Wilsons Hospital Ireland 1798 AAR

For tonight's game Chris Charlton had brought his wonderful 1798 Irish rebellion collection. I have not played a "proper" game with these yet and Chris has only had 3 outings so far.

These are all Trent miniatures wonderfully painted by Steve Shann and the game was held at Steve's house. Black Powder with very few amends, the main one being fire before moving.

I also brought along my fortified manor house for its first game, doesn't look much like a hospital but never mind.

This loosely based on a historical action. The United Army of Westmeath was besieged in the demesne of Wilson's Hospital. A Farnco Irish force under Humbert diverted from its march on Dublin to gather much needed reinforcements from the Westmeath troops. The Crown forces under General Lake historically destroyed the Irish comprehensively but we all know that wargames don't always go the same way so with a load of really terrible Irish accents we were off.

The Westmeath forces at the hospital had two brigades all pike armed and supported by a small skirmish screen. Whilst the Franco-Irish force included two battalions of French and one of French trained (Kind of) Irishmen, the rest again being Pike armed. The Franco-Irish had two guns and no cavalry.

The crown forces were a mix of Fencibles, regulars and the mercenaries of Honspechs mounted rifles. Generally much better armed and trained than the Irish but not as good as the French. The British forces were split into three brigades including 4 units of cavalry and two batteries of guns.

I took the vanguard, a combined light battalion, a unit of Fencibles cavalry and the Homspech mounted rifles who had the "Bloodthirsty" special rule. Apparently these Germans had a pretty horrible reputation for brutality.

Steve commanded the rest of the Crown forces marching onto the table.

Chris Flowers had the Westmeath boys in the hospital and Chris Charlton the Franco-Irish army.

Mark couldn't make it but we still ate the cakes he left last time. Thanks Mark!

Chris's historical write up is below as are the army stats for all the troops involved.

The Irish went first with Chris splitting his Franco-Irish Force to push the Regiment Irelandais and three units of pike at my advance guard whilst the French regulars supported by the guns and two more pike blocks advanced on the main British force.I got my light infantry forward and into cover quick sharp with cavalry on either flank. The Legion Irelandais charged my light infantry whilst the large pike unit charged my mounted fencibles. After a furious melee the partially trained Irish were destroyed, the Pike though had the furious charge special rule allowing a re-roll of all misses along with long spear which negated my charge bonus. The Fencibles did very well to hold the Irish to a draw in the first round.

The Irish Pike units had the special rule forcing them to attempt to charge whenever they could, I am not entirely sure that they were historically quite that enthusiastic but it made for an interesting game.

To my left Steve got a gun and his first unit lined up ready to try hold back the veteran French, whilst the rest of his force dilly dallied ont the table edge unable to get moving apart from a single light dragoon unit trotting along the road.

Next turn and an ineffective volley and the French smash into the Crown forces and drive them from the field.

My German cavalry charge a unit of Pike and force them to retreat, a sweeping advance and both units are shaken forcing the mounted rifles to retire but the Irish break. A further pike unit charge my light infantry who are also now shaken and force them to retire whilst the large unit fights another round of melee with my fencibles and forces them back too. All three of my units are now shaken and although we have destroyed 2 out of 4 Irish units the remaining two are in good shape.

On the left flank a unit of pike are in speculative charge range of the dragoons on the road, a die roll sees them roll low enough to reach the dragoons and off they go catching them in line of march. Steve does well to hold them but his remaining British regulars and still unwilling to get forward.

His second unit of light cavalry however capture the combined grenadier battalion in skirmish order. They manage to form u to receive the charge but are unable to get off a closing volley and lose the subsequent round of melee and are forced to retreat.

The British regulars form a new line to receive the victorious French regulars whilst the Dragoons finish off the French Grenadiers .

To the left the Steve's second unit of cavalry have seen off their Immediate threat and broken the pike unit and his second brigade of foot and marching forward but so are the two brigade's of Irish pike.

Chris Charlton's large unit of Pike charges my shaken light infantry and the ferocious charge re-rolls prove decisive and my foot are broken. Leaving me with two units of shaken cavalry I am unable to rally.

The French hit the British regulars and are held to a draw which is the best that can be said at this stage in the game.

As the Irish charge the British guns from the flank taking the first one out and are now poised to fall on the two units of regulars who are still in column of March. AT this stage General Lake realises that he is not going to be able to rescue a victory from the day and orders the remnants of his force to retire in good order leaving the Franco-Irish forces in possession of the field and celebrating a famous victory.

