Early War German Transport

I'm now being back down south after a trip home over the weekend and the only things I managed to complete were a couple of Krupp Boxer trucks, which added to my existing trucks will provide transport for a RF Shutzen battalion. I had earlier painted some Hat Tank riders to crew the open-backed model from Eidai.



I also managed to find some Crew for my desert Priests. Thanks to Charles who suggested the Airfix Commando figures, I had forgotten that I had some in my for sale box, as I had never entered them in my inventory.

The commandos have also been cut up to provide crews for my Bren Carriers, which were making slow progress.

Triples - the booty

I went to Triples with not much of a plan besides picking up the Plastic Soldier Company Loyd Carriers and US Heavy Weapons. All went well until I spotted some bargains on the B&B.

It consisted of several lots of Italeri fast build tanks and bags of Ancient, ACW and WW2 figures. I'm certainly not going to use them all and the excess will go for sale or trade. The box on the right is those I have already decided to sell.

Triples 2014

After a gruelling slog through the traffic on the M5 and M6 I got home late on Thursday. One day of family jobs meant I could escape to Triples to join the Lance & Longbow Society for the Battle of Baugé 1421. I took the part of Thomas Duke of Clarence with a dispersed English force atacking the combined French/Scots army.

Initial positions with French (left) and Scottish (right) reinforcements entering the table. The rest of the Scots are around Baugé.

English forces marching up the road, Clarence was impetuous, so I was worried that he would attack the Scottish schiltrons, but luckily throughout the entire game he remained calm and collected.

A plan comes together, leaving the Scots to the archers, I lead the English cavalry in a successful attack on the isolated French command of la Fayette (partly thenks to some skillful dice rolling by Andrew's son Charlie who was passing by)

Closing position with a conclusive victory, the Scots are bottled up in Baugé after an anxious moment when one of my archer units was stomped over by a Scottish schiltron.


Other games that caught my eye

The battle of Zorndorf by the Ilkley lads, lots of eye candy








First St Albans


French & Indian wars, very nice terrain








ACW game using Longstreet rules


Indian Mutiny
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Almanza - very impressive collection, but just seemed to be a line them up game and the castle on the hill looks odd.

Lightfoot Southern flank at Exter

Unexpectedly I managed to escape on Saturday and joined several southern members of the Society of Gentlemen Gamers for a game at the legionary show in Exeter.

It was one of the Rapid Fire scenarios, Lightfoot Southern flank, which pitched the 7th Armoured against positions held by Folgore and Ramke paratroops, backed up by Axis armour. I took on one flank of the British assault and we won best in show so it was doubly a pleasure to play

Preparing for the off, the Axis positions stretch before us. The first fifteen moves would be in darkness so there would be limited visibility

The Italian position to my immediate front

One on the other flank

The British encounter the minefields. Don's invulnerable scorpion attacks single-handed in the centre

The view from Don's flank

While the engineers clear the mines the infantry advance on the first positions

Axis second line awaiting the onslaught (must plead guilty to using Grants as assault guns)

Don's scorpion continues its rampage

A Boston attempting to take out the Italian 149mm.

Positions at the end of the day with the Axis positions crumbling under the weight of British Artillery

The axis realised the enevitable and conceded victory.

One of the other games Vimero 1808

Service Interruption!

Regrettably I won't be posting much for a while as my father is seriously ill in hospital and I'm staying near Bath to support my mother.

I have made some progress on my plan for April, but nothing has been completed yet even though some are almost finished events conspired against me. I might get some SYW fusiliers painted as I threw them and my paints in the car before leaving.

Palm Sunday at Towton

After many years of trying I finally got to the Towton reenactment. The Lance & Longbow society puts on a game in the barn, this year it was Bosworth. Positioning was excellent right next to the bar, however it was cold with quite a breeze blowing through, outside was warmer because it was in the sun!

Initial deployment, using the latest interpretation of the battle. The farm was moved to one side not to hinder play.

The Tudor pike push through, shortly after Richard III managed to impale himself in a vain attempt to turn the tide.

We played the game twice and on the second Richard emerged triumphant as it came down to personal combat between him and Henry.

Throughout both games Stanley and Norhumberland carefully sat on the sidelines avoiding commitment to either side

At the end of the day was the reenactment of battle out on the field.

Spot the arrows!


Painting, of the decorating variety has been progressing steadily, so progress against plan has been slow, now back to the paintbrush and a tin of non-drip white gloss paint!

On the workbench - April 2014

Well I'm feeling quite smug as progress in March was better than expected given the amount of other work that was needed around the house. Unfortunately this distraction continues so I'll be moderate in my plans

• Firstly finish off the Universal carriers being modified to the mortar version, progress is OK, but I'm struggling to find really suitable crew figures so I'm cutting up the Hat vehicle riders. An in-progress picture

• The Ace 20mm AA and 75mm Infantry gun have been assembled but put on hold as I may use them for winter games, which I need to sort out properly

Then it's back to attack the stash with

• 2 x British Desert Bedford QLD
• 2 x British Desert Bedford QLT
• 3 x German DAK Panzer III plus a Befehlspanzer III (will give me enough armour for the Alam Halfa scenario
• 3 x German DAK Sdkfz 251/1, a Sdkfz 251/10 and Sdkfz 251/7 so I can represent either a Panzer grenadier company at reduced scale or the 10th Panzer in Tunisia
• 2 x German Krupp Light truck to tidy up my early war german transport
• 3 x Italian M13/40
• A Hessian Fusilier regiment for the AWI
• and I couldn't forget my Frundsbergers, so they will get a Fusilier Regiment as well