On and Off the Painting Desk This Week
-
I needed to add 2 more of Gorham's rangers to fit the plan, so now that's
done. In the early days the friendly 1st Nations warriors were a large
part or...
Resins to be cheerful and money well spent.
-
This was waiting for me on my return home yesterday. A charming guide to a
model railway pioneer. Lovely coloured and b&w pictures and interesting
text...
More Ship Building
-
We interrupt the Little Great War narrative with the announcement from the
Admiralty that the Ruberian Navy has commissioned 3 more line-of-battle
ships,...
Dhich'une is Dead
-
The penultimate session of the House of Worms campaign wrapped just minutes
ago, with the defeat of Prince Dhich'uné within the bowels of Avanthár.
Next ...
WoFun Russo Japanese Ships - A Few Anyway….
-
*The contents of Japanese sprue number 2. The ships are 1:1400th and not
1:1200th as I reported previously. The bases have been edged in black using
a...
"Pancho sees stars"... setup and game
-
Time for another update.. and a game this time...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Whilst continuing my efforts to declutter the loft the other day...
Lands of the Heresiarch
-
The once-thriving Papal Isthmus is now in a state of corrupt desolation.
Few are seen on the road, flies feed on the remains of untended hogs.
Three items ...
GEN. PETTYGREE'S SYW INDIA BATTLE STORY
-
*GENERAL PETTYGREE'S*
*SEVEN YEARS' WAR BATTLE FOR INDIA*
*September 6, 1758 (2025)*
My dear readers, two-hundred sixty-seven years ago the ruins behi...
Playmobil with Bear
-
The convoy sets out.
The Kinchlets and I were gifted a rather magnificent 18th century Playmobil
set by my friend Stefan. We've been playing games w...
Basic Reds Done at Last. . .
-
Still quite a way to go with the current batch of 20 human figures and a
horse (of course), but they're actually starting to look like something
after...
Creating Autobot Huffer
-
Hound gets a decal and is ready to roll.
The pessimistic Huffer is a classic Autobot and one that I was keen to
create. Known for his can't do attitude,...
More Hills and Even Further Away
-
Travelling again - my life seems to have taken on an unfamiliar level of
sophistication, not to mention luxury. I have just returned from the home
of th...
Aspern-Essling at Nigel's
-
Yesterday I took a trip across the border to join Tony and Goya at Nigel's
sumptuous wargame room in the heart of the rolling Cumbrian hills. Nigel
had d...
Spanish Peninsula War Project Update - Fall In
-
*Hopefully everyone will concur that this table looks like Spain.*
I wanted to post an update on my 40mm Spanish Peninsula War project that I
am build...
ONE LOVELY DRAWING, part 77
-
In one of the greatest passages of western literature, Dante begins *The
Divine Comedy*:
*Midway through the journey of life, I found myself in a dark wo...
More Shiny Men.
-
Now it has been some time since my last blog post. What with one thing and
another 2 months have slipped away almost unnoticed so it is well past time
for ...
Nebelwerfers
-
Among the toys making their combat debut at the recent Ardennes game was
this pair of Nebelwerfers. These are 3d prints, with crew figures sourced
fro...
Some news on the American war of independence
-
Our Hobbyfriend Uwe Rausch asked to print the Grenadiers in 40mm and
painted them as SYW Prussians of the 48th regiment. This is the result:-)
And...
Bunker Hill: Gentlemen Pensioners Sunday Game
-
Traditionally, Steve hosts a game for the Gentlemen Pensioners on the
Sunday following the Phalanx Show. This year it featured Bunker (or
Breed's) Hill...
All change!.
-
Due to vast amounts of unwanted attention I am taking this blog down
permanently. But fear not, I have copied most of the posts onto a new blog My
"Old ...
Very Sad News
-
I'm very sorry to be making this post but I've just learned that Dale past
away from a heart attack on November 5th.
Most of my relationship with Dale wa...
Trying Something New
-
Based on what I said last time, I’m going to try out something new. Check
out my posts at Medium – one test you can ignore, one discussion of why I
chose t...
Short Rules by Leon Tucker
-
A bit of an experiment as posts go… This is an overview of one of my
favorite, older, short, simple war game rules. Plenty of information to get
a feel f...
Warplan 5/5 Campaign System
-
I'm afraid I couldn't find a way to reproduce the snazzy double headed
arrow in 5/5 in the text so will have to do with this instead.
Warplan 5/5 came o...
