U.S. Medic Treating Wounded GI
Modeling the U.S. Army in WWII

YANKS Miniatures
9609

There is a photo in “The War in Europe: From the Kasserine Pass to Berlin, 1942-1945” by J. Phillip Langellier, of a wounded man sitting on the ground, right leg outstretched, left leg up and bent at the knee. His left arm is resting on his knee. He has a wound to his lower right leg. Standing bent over him is a medic appearing to be unrolling a bandage.

This pair is the essence of two figure sets, Verlinden Production’s “Medic” and this one from YANKS Miniatures. The main difference between the two is Verlinden’s wounded man is in a poncho, and the medic wears overalls. In the Yanks package, both men wear the M1941 jacket and trousers. The Verlinden figures are more on the 6’ scale in height, while Yanks’ are more in the 5’9” range.

The quality of the these figures is rather disappointing. The sculpting is coarse, and the level of detail is fair. The faces are rather expressionless.

My wounded GI seems to have been short-shot in the leg, so to speak. His right boot is a separate piece, and when attached to the leg it’s all significantly shorter than his left leg, even considering that leg is bent. It’s difficult to tell from the package photo because the medic's boot and shadows are in the way, that there is some sort of bandaging on the leg that did not get molded onto my guy. I managed to get by with a dab of Milliput. The fit of the arms of the medic was a bit of a problem, as the hands do not come together to give the appearance of unrolling a bandage.

One nice thing about the medic is that he has a pair of one of the correct types of medic bags, and he is wearing the special yoke to which they were attached. I have not seen either of these items in any other product. Another nice touch is the separate canvas gaiter that has been removed from the injured leg.

One wants to give this duo higher marks simply because of the dearth of U.S. figures on the market. As it is, however, it's a useful set and would work well in a diorama.

-tss-

 

Modeling the U.S. Army in WWII © 2002—2007 Timothy S. Streeter