'Childhood' from JamesM: Unguided/Misguided Youth

Hi folks,

My original plans for this entry had been to get some of my 6mm BAOR Team Yankee figures painted, representing my own childhood. However, my mess up with dates for the last themed round meant I had 3 Nebelwerfers left to paint, and Martin gave me a cunning plan (so cunning, it couldn't possibly fail twice...).

My entry this round is yet another unit of 15mm scale Battlefront Nebelwerfers. This time, fitting with the theme, from 12th SS Panzer Division 'Hitlerjudend' or 'Hitleryouth'. This division was formed in July/August of 1943, and comprised mainly of 17 year olds but with some younger boys from Hitler Youth groups. NCO's and officers generally came from 2000 veterans of the 1st SS Panzer Division "Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler", who were generally brutalised from fighting on the Eastern Front. The unit fought against British and Canadian troops from D-Day onward, committing various atrocities against prisoners of war and French civilians. Often fighting with a fanaticism bred from years of indoctrination into the Nazi creed, the divisions stubborn resistance meant they contributed heavily to the German defences in Normandy, but came at the cost of horrific losses in men. By the time the Division fled from Normandy it was reduced to a shell, having lost 80% of it's troops and tanks.

During Operation Totalize, several 12th SS battlegroups responded to the allied 'break in' on 8th August and launched local counter attacks. These were beaten off, but delayed the allied advance and limited it's forward momentum.

Obviously, the post title is a play on both the state of the weapon system and the crews. Most wars will have a substantial impact on the children on all sides, but Nazi Germany made a particular point of mobilising it's youth and sending them off to fight. 

These Nebelwerfers are from SS-Werferbataillon 12, which provided integral Nebelwerfer support to the Division.

These models did take a bit of extra work. Battlefront don't make any Waffen-SS Nebelwerfer crews, as far as I'm aware, so I took the regular Heer models and did some conversion work. This involved adding 'green stuff' to helmets to make SS style canvas covered helmets as well as trimming off the shoulder tabs to make the jackets more 'smock' like.

The chap on the left has 'Oak Leaf' helmet cover, 'Pea Dot' Jacket and Spring 'Plane Tree' trousers! His colleague has a 'Oak Leaf' jacket and 'Plane Tree' helmet cover. 

Painting wise, I also attempted to add three different camo patterns. Specifically 'Plane Tree', 'Oak Leaf' and 'Pea Dot' camo. As the units supply of uniforms and equipment was so irregular, I've mixed up items. Some crew have the regular army jacket or trousers, a couple have camo's of different types on trousers and jackets.

The launchers themselves I went for a full on camo, rather than the more obvious yellow's of my Heer launchers. 

I've also painted a spotter team for these launchers, again as SS using the various camo options.

So 3 x 15mm scale launchers and 17 crew figures bring this batch to a total of 46 points.