What Do You Mean “It’s Only A Movie”?
-
Like many of my friends and fellow students of military history/military
affairs, I went recently to see the new movie “Midway”. This community can
deli...
Tribute to Stuart Asquith
-
Whilst it is not news that we have recently lost one of the hobby's
best-known figures this past week, I thought it would be appropriate to add
my own trib...
The Fritz Leiber WIKI - [Currently Reading]
-
---------- The Fritz Leiber WIKI Welcome to the Scrolls of Lankhmar. It
contains information on the writings of and also the RPG Guide to Nehwon,
which is ...
A Tale of Two Battles - Part the First
-
The Italian infantry brigade.
The only unit to come out of this with their heads held high.
This is the first of two battle reports featuring my French ...
Supplies to San Lorenzo ....
-
*San Lorenzo, lies near the border with the British territory of
Malize..... The British have allied with some local natives attempt to
disrupt one of the ...
Character Figures and Settlers for the FIW
-
Conquest Miniatures put out a nice little blister of the main characters
from the Last of the Mohicans, also released by Warlord Games. I had fun
painti...
Sources For The Interwar Gamer
-
I have been meaning to add some content here for a long time, apparently
three years of a long time in fact, how time flies. So with this post I
hope to k...
Stephen King’s Threshold
-
“There is probably no dedicated fantasy fan in America who doesn’t have at
least one of those distinctive black-bound volumes upon his or her shelf .
. ....
The Return of the Iron Duke
-
On Saturday, Nov. 21, six of us gathered at Jay's to fight a Napoleonic
battle using a highly modified version of Command and Colors Napoleonics we
laughin...
High time...
-
It is high time I posted here again. The project has stalled. Last night I
decided to have a read of book 2 after many years away from it. It begins
so wel...
Top (TV) Duels
-
To go with my posts on top one-on-one fights (in films) here's a quick
selection from television.
*#5* Agents of SHIELD (May vs. Ward)
This was a fascinat...
La Passeggiata
-
Artist: ItalianTitle: La *Passeggiata*
★Thank you for Visiting!★ ~ Return to Website ~ Return to Blog
Thank you for subscribing to the Orientalist Gallery!
Memories, Tangents and the Power of the Pastoral
-
*Charles Stadden 30mm BEF released fifty(ish) years ago*
It occurs to me that wargaming the Great War is not going to be a straight
forward thing.
L...
Second World War comparisons on "World War 20mm"
-
Piers Brand has recently posted a side by side shot of several figures
painted in his inimitable style. They represent a number of different 20mm
metal ma...
Fauna
-
After a recent expedition "down under" a couple of new animals have been
added to the national zoological gardens.
*If I recall correctly these are from a R...
Byzarbia at Ayton Game.
-
Once again it's been a while, though in my defence I plead that I have been
busy painting figures for our second Ayton Weekend Game, even forgoing two
of o...
Blog Harassment
-
I am sorry to say that I have had to select comment moderation as a
permanent feature now. I am sick and tired of being harassed by a follower
of this blog...
Buy my e-book and save the police (again!)
-
*Wasting Police Time** is now available on Kindle.
You don't need a Kindle itself to read it - you can download an 'app' onto
your iPad/laptop/whatever.
U...
10 of the most beautiful things I've ever seen
-
1. The sun setting over a still sea, woven to silk, and the swimmers,
silhouttetted wading back to the shore like merman returning to land.
2. My br...
Why the WAR OF 1812?
-
I just received two of the more recent Osprey Men-at Arms books on the War
of 1812 in the mail the other day (not really that recent - 1998 and
2000...but...
I've been extemporising Horse artillery for the last while, using an ADC figure and two chaps from the foot batteries. As a stop gap, it sufficed and there was little doubt as to which were the horse batteries and which the foot. But it rankled, so I have just mustered two new gun crews into the French service. These are Newline Designs figures and are a touch small, but they do well in units on their own. I had toyed with HATs offering, but wasn't convinced by the sculpting. I also wanted each horse battery to have at least one mounted gunner so that the difference between horse and foot batteries would be clear.
Up close for a whiff of grapeshot
My readers are all no doubt familiar with horse artillery, but in case Tim Gow has had a sudden rush of blood to the head and momentarily forgotten anything that doesn't have a jet engine on it.
