A slight diversion - French R35s

Having failed to buy any S-Model R35s at Derby as PSC was out of stock. I took the plunge and ordered direct from China, the price including postage was virtually the same. Although I had some 1/76 resin R35s I always wanted some more.

The package arrived while I was in a lull with my cossacks so opening the kits I decided they would be quick to assemble. Indeed they were, I assembled three as the early version with the short 37mm and one with the later long version. I general Im ignore the PE parts but I did use a couple of bits and some "Sgt's mess" stowage.


The commanders came from the Matchbox Char B1 and a Solfig set I won at a SOGGy auction a few years back.

Out of the various camouflage schemes possible I picked this one as it looked the most suitable for fighting in France, the Levant or Morocco

Last of the half tracks - for now!

An Esci sdkfz 250/3. This should have been completed at the same time as the rest of the 250s. However on starting construction I found the model was badly warped and I had to try various method to get it stright again. In the end It was done by actually cutting the upper hull into pieces and then reassembling and filling the gaps.


I also scrapped the interior, which was badly modelled as well as warped and used a left over PSC interior cut to fit and added in the supplied radio plus some PSC crew.

To finish the saga, I realised that I would be better painting it for early war.

I did have an unwarped 250/10 but after my experiences with this one I sold it.

Agincourt day

We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition;

And gentlemen in England now-a-bed
Shall think themselves accurs’d they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin’s day.

I still have fond memories of the salute game back in April


link

Stalingrad refought - well a bit of it!

I had the honour of refighting a bit of Dougie's Stalingrad terrain that was posted earlier on my Devizes report. It was a great days gaming and I say that even though I lost. I was the commander of the much reduced 120th regiment of the 39th Guards Division, occupying the central position and in particular defending the Red October Factory. As usual I seemed to be too involved in the game to take enough pictures.

The table before the start, the dice indicated the German start line and the arrows where patrol would endeavour to find our positions







Luckily they would find very little except the bread factory Militia who would suffer in the subsequent bombardment and air attack, In general we suffered few casualties as most of our troops were in the cellars, but the consequence was they were unable to use reserve fire on the advancing Germans.

The first of many brave attempts to stop the Fascist hordes - a miss





Germans overrunning the bread factory


and crossing the railway line


German armoured support working through the rubble




One round of katyusha fire and it was pounced upon by a Stuka


On the northern flank the German armour runs into a Minefield and a dug in T34


Germans consolidate after crossing the railway and taking the Russian forward defence line, They were virtually wiped out, and the remnants routed.


retribution - a Stuka is shot down!


The German meat grinder gets to work on the Red October factory complex


despite heroic resistance the Russian northern flank crumbles


The same in the South, A trickle of reinforcements from across the Don move up to attempt to stem the tide.


The Stukas return, luckily one was intercepted y a Yak-3


More minefield fun for the Germans, but not enough to stop the advance


The end, the Germans push on and bring the Don crossing points under direct fire

I was left with my RHQ and band of invalids (a proportion of casualties were recycled) holding the last building in the factory.

A great days gaming at Bristol Independent Gaming the dice gods were certainly on the Germans side

Back to winter - more Russian armour.

More diecast reinforcements for my Russians. The KV1s and 2 were repainted before being given their winter white drybrushing. The Matilda was just drybrushed. I have no plans to use the SU76s yet, but while working on the others I touched up the missing paintwork on the lower hull and then drybrushed them.

Also included were some 50mm Pak 38s for my Germans and 76mm ZIS 3 for my Russians, both PSC kits.

Yet more half tracks - US this time

A couple of remnants, completed to create some space. The lead vehicle is a Frontline M3 with spare crew from the PSC version. Behind was a much battered Airfix model that has been fixed up with bits from the spare box, including one track unit.

More German half tracks - sdkfz 250 Alte

Keeping on with the same theme, here are the 251s smaller brothers, again the models are from Plastic Soldier Company and they go together very easily, I just had to check with my references to ensure I had the interiors correct. (not that you can see that much of them)

I built one each of the various combinations and one extra 250/1. Originally I intended to use them together with my existing force of 250s to make a Late War Aufklrungs Abteilung but they aren't compatible enough so in due course if PSC release their promised 250 Neue I'll complete the unit with those.

Of course with so many variant thee are quite a few figures left over and they'll be useful for providing other vehicle crews.