Partizan 2008 & Theatiki.

The club's visit to Newark's Partizan show was a success. It was surprisingly busy; I guess most of us were thinking people would be pulling in their horns when it came to buying wargames material due to the much touted "credit crunch." Instead, it seemed the crowded halls of Kelham were filled with people determined to spend while they could.

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I don't think there was a single trader who didn't have a throng three-deep at his/her stand, at least in the first half of the day. Certainly the folks from Cambridgeshire who make nice hand-crafted buildings for 25/28mm figures profited from the New Buckenham club's visit. We bought a sizable quantity of buildings from them, leaving their table looking rather bare!

Nigel Higgins of Anglia Models displayed a nice and very tempting range of 28mm Spanish Civil War figures. Old Glory were present with some superb WW1 and WW2 aircraft from their "Li'l Flying Fokkers" range in 15mm, just right for the popular Flames of War rules set.

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The games themselves were many and varied. A Mexican-American War of 1848 caught my eye, with its gorgeous uniforms. A Spanish Peninsula game featuring a naval landing party saw the deployment of two splendid and sizeable vessels attacking a port, all in 28mm. Other games featured a mediaeval seige complete with trebuchet and early cannon, a long and dangerous-looking bronze tube under a mantlet.

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All in all, a very successful event, and one I'm sure to visit again, possibly later this year at "the other Partizan."

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This year sees a number of re-enactment events in celebration of the French-Indian War 250th Anniversary. One of the best is "The Gathering on the Theatiki," near Bourbonnais, Illinois, on the weekend 12th - 13th July. As I'll be in the US at that time, I'm hoping to join my fellow soldiers of the 78th (Simon Frazer's) Highlanders in their struggle for supremacy against the French. There'll be numerous events based on those times, and several dozen merchants on Traders' Row. Anyone in the neighborhood is welcome to stop by to visit the 18th century.

Partizan 2008.

The New Buckenham club fought a moderate-sized early English Civil War battle last night. The objective was to capture and control a small village with a bridge by nightfall.

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I was one of the two Royalist generals, and commanded the left wing. The ground wasn't really suitable for cavalry but I deployed them in the best area I could find on my flank, and forded the river to engage the Parliamentarian infantry there. For once my dice rolls weren't infallibly awful and I managed to push across the river, destroying an enemy regiment occupying the village churchyard in the process.

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My cavalry engaged another infantry regiment lined up behind one of my shiny new hedges. Maybe I made them too well, for the initial exchange of pistol and musket fire failed to damage either party! I destroyed the regiment at the cost of two of mine, and lost the last cavalry regiment in a prolonged fight with a single élite Parliamentarian one. They bought enough time for my infantry brigade to deploy in the village, although night fell before a decisive result was obtained.

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Tomorrow I shall be off to "Partizan," the Newark wargames show. I went for the first time last September and enjoyed it. It's a large venue, easy to reach, with a good spread of traders and games.

Hedges.

A couple of pictures of the completed hedges.
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I finished a total of 30 inches of the hedge sections in three days, including allowing the paint etc. to dry. Each piece is 5 inches long. I'm planning to make a few more sections with small trees growing in them and a number t-section pieces to represent the corners of fields, just for the sake of completeness.

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Figures-wise, I did a bit of soul-searching and have decided to restrict the armies of Hetzenberg and Dunkeldorf-Pfuhl to one brigade each with a cavalry regiment and attached artillery. This will be enough to field a decent-sized action. More units will be added, time and circumstances permitting.

Pootling along...

Nothing much doing this week, beyond clearing yet more of my workshed now the weather has improved. Once I could clear a patch of workbench I began making a batch of hedgerow sections suitable for use either as bocage in 15mm or ordinary hedges in 25/28mm. We found ourselves rather short of these at the club so having the materials to hand (and needing the space using them would free-up!) I set-to.

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Basic construction is two thin strips of scrap 4mm ply, 5 inches long glued in parallel to another shorter length set vertically, forming an upside-down T shape in cross-section. The sides are filled with a paste composed of PVA, spackle powder and Eberhard Arts powdered papiermaché. This dries quite quickly and is hard enough to survive most casual wargames use.

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The hedge material itself is rubberized horsehair, torn into rough strips 1 1/2 inches wide, which is folded over the upright section and glued in place. A hot-glue gun would be best for this, although I used impact adhesive. A dark green rattlecan paint at close range gave the basic coat to the foilage and filled the interior. While this is still wet a lighter green is sprayed over at a longer range to give a light shading, before scenic flock is dusted over all, ensuring the sides are covered as well. Tap off the excess, and paint the lower part in varied shades of green and brown to represent the hedge banks.

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I'll post a few pictures tomorrow of the work in progress.

The things one finds...

...when clearing out a workshed.

For various reasons I had to use mine for storage until recently, when the better weather allowed me to begin a general tidy-up. Right at the back I have a couple of shelves on which were a row of books. One was an Osprey Campaigns book on Leipzig 1813 which I thought I'd lost years ago. Tucked away alongside it was a slim booklet - a copy of Charge! rules!

