I've purchased several 1/24 railroad figures from [link=http://www.slmonline.com/]Supply Line Minatures[/link]
They are nicely sculpted and well realistically proportioned, but would probably need some modifications to represent sailors.
Not sure of your inclinations- but I'm starting on sculpting some figures for a 1/10 model following the [link=http://www.mylargescale.com/articles/articles/figureclass/ch1/figures-01.asp]Figure Class[/link] at MyLargeScale.com
The author details basic techniques to sculpt figures using polyclay.
The articles are well done and it seems actually do-able!
I'll take a pic to post on the 1/10 figure thread.