Dawn breaking over Wellington’s left at Waterloo earlier this week.

Mons at the weekend for a wedding meant a chance to visit the railway bridge at Nimy on 23 August. 111 years to the day from Westmeath man Lt. Maurice Dease and Pvt. Sidney Godley of 4th Royal Fusiliers earning the first VCs of the First World War here; posthumously for Dease.

Crossbelt cam footage from the firing line at Waterloo on Sunday.

Sore and sunburnt today, but what a bucket list item ticked over the weekend at the #Waterloo210 reenactment.

In the throes of final prep for the #Waterloo210 reenactment at the weekend. Leather whitening and brass polishing.

In Dublin rather than Waterloo this morning, but green wreath delivered to perhaps the most Irish location on the battlefield, the Inniskillings memorial. Remembering all those from the island of Ireland caught up in the 1815 campaign. #Waterloo210

Crossbelt plate worn by a soldier of the 3rd/1st Foot (Royal Scots) at Quatre Bras #OTD in 1815. Recovered on the battlefield in 2002 and now on display in the Ligny 1815 Museum. At least a third of the battalion was Irish during the Waterloo campaign. #Waterloo210

New Belgic shako in the post. One step closer to the #Waterloo210 reenactment at the end of the month.

A standout memory from the 80th anniversary of D-Day this time last year. Daybreak on Sword Beach, where the 2nd Royal Ulster Rifles landed on 6 June 1944.

Bank Holiday weekend return to Ypres.

Great day of Cold War gone hot gaming yesterday with @tomjmegan.bsky.social hosting @aquestingvole.bsky.social and I.

#AnzacDay2025 at Grangegorman Military Cemetery this morning.

T-34/85 in London’s Imperial War Museum. This is apparently a post-war Czechoslovak built vehicle sold to Egypt before being captured by Israeli forces during the 1973 Yom Kippur War. #TankTuesday

A taste of France for #TankTuesday. Char B1-bis ‘Flandres’ outside the Musée de l'Armée in Paris.

The mandatory #Salute52 hobby haul shot. New plastic US airborne from Warlord and nearly enough Perry metals to break my baggage allowance, plus a few other bits and pieces.

Also squeezed in a quick stop at the Household Cavalry Museum yesterday. I liked this tiny cheat sheet on the Riot Act. Intended for the use of cavalry officers on public order duties to ensure the wording was recited in accordance with the law. ‘Must be read correctly: variance fatal.’

And a very worthwhile visit it is. Four centuries or so of Foot Guards history from the Civil Wars to the War on Terror. My first time there in years, but I won’t leave it so long again.

The #Salute25 miniature of James MacDonell is appropriate company at the Guards Museum.

A touristy morning in London. Band of the Welsh Guards and Nijmegen Company Grenadier Guards on The Mall.

Wilting now, but worth the 2am wake-up in Dublin. There really is nothing like Salute. Lots of inspirational games, terrain and painting plus a chance to say hello to new and old faces. #Salute52

In the belly of the beast. #Salute52

Shermans of the Irish Guards Group in Aalst, south of Eindhoven, on the second day of Operation Market Garden. September 1944 and July 2022. #TankTuesday

A week to Salute! Who’s going?

To Carrickfergus in County Antrim for #TankTuesday, where a Harland & Wolff facility was one of the production sites for Churchill tanks during the Second World War. This restored Mk. VII example sporting the markings of the North Irish Horse was unveiled in 2014.

Hougoumont in situ! 15mm Sarissa kit built for @tomjmegan.bsky.social , article in @wssmagazine.bsky.social in the near future.

Our work is making headlines. We are now the focus of a national news article in the UK, featuring in today’s Daily Express. Thank you to everyone who is supporting our efforts by following us on social media, or signing up to our mailing list on our website www.express.co.uk/news/world/2...

(1/5) A short thread of some of the things that caught my eye at yesterday’s Irish Model Soldier Society show. For a small island and a niche hobby, I’m always amazed by the talent on display.