 A really fun game which the Black Powder rules handled very well indeed. The Irish felt a little too robust to my mind but then I did lose so maybe that's just mildly sour grapes. The figures are gorgeous and we are talking about using this as the basis for a demo game in the summer at the Newark Partizan show.

Thanks for the game gentlemen I will see you all again very soon. Perhaps a chillier winter game in the frozen East next time.

Saxon Dragoon Regiment Kurprinz

Its been a while since we saw anything for the Great Northern War, sorry! But just to prove its not forgotten here is a unit I have been working on in the background that is finally finished.

For my Allied dragoons (Saxon, Russian and Polish) I want both mounted and dismounted figures, so I was really pleased when Ebor released some Russian dragoons. They come with seperate heads so the variety of troops available increases and the Poles will probably have fur hats when I get around to them.

I wanted the dismounted dragoons to have a seperate base for the horses. Mainly for the look but it also is a visual reminder that thye only get two firing dice rather than the usual three for regular foot as a third of troops are holding the horses. It also allows us to leave the horses where the troops dismounted and make them return to that spot in order to remount and move should we wish to.

These are actually sold as Russian dismounted dragoons but I think they look spot on for my Saxons.

I have chosen regiment Kurprinz as it fought in many engagements, I had the flags and yellow contrasted well. You might notice that the mounted and dismounted flags look different, I have put the Colonels colour with the mounted part and the Kings colour with the dismounted rather than buy the set twice. A tight Yorkshire man to the end, short arms and deep pockets.

I also wanted these to be a slightly looser formation which I think suits their role.

The mounted figures are also Ebor except the drummer who is a Stratagem figure I had spare. I am not quite as happy with these as some other Ebor figures, they seem to have  no necks and there is only a single trooper figure to choose from. However by varying the arms and swapping a couple of heads I think they have come out OK and certainly look far better than the plastic Warlord Dragoons I originally had.

I am hoping to organise a very big Great Northern War game in the early summer so hopefully you will see these guys on table in the not too distant future.

North West Frontier Workbench

No this is not a case of All Quite on the Preston front, its a different North West.

With a "The Men Who Would be Kings" game coming up I wanted to get a few figures finished for it, it was planned as 1919 Third Afghan War. So I managed to paint but not quite base these two Mounted British Yeomanry figures converted from Perry's WW2 cavalry for Syria. The wide brim to the helmet is a sunshade. I really like these and have 4 more to paint all with head swaps for the earlier sun helmets.

I also managed two Pathans, these are in typical faded drab clothing and carry modern rifles. Both from the Empress Jazz age Imperialism range. This gives me about 10 armed with modern weapons and another 10 to paint, I may stick with that and use the earlier troops to bolster my forces, famous last words, lets see.

I also got this chap with a Lewis gun almost finished too! I do like this pale blue grey colour "fog grey" I have lightned the highlights on it almost to white to have that washed out appearence, I have used it quite a lot on this latest bunch of figures coming off the workbench. It also works quite well for the British army shirts as the final highlight.

Having started on Afgans I decided to crack on with some of the tribal types outsanding for my Sikh Wars project.

I decided I would keep this post in draft for a week and see what I managed to paint up.

These three kind of fall into that category, the chap at the back is an old Foundry Afghan whilst the two at the front are Sikh irregulars. All a good fit for my irregular forces.

The foot are again mainly the old Foundry range, perfect as Kashmiri hill tribes fighting for the Sikhs against the British, there are 4 Sikh irregulars, again old Foundry range, mixed in with these chaps. The old Foundry stuff still has loads of character and has really stood the test of time.

So whilst on with these I though why not add a few artillery figures, below are one each of Sikh horse and foot artillery, happy to just add odd figures here and there until I have a few and then start finishing units off.

Inevitably this led me to expand my East India Company forces by adding a few more Sepoys, currently these forces are outnmbered more than three to one and I have no where near enough for  a game. Again these are all Foundry except the wounded officer who is a Studio Miniatures figure. The chap in green leaves me with a dilemma, the company native battalions had started a process of moving some light companies to green uniforms and some of those armed with rifles. Even by the mutiny this process was not complete. My first unit of Sepoys has a stand of 4 in green as a nod to this, however this chap is the last flanker I have in covered cap and will look odd mixed in with the red coats. I may have to repaint him or add him to a third battalion which will be mainly in shako's. I wont decide just yet.