The publication date is March 1981, by Athena Books of Doncaster, England, the co-authors of the modified rules were Stuart Asquith and Alan Cook, the producer/distributor Terry Wise.

I can remember buying them way back when with a vague idea of trying to game the Seven Years War, but for some reason the project fell by the wayside - probably because I got into Colonial wargaming in a big way.

Now I am playing in the 18th century, that little old booklet will come in useful.

Update.

Real life has got in the way of things once more, and the development of the Hetzenberg army will be put on hold for a while. I have been constructing a rathaus using Hirst Arts components and foamcore as part of the urban area for the wargames' table. The main body is complete, just the roof and windows to do. Cutting out two sets of crow-step gables is not easy!

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At the New Buckenham club, we've been putting the Flames of War WW 2 rules set through its paces, with the first two actions of the Villers Bocage scenario in the D-Day supplement. The scale is 15mm 1-to-1, British vs. German, principally the 7th Armoured Div. against 101st SS Heavy Panzer.

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In the first action, "Wittman's Wild Ride" became a short hop! Ubersturmfuhrer Michael Wittman was a German tank ace, with a crack crew and many kills on the Russian front to their credit. He became a legend in the German army as part of the 101st SS Heavy Panzer.

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The encounter opened in the early morning with the vehicles of the British force lined up alongside the road to Villers Bocage. The officers were away at an orders group and the troops were out of their vehicles brewing tea. Then the redoubtable panzer commander's Tiger came on the scene, rumbling up a side road out of the morning twilight.

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The first shot of the encounter destroyed a Sherman V Firefly, a 17-pounder armed version of the ubiquitous tank and one of the few weapons capable of stopping a Tiger. This vehicle did have a hand in destroying Wittman but not in a way the designers could've envisaged.

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Most of the British force was caught unawares by the sudden onslaught but the commander of the infantry section nearest the scene got his men into action promptly. The platoon's 2-inch mortar laid a barrage of smoke across the opening to the side road, obscuring the chaotic scene from the German gunner and giving valuable time to the British force to get its act together.

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This had an unexpected benefit. Frustrated at being unable to get a clear shot at the enemy troops on the road by the smoke from the mortar bombs and the burning Sherman, Wittman ordered his driver to advance. The driver was rated Ace but today he was playing far from the top of his game. Catching only the briefest glimpse of conditions ahead before they were obscured, he gunned the engine and the Tiger rumbled into the smoke - and ran slap onto the dead Firefly.

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Even the mighty Tiger couldn't shake off a collision of this kind so easily, and the delay allowed yet more time for the British to react. The infantry section's PIAT team got into action, creeping along behind the bocage hedgerow to a position where they could fire upon the Tiger's thinner rear plating. The PIAT gunner took aim - fired - a hit! The rear armor of the Tiger was thick enough to shrug off the PIAT bomb, but the shock of the impact was such even the normally fearless ace crew wavered on the verge of bailing out.

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They stayed put, though. The Tiger's driver finally freed the massive tank and it turned left to head up the road, either not spotting or ignoring two Cromwell IV tanks parked further up the road to the right. Although tempted by the presence of so many M5 half-tracked personnel carriers lined up along the road, there were slightly more dangerous targets to hand. Opening up with the 88mm gun Wittman knocked out two Stuart Mk 5 light tanks that were rushing back along the column to see what the trouble was. The third tank of the troop stopped and the crew bailed out, preferring discretion to valor.

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The plucky PIAT team, undeterred, rushed to take another shot. It hit - once again the Tiger withstood the impact and the crew wavered. Once again they rallied and drove on, tearing up an infantry section with machine gun fire. Other PIAT teams rushed into action, and the bailed-out crew of the Stuart took heart and re-mounted their vehicle.

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Now the action grew furious! Two 6-pounder anti-tank guns came into battery and their armor-piercing shot bounced off the Tiger like grains of rice. The PIAT teams swarmed the hedgerows and added their bombs to the melee, with yet another hitting the Tiger's rear plating to no effect. The Last Stuart roared up in a death-or-glory ride, attempting to buy yet more time for friendly forces to react.

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Gritting their teeth, Wittman and his crew ground onwards, shooting up an infantry section and destroying one of the 6-pounders by the simple expedient of running over it. The gun crew scattered to safety, but once more the Ace Tiger driver failed in his skill and the tank became stuck on the wreckage of the gun.

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By now the two Cromwell crews had mounted their vehicles and set off in pursuit of the rampaging - and by now very battle-scarred - Tiger. They came upon the scene just as the Tiger stuck fast on the gun. Taking rapid aim, the tanks blasted off two 75mm rounds straight into the rear of their wallowing enemy. Its battered armor plating finally gave way and gouts of flame and thick black smoke billowed out of the engine compartment. Wittman and his crew bailed out - right under the guns of the furious Desert Rats. Exit one legend...

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This was a game that took only two hours to play out to a conclusion. The results of this scenario carry forward to the next, when the rest of Wittman's company ambushed a British tank force further up the road. Once again, things didn't exactly go according to the historical script - but that's a story for another time...