Horse artillery are simply put, batteries of artillery where the gun crews ride rather than walk. The idea behind them was that they would provide fast mobile firepower where it was needed. Foot batteries, which typically carried a greater weight of metal, were more powerful, but couldn't be relied upon to get to the key point quickly. Horse artillery, sometimes called "flying batteries", though I've only heard this used when referring to the American arm, were most numerous in French service. They were expensive to train and raise as they required more horses then a foot battery and men who could ride as well as shoot. The first batteries were raised in 1792 under General Mathieu Dumas.
Sadly, this is not Alexandra Dumas father, who was the rather more imposing Thomas Alexandre Dumas. But the French artillery and horse artillery especially certainly shared his aggression. Paddy Griffith covers the "artillery charge" in passing in his Osprey on French Napoleonic Infantry tactics, but essentially it boiled down to getting in close and shooting fast, delivering murderous close range fire to rupture the enemy line.
We will never see a horse artillery battery in action in earnest, but to give you some impression of the speed, precision and dash of these men, have a look at this footage from the Royal Tournament in 1985.
Stragglers
While Command & Colours Napoleonics gun crews (at least as I organise them) come with only three crewmen and a gun, that seemed a rather scanty number of gunners. The Newline Design packs came with more figures than I needed, so should I ever need more crewmen (I won't say a full crew), these fellows are waiting in the wings.
I suppose that these pictures are part of a larger project to document my collection of figures, for my own satisfaction and so that I can insure them. I posted (as I usually do) a link to my blog entry on the subject to The Miniatures Page recently and received some interesting and not so interesting responses.
The discussion spiralled out of the bounds of reason and decency shortly there after and considerable time and energy that could have been more profitably spent calculating how many angels may dance on the head of the pin or perhaps ironing the undersides of cats was expended on the subject of whether it is right or proper to murder someone who is burgling your home. For a variety of reasons, I shall not go into my position on the subject here. I can only steal another man's eloquence.
"It is a big step to take another human life. It is never to be done lightly. I know of men who have taken life needlessly in other conflicts. I can assure you they live with the Mark of Cain upon them."
You're right:HaT's French horse guns are horrible and Italeri's are really Imperial Gurad horse artillery, so there's not much in the way of plastic 1/72nd stuff.
I've been wary of buying Newline as I've always thought it too small. I have been tempted to try SHQ's artillery, though haven't yet go around to it.
I have too little time in my life to even think of visiting the TMP site based on what others have said... on to more interesting subjects, I have seen the RHA in action at the Royal Tournament as a child, and I specifically remember the sheer speed in such a confined space - magnificent horsemanship - those guns skid as they go round the corners...... fantastic.
Rosbif - isn't it? Stirring stuff. I have a set of the Italeri Guard that'll get done eventually, but it's not exactly priority.
Steve - TMP is a curates egg and I wouldn't write it off entirely. As the the RHA, I've only seen our own mounted unit in action once and they were incredible. I can't but imagine what seeing a team would be like.
Tim - Gow, see me after class.
Ross - I couldn't agree more. If we ever meet in person, there's a funny story I must tell you about a home invasion.
Excellent footage Conrad!
ReplyDeleteYou're right:HaT's French horse guns are horrible and Italeri's are really Imperial Gurad horse artillery, so there's not much in the way of plastic 1/72nd stuff.
I've been wary of buying Newline as I've always thought it too small. I have been tempted to try SHQ's artillery, though haven't yet go around to it.
I have too little time in my life to even think of visiting the TMP site based on what others have said... on to more interesting subjects, I have seen the RHA in action at the Royal Tournament as a child, and I specifically remember the sheer speed in such a confined space - magnificent horsemanship - those guns skid as they go round the corners...... fantastic.
ReplyDeleteI'm intrigued by the mention of jet engines in a post about Napoleonic horse artillery. Now there's an idea...
ReplyDeleteHmm does make one wonder if rules for horse artillery should make them fast but require them to always move in circles.
ReplyDeleteOne of my favorite troop types though.
Possibly home invaders should be forced to sit and read TMP threads.
-Ross
Rosbif - isn't it? Stirring stuff.
ReplyDeleteI have a set of the Italeri Guard that'll get done eventually, but it's not exactly priority.
Steve - TMP is a curates egg and I wouldn't write it off entirely. As the the RHA, I've only seen our own mounted unit in action once and they were incredible. I can't but imagine what seeing a team would be like.
Tim - Gow, see me after class.
Ross - I couldn't agree more. If we ever meet in person, there's a funny story I must tell you about a home invasion.