Toy Soldier Collector Magazine

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Skinner’s Soldiers

Canadian writer Guy Elliott tells of how he started collecting figures made by Bill Skinner of The Scottish Toy Soldier Company

I met Bill Skinner, owner and operator of The Scottish Toy Soldier Company, only once and for a total of about ten minutes. It was Saturday, December 2, 2001 at The Toy Soldier Show London, held at Royal National Hotel in where else but, London. I was there for my one and only visit to the famous show, and that meeting started for me a love of the soldiers of the 18th century.

As a boy growing up in Canada in the 1950’s and 60’s I collected plastic military model kits, Dinky toys, cowboys and Indians and especially, Britains. But 1700’s stuff, never! Admittedly I had the odd run in with figures from the period, some Bussler Hessian castings in the early 1960s, Britains ARW ‘Swoppets’ in the middle of the decade and an unusual ARW American Artillery vignette, by lesser-known maker Strombecker, in 1969. However it wasn’t until thirty two years later, after a career teaching history, that I bumped into Bill Skinner for the first time.

I was at the London show, part of a trip to the UK as a treat to myself upon retirement, when I happened upon the table marked The Scottish Toy Soldier Company. Bill starting chatting away immediately and I soon realised he was the owner of this small business. As we chatted I purchased some 11th Hussars and two boxes of Indian Infantry, the figures were simple toy soldiers but very neatly painted and extremely well-priced. As we continued talking I mentioned to him I was Canadian, and frustrated by the duty I had to pay when ordering toy soldiers from the UK. “Nonsense“, came Bill’s reply, “I’ve been shipping to Canada for years and there’s no duty to pay. I put the correct code on the packages so your customs ladies know how to deal with it “.

Once back home in Canada I sent for Bill’s catalogue and noticed, only in passing, that he also did 1700’s British and French Infantry and Cavalry. That summer my wife and I were in Kingston, Ontario and I read an historical plaque whilst there which was dedicated to the King’s Royal Regiment of New York. This was a Loyalist Regiment from the American Revolution which came to Kingston to disband and settle. I again thought of Bill and his catalogue, upon checking I was disappointed, but not overly surprised, the regiment wasn’t one he made. I then started to wonder if maybe he’d do them as a commission. Sure enough after communicating with Bill he said he’d be happy to make what I was after, not only an unusual regiment, but an eight-man set instead of his usual six. A few weeks later my new troops arrived and they were amazing, and they were just the beginning!

That same year I was reading an old Osprey book (one of a number I’d picked up in London) when my wife Sandy walked by, looked at the cover and said, “That’s a good looking soldier on the cover. Do you have any like that?“ It was the Buffs, with a picture of a Grenadier from 1751. I didn’t have them and Sandy was right, a dramatic uniform which was well worth adding to the collection. Bill made the Buffs and since 2002 has done many other units for me. I browse through my references, find a regiment I don’t have, and do want, and Bill makes them. He has an amazing depth of knowledge to help me; for starters he knew what ‘gosling green’ was as a facing colour. Soon the regiments missing in my collection began to arrive and as the painting is so good I began asking Bill to always to do a drummer for each unit in their startling reversed colour scheme.

He knew so much and was so willing, I began to try and raise the bar. Would he do artillery and cavalry, yes came the reply. How about something from the early 1700’s around Marlborough’s time, again the response came back a yes. In fact, it seemed that the more difficult the challenge, the more he enjoyed doing it. As for the quality, in truth, the sets kept getting better and better. I then turned to my favourite uniform book, Blandford’s ‘Military Uniforms of the World in Colour’ and the section on the Dutch, Austrian and Swedish troops, no problem all done. Next I went for American colonial and Soldiers of New France, within a short space of time these were done.

Okay, a lot more work for the next one I thought. In 1758, as was the custom, General James Wolfe assembled the Grenadier companies from the Regiments present at the siege of Louisbourg into an elite assault unit. But unusually, he kept them together as a unit and they fought at the siege of Quebec as the Louisbourg Grenadiers. In the set would be six grenadiers, one drummer and one officer but made up from the 22nd, 40th and 45th Regiments. Bill again stated; “No problem“. (You should be able to just about make out the three different regiments in the photo).

Often Bill and I chat on the phone to work out technical issues which always pleasant, if a little challenging. Bill has a strong Scots accent and from his point of view I’ve a strong Canadian accent but we struggle through, even though he has a droll sense of humour! When all the brouhaha, about so many shows a year in London, occurred a few years ago he simply wrote to all of his customers to say that he was just going to stay home until it all blew over. He has indeed done this, but has also passed on his lowered costs by reducing his prices. He’s even been kind enough to extend my wife and myself a standing invitation to visit should we ever be in Scotland.

Now before anybody reading this gets confused I do order figures from other makers, mostly castings I will admit, and I do also order other periods from Bill but his 1700’s era soldiers are so great I just keep going back for more. In my collection his sets are spread out amongst the other regiments but look particularly great en masse as a unit advancing in line. Half the fun for me these days is spending my time searching for regiments, knowing full well that Bill will make my quests come true.

The spill-over from all of this is that I now consciously watch out for sets from this period. I’ve been rewarded with two sets from a local Toronto maker, Queen Victoria. These are a little closer to 60mm than 54mm but I couldn’t resist, what has Bill Skinner done to me!

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