So I did say I would add pictures as I got stuff painted and I have a bunch just varnished to share, Expanding on the 2 Sikh Gunners I have anther 6, mainly horse artillery, these will be three man crews on small 6 pdr guns. Two more figures will give me three crews. As the Sikhs had more artillery and heavier metal I will make a few of their batteries 3 instead of 2 guns to beef them up.

5 more Sepoys, this next battalion is well on the way, Foundry figres with an Iron Duke Havildar.

4 more irregulars, you can see here the simple colour pallets I use, added to the other pallets they will be mixed up on bases to give a very irregular look. I will have one or two units with just bladed weaons as well as the matchlock musket units. Again all Wargames Foundry.

This irregular cavalryman is an Afghan rider on a Sikh horse. Some nice colour contrasts.

Now the Bengal Native Light Cavalry have been sat for some time waiting for me to get around to them. Mainly Iron Duke figures with a British Officer from Foundry added. These are really lovely figures, two more on the table, really not sure why it has taken me so long to get into these.

A couple of Sikh Regulars to kick off the next regular regiment, although painted as the same unit these are two different manufacturers, Studio and Old Glory. I dont really think they fit together but I have enough to do a seperate battalion of each manufacturer which might be the way forward.

And lastly a pair of British foot from the 31st regiment with buff facings. Again Foundry and still really lovely figures.

I have dropped all these figures into the painted figure box until I have enough to finish units and start basing them up. Not bad for a weeks work.

So there you go, a busy week in the strange mind of a wargames butterfly. Hope to have some of these based up and shared in units soon and hopefully a game by Autumn. Lets see.

Russian Civil War Cossacks

I have had some of the fantastic RCW figures from sculptor Leonid in St Petersburg before. So when I saw he had released a set of 10  Kuban Cossacks I decided I needed to have them.

These are now available from Studio Siberia. http://siberia-miniatures.ru/ the box art is awesome.

Leonid has already done some Kuban cossacks which I have bought and I planned to add these to them for a further two units if I could.

The wolf banner for Shukiros wolves Divizion comes with the box set. Apologies a couple are upside down, I now cant figure out how to rotate them!

The figures are a reasonable match for Copplestone in terms of size, not quite as a clean and sharp but with much more dynamism in the poses. The big fur hats make themideal for the classic Caucasian style Cossacks.

Most wear the long Cherkeska cossack coat but a few are in gymnasterka shirts. A mix of three horses but I had a couple left over from other projects allowing me to mix them up a little.

Typically I prime horses white, add a layer of acrylic paint paler than the desired colour then when its dry paint a darker oil colour over the top and wipe off with a cloth so the darker oil catches in all the folds and creases. I use Halfords white car primer which gives a nice even coat.

On this occasion I tried using a buff colour to avoid the extra coat of acrylic colour, it was a bit shiny and thick to start with but the end result turned out pretty good to be honest.

The end result on the horses looks something like the below before I add any detail and colour the mains, tails and hocks. It may sound drawn out but its much quicker than painting them by hand and has the advantage thats its more technique than skill.

I decided the first ten would be Ossetians, these were a fairly numerous Christian ethnic grouping in the Caucasus mountains and fought through the Great War and the Civil War forming part of the Volunteer Army at one point and also part of the Shukiro's Wolves Divizion too. 

Apparantly they wors a lot of civilian gear so I have made their Cherkeska coats a mix of colours as are their fur hats. The Shoulder boards and cloth tops for the fur hats are all in sky blue which is the facing colour for the Ossetians.

I am pretty happy with how they came out, especially the officer with pistol on the grey.

I was asked for close ups so have added a few, again the officer on the grey is a favourite, these two dont comein the pack but are available seperately.

These next two arefromthe pack but have horses from different ranges to add abit of variety.

Again these two are available seperately, you can see the chapwith the Swordis the same as the first picture but a different paint job makes him look quite different.

These last two are straight fromthe pack on their original horses, that leaves me 6 more from the pack as the basis for anothe runitof Shukiro's wolves.

For perspecive here they arealongside Copplestone Cossacks.

Even more persepective the same unit of Siberian Cossacks in Copplestone and Studio Siberia. Both beautiful models but different enought that I have kept them in seperate units.

This unit have already seen action on the railway bridge scenario nalthough they arrived just as the Reds conceded so didnt get much involvement.

I have already painted the first two from my next unit which will be the Shukiro's wolves with the banner, these guys will be slightly more uniform and have red shoulder boards and cap cloth. That will be pretty much all the White cavalry I want, honest! 6 units of Cossacsk supported by 4 units of Mongolian cavalry should be plenty.