H is for How They Come In - London Show December 2022 - General Purchases

And so to London, as the saying goes, with the final toy soldier show in the calendar at the Haverstock School, Chalk Farm, where I had quite a good show, given it's mostly metal these days, but various 'Plastics' guys are there and between them gaps were filled and rarities found!

This came from a mate, and he actually had two different, but I only grabbed one and it'll feed my need for regular injections of horse-drawn stuff, but it is both a delicate and space-consuming heft of packaging, so one is fine, my first Brumm, known from the catalogues which aren't rare and of which I have a few and very well-made when you actually get to see/handle it.

Modern combat forces got a good boost, with a bunch of Frenchmen from Cofalux, Starlux and one or two others . . . I picked up a few more a week or two later, then got some more in the machine-gunner lots, so I've done well on Frech plastic this past autumn/early-winter!

To their right are a bunch of Japanese from Britains Deetail range, I knew I only had one or two, and realised (quite late in the afternoon) I had seen all of them on two different stalls, so having some cash still warm in my pocket rushed round as people were starting to pack-up and purchased both lots.

Thus giving me five of six poses, alternate painting of the advancing chap, and two different treatments of the LMG, along with the US recoilless rifle re-purposed to the Land of the Rising Sun, to keep Britains' costs down! I'll have to hope the missing pose is among my existing few!

Below is two shots of a very clean Trojan jungle fighter, I seem to be building my Trojan Japanese, Australian/Anzac and 14th Army samples one figure at a time which isn't the cheap way, but it'll be fun when I find the last one - about another ten years at the current rate!

Now, I didn't shoot or record the maker (on the back of the cards) before they went up to the unit, but I may have some of these already in the collection (I've certainly seen them before), so when everything is sorted out, we may well de-card a duplicate, set them up and have a return post with all the details . . . modernish (1970's?) and aimed at the tourist trade I suspect.

Had a good score on Gem/Gemodels, with four knights (from the 'orange paint batch'!), one of the King's Men from the Humpty Dumpty cake decoration vignette (he appears to be laughing and pointing at the 'scrambled-egg'!) and two others, the snowman with an icing spike and a skater in yellow base polymer, along with a Hong Kong copy of the Crescent Santa Clause, I already have one or two in that section, but I think the paint on this chap is far superior to previous finds?

These were from Matt Their at White Tower Miniatures, and while you know my views on 'new' poured metal (as displayed in the last post!), the smaller guys aren’t so expensive (despite having higher overheads/unit costs), so I try to support them when I can, and while I always admire Matt's stuff I haven't previously bought any, so I thought I'd better rectify that with a  swift purchase!

I bought one glossy 'toy soldier' style finished figure from the Robin Hood series, and one matt painted figure from the Wild West range, and they are both really nice figures, Robin himself summoning the Merry Men for some shenanigans, the Indian is from an older hollow-cast moulding I think Matt said, but now done as a solid. Matt also sells all of them as unpainted castings.

This MTB/PT-Boat was nice, some age (dime store type/era), and pretty clean, but there is a small question mark over the opening beneath the conning-tower, and the two openings just in front of it, I can't work out if something is missing, or if someone has had a dig to fit a couple of figures, now missing, no brand or brand-mark, nor the typical Kleeware/Tudor Rose circular mould-release/blanking disc marks, so maker is totally unknown but could be an early Thomas or Lido/Pyro/Reliable type thing?

A pair of beautifully painted Commonwealth 'World Dolls'; Ms's Hawaii and Holland, and painted by George Hanger, who used to paint stuff for the BMSS museum and their magazine articles, indeed, given who I bought them off (who also gave me their history), I'm guessing those Mokarex/Figurines Historiques Musketeers (bottom of post) were painted by George as well?

Polish [French] cavalry from PZG, going for a song in a little bag, I'm not sure on the horses, so gave the most obviously different one to the Trumpeter, and the other odd one to the 'officer' in white!

Smaller single/rummage-tray pick purchases include (going vaguely clockwise from the top left); Kinder fantasy figure, I've several of these come in recently (so not rare) in both blue and green, a large native American Indian type from . . . Lido? Tudor Rose? Someone like that, he's in the archive somewhere and probably tied-in with a Lone Ranger or similar movie? And finally in that shot -  a US MP with pod-feet, again I should know, I've seen him before and I think I have him in dark blue, so this may be a 1990's reissue?

Poplar tractor (another!), an aluminium totem pole (Wend-Al or Aludo?) and a tin of my favourite brown! I have the old Authenticast semi-gloss leather version and the bog-standard gloss, but this matt dark-brown is hard to find these days, or seems so to me, so I thought I'd grab a 'newie' when I saw it!

A Toumoulage French soldier in metallic mauve polystyrene (why not!) and a rather nice-paint Cherilea Egyptian share the line-up with a less common cake-decoration deer sculpt and one of the Airfix (or Frazier & Glass I think . . . now!) cadets.

Finally another big Indian I should know, and another of those teeny-tiny Topo Gigio (Louie Mouse) figures from Italy, which I keep finding (or being sent), I have four or five now, I think in three colours, but all the same pose? Board game pieces maybe . . . or were they an early Kinder or a gum-ball capsule-dispenser thing?

The Toumoulage Indians we've already looked at above, with a mix below; the big guy is a Marolin, probably post reunification? Next to him is a better-quality Hong Kong copy of a Herald sculpt, with a French-made cowboy on the end of the row. In front a Marx 45mm PVC-rubber cowboy and a French (or more likely Polish) Indian with peace pipe, one of several (with pipes) who've come-in recently.

Big Joe from Big, what Jean Höfler became, a Gulliver late-issue copy of an Atlantic cowboy and a Pech y Hermanos artilleryman, the gun in front is similar to the Pech one he should be found with, but bigger and a Hong Kong (or early British garden/beach toy, it's unmarked?) Aussie jungle 25lbr without splinter-shield.

Quick note; I've finally bitten the bullet and switched from Firefox to Chrome, still getting used to it, but it has changed the gaps between images and paragraphs, nothing I can do about it, the Internet like most everything else these days seems to be slowly fragmenting and getting worse not better!