One last reminder for anyone within striking distance of Dublin today! Irish Model Soldier Society annual show. Greenhills Community Centre D12 from 10.

#TankTuesday from just last week in the south of France. This Sherman DD tank was knocked out and abandoned on Delta Red beach at La Nartelle, one of the US 45th Infantry Division’s landing areas for Operation Dragoon in August 1944. Recovered from the sands in 2011, it’s now a roadside memorial.

Reminder a week out!

German Spring Offensive begins #OTD in 1918. Missing of the Royal Dublin Fusiliers on the Pozières Memorial on the centenary back in 2018.

A few days on the Côte d’Azur this week meant a chance to get a flavour of the often overlooked Operation Dragoon landings of August 1944. An incredibly scenic battlefield location. Photos here from the US 45th Infantry Division’s landing area north-east of Sainte-Maxime.

I've just completed a project that I'd been planning for a long time but found a 'challenging' prospect! It's a replica 1844 pattern Albert shako, with fitted cotton canvas sun cover, as worn by the 9th East Norfolk Regiment during their campaign in the First Anglo-Sikh War of 1845-46.

Heritage 1815: a committee of Napoleonic historians working to safeguard the future of sites from the Waterloo campaign. Following news of the planned sale of Gemioncourt Farm & 8.5 hectares of land on the Quatre Bras battlefield, the committee has issued a statement 🧵1/

Golfe Juan yesterday and a Hundred Days bucket list item ticked off. On 1 March 1815, Napoleon came ashore here from Elba at the beginning of the road to Waterloo.

Ar dheis Dé go raibh a anam. raf.mod.uk/news/article...

St Patrick’s CWGC Cemetery in Loos. Begun in 1915 and used by the 16th (Irish) Division during its time in the line here the following year.

Deep pockets and a love of the historic Belgian countryside? The farmhouse of Gémioncourt on the battlefield of Quatre Bras is up for sale. www.immoweb.be/fr/annonce/m...

The original. Mark I crunching through barbed wire at the Tank Museum for #TankTuesday.

A then and now with a twist from last summer. Dog Green Sector, Omaha Beach, 1944 and 2024. Or rather: Ballinesker Beach in Wexford, where the opening scenes of Saving Private Ryan were filmed in the summer of 1997.

Irish Model Soldier Society annual show at the end of this month. Saturday 29 March in Greenhills Community Centre, Dublin 12.

Fascinating Waterloo Association talk by Paul Wilcock last night on French Klingenthal cavalry swords. ANXIII sabres potentially in use by some French cavalrymen as late as 1914!

Battle of Barrosa #OTD in 1811. Sergeant Patrick Masterson and Ensign Edward Keogh of the 87th (The Prince of Wales’s Irish) Foot capture the Imperial Eagle of the 8e de Ligne, Keogh dying in the effort. It’s the first French Eagle taken in action by the British army during the Napoleonic Wars.

Interesting news on the development of a museum to tell the story of Irish service in the British army.

I can never pass up a free sprue. @warlordgames.com Caesarian Romans with this month’s WI.

Always a favourite. Sherman Firefly in the Tank Museum in Bovington for #TankTuesday.

Given the state of the world I’ve decided to run a scale model group build and competition in aid of Ukraine. Please spread the word and join in, details of how to enter the competition will be released soon. I’ll set up a feed on here and a facebook page soon. #ForUkraineGB u24.gov.ua

Another from the Waterloo postcard collection. What looks to be an early twentieth century view of La Belle Alliance, complete with Scottish-themed advertising for Auld Reekie tailors in Brussels as well as an ad for Heinz baked beans.

(1/2) 210 years ago today, Napoleon slips away from Elba at the start of the road to Waterloo. Wicklow man and later Whig MP, James Grattan, just landed on the island in the hope of an audience with the erstwhile Emperor, is an unwitting eyewitness to the escape.

A then and now for #TankTuesday. Sherman DD amphibious tanks of the 13th/18th Royal Hussars and infantry advancing into Ouistreham on D-Day. 1944 and 2024.