figure.

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    1. I took a look at the Lone S ranger site and some other sources and I am no clearer now than when I started. I don't think Russians have long coats and the saddle cloth is not right. As you point out the plume is odd too for any of the nationalities. I remain confused!

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  3. What makes it harder is that the '3rd generation' catalogue range of horses has no equivalent. The few 'rounded corners' are all surmounted with a sheepskin orr other blanket that covers the satchels. Suych as they are, and the 'S' range 7YW horses are all associated with dragoons or light dragoons at that.

    The figure does not look Austrian. Probably not Prussian, either. The bicorne looks pretty tall, which would go with Russians, and the tall plume does suggest Spanish.

    I'd go with Spanish. It so happens I have a couple of riders also with a tall plume that I haven't been able to identify!

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    1. My initial reaction was to go with Spanish, but the coat does not look right to me. I have been trying to find a potential source for the figure designer, but no luck so far.

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  4. It's a long time ago but I'm fairly certain that was one of their Spanish figures.

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    1. You may be correct, I thought initially that he might be Spanish, although others suggest that there was no Spanish General in the S Range?

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  5. I'm determined to keep an open mind on this...! Minifigs were not always infallible in the uniform detail, of course, and some of their shabraque shapes were definitely a bit non-regulation, but I went back to having a good squint at the details of his uniform. He has epaulettes, which rules out Spanish, Austrian, Bavarian and a few others, he has a possibly double-breasted, certainly heavily-braided coat front and a round collar above, he has a fancy big sash with danglers on his left, he has long coat tails and that rounded shabraque. I had a couple of these, unpainted, in the spares box for years, and I always "knew" they were Russian. Whether that means someone told me they were Russian or I had some actual evidence I don't know! I wouldn't have knowingly bought them as Russians because I have never had, nor attempted a Russian army.

    My guess? I still have a hunch he's Russian, just for old times' sake, but if the only known saddle-attached MF Russian general doesn't look like that then I would guess he might be intended as a Spaniard, but the uniform is miles out.

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  6. I took a look at the current Minifigs range and they have a 'Field Officer' figure, who has epaulettes and a mounted officer with telescope wearing a coat - neither have a long thin plume though.

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  7. I looked at the current Russians in the same catalogue - how about your figure being a predecessor of the current RNXC-2 Bagration - one of the last of the saddle-attached Intermediates? Spanish generals just didn't wear epaulettes, though MF ones might have, of course... :-)

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