The Iron Brigade was the only all-Western infantry brigade in the Army of the Potomac. Most Eastern Federal brigades were drawn from the eastern states — New York, Pennsylvania, New England — and reflected the culture, accents, and recruiting networks of those regions. The Iron Brigade was different. Its original four regiments came from Wisconsin (the 2nd, 6th, and 7th), Indiana (the 19th), and the prairies and lake counties west of the Appalachians. The 24th Michigan joined them in October 1862 from Detroit and the eastern Michigan farm country. The Western men were noted by contemporaries as taller and longer-strided than the average Eastern recruit, attributed at the time to better childhood diet on Midwestern farms. They drew their own distinct identity from being a transplanted Western unit in an Eastern army, made it stick with the black Hardee hat that no other brigade wore, and gave the Army of the Potomac the kind of regional pride no other formation provided.

The W. Britain figure catches an Iron Brigade soldier in mid-stride, rifle at right shoulder shift, mouth open in a shout — the moment a regimental line goes from controlled advance into the cheering rush that closed the final yards before contact. He wears the brigade kit without gaiters: the dark blue nine-button frock coat with branch piping, light blue trousers rolled at the cuff over the brogans, the tall black Hardee hat, and the cartridge box and haversack on his hip. The bayonet is fixed. The figure is sculpted with enough generic accuracy in the uniform that, if you remove the Iron Brigade context, it works equally well as a standard U.S. infantry private of the late 1850s, the 10th Maine Provost Guard at Gettysburg, or any Federal regular-army unit campaigning before the war. Pair this figure with Iron Brigade Advancing at Right Shoulder in Gaiters, the gaitered companion figure showing the brigade's earlier kit; with Col. Henry A. Morrow of the 24th Michigan, the brigade's regimental commander at Gettysburg; or with Color Sergeant Abel Peck, the brigade's color sergeant killed on the first day of the same battle.

Scale: 1/30 (60mm). Matte-painted metal. W. Britain model 31290. From the American Civil War range. Single foot figure, supplied painted and ready for display.