Two entire armies - done!

Hello all - more 2mm ACW stuff which I've knocked into order. The rebel army has been rebased, and now stands at a pretty respectable level. I'm thinking of going for a corps as represented by between three to five 'units' in Black Powder, which means each individual 'unit' represents about two or three brigades. Incidentally this means each of the 20mm by 10mm bases used to make up a unit equates to one brigade. I've done the Rebels in three corps of infantry, plus one of cavalry, to represent Lee's army in the Wilderness, right at the start of the huge Overland Campaign of 1864. In total, thirty-four infantry brigades, seven cavalry brigades and nine artillery 'battalions' of corps-level guns. Below is a view of some of the troops, plus some terrain I've found - some stretches of trenchworks and a pair of large redoubts - pretty much essential for refighting the Overland campaign. Although these were bought from Irregular Miniatures some years ago, making your own should be intensely easy.

Here is the Union, which I have also managed to represent in it's entirety. Four infantry corps, plus one cavalry. 41 Brigades of infantry, seven cavalry, plus about ten artillery 'batteries' of corps-artillery. And wagon-trains, camps, and supply dumps, naturally.

I also had a go at adding a bit of 'detail' to the infantry, and had to give up almost straight away. If you're trying to vary the grey ranks with browns of various shades, your efforts become completely invisible even at a few inches' distance. Only bold colours have a chance, such as in the photo below. On a whim, I coloured one Confederate corps commander in red, to represent A.P. Hill's notorious habit of wearing a red 'battle-shirt' when he led his men into a fight. At least 'Lil' Powell' will stand out!

Here's a few of those Union 'tail' formations behind the fighting troops. I tend to plough mounds of spare units, wagons, riders, cavalry troops, and tents onto all army HQ bases, to represent the chaos at a large staff-base. The Union tends to have more tents, just as a gesture towards their larger numbers and better supplies. In the background to this photo, you can also see Sheridan's troopers in the US Cavalry corps, ready to tear up some railway tracks.

2mm Extravaganza!

If you've not read it, I'd advise reading the blog 'Steel on Sand' for a good resource-pile relating to 2mm - for my money, one of the most routinely under-rated scales in wargaming. While my Wars of the Roses painting rumbles on, and my ACW campaign is on hold while I write up my campaign history (book-keeping - in real life, and in the hobby, it gets everywhere!) so I've taken my inspiration from it and dug out some old 2mm figures to see what I have. Turns out: far more than I realised! I have several armies of Horse & Musket kicking around in various states, so I thought I'd pick one to illustrate:

Take the above, for example - a full Confederate army in 2mm. I'd based it for DBA or something similar, but now with the excellent Black Powder rules in my hands, I'm thinking of converting it over to bases half this size.

Above are some Rebel infantry, which show the uneven and half-completed paint job I got through. Some units have little face-dots and stars-and-bars flags, while others are grey basecoats and no more. The above even has some rear-line regiments fashioned experimentally out of matchsticks. This may sound mad, but once painted and viewed from over the 'two-foot rule' distance, they are virtually indistinguishable from the moulded lead ones! To the front, a Corps commander plus his staff have a base of their own.

Here is a close-up on the cavalry, which includes Jeb Stuart and some light horse-artillery. The troopers themselves are modelled as a dismounted scrum of skirmishers (the collective noun?) to the fore, and a clutch of tethered horses to the rear. Looking at the photo, I've walked round the table and photographed them from behind - D'oh!

Now up to more refined levels - Army headquarters! the right shows the reserve artillery park of batteries, most of which are to be attached to the infantry corps. On the left is the HQ camp of R. E. Lee, with staffers, tents, hangers-on and even a little wagon. Behind it is the army supply base of yet more tents and such. One of the best things about 2mm is that you can model not just the fighting edge of an army, but the 'tail' as well, which can add a real extra dimension to large-level campaign games. (Plus, having it pillaged by enemy cavalry is a pain in the backside!)

Some close-up views of Johnny Reb. I feel like adding some variety to the uniforms, by putting in some splashes of browns and such - they're too neat and uniform! Each little 'unit' is a strip of a formed body of troops, forwarded by a skirmish line. I originally based them as 20mm by 10mm units, but then glued them together for DBA into 40mm by 20mm (as shown here.) For Black Powder I'll probably revert back, and a BP unit (probably around a brigade-sized outfit, at this scale) will consist of two 20mm x 10mm bases. This way they can go side-by-side for line formation, or back-to-back for a column. By converting scales I reckon they will move at about 2" a 'move' order and have a range of 4" for rifled muskets. At that scale, I can probably fight a battle on a small table or use a large one for effectively doing a series of battles - the entire Seven Days' battles on your dinner table?

First WotR Army painted

Hi - just a quick update plus some photos. I have almost completed painting 80 figures, or one of my Wars of the Roses armies - half the total I got delivered recently. The base-coats are on, and following a few little additions like livery badges etc. I'll be ready to 'dip' the whole lot in a stained varnish to add detail to the figures. Rounded off with an aerosol spray to kill off any glossy finish, then some flocking the base with grass, and they'll be done! Below you can see a ward of two companies, one under the Kingmaker Warwick, plus another minor noble with blue & yellow livery colours (doubtless some minor noble too humble to trouble a chronicler!)

My 'Main' Battle with the retainers of Henry VI or the Duke of Somerset (both blue & white - I've discovered many livery colours can apply to several people, reassuringly!) With him are further troops in Percy-ish colours, plus assorted minors, and even the five unpainted figures I've just to finish up (no doubt the unhinged Henry VI's personal escort, who'll be several miles off the field when the battle comes.)

Another small company of troops - Henry Holland, Duke of Exeter - in red and white.

The whole host, ready to battle!

My wargames weekend

My weekend has actually passed with a rarity for me, when a friend of mine bought a copy of Memoir '44 and (despairing of his girlfriend) asked me to join him for a few games. I went round for a "boys' night in" featuring pizza, beer plus about 7 or 8 games of Memoir '44. Excellent fun, and so much so that we have agreed to do it again! I had not played Memoir '44 before, and had low expectations of what it would be like. Certainly t was not what you would call 'historically realistic' in the detailed sense, but the game was a great deal of fun and gave a great flavour of things - I finally 'got' the game, after a year or two of thinking it sounded bad. What a turnaround! I may even be tempted to try it myself for different periods, so I shall be following the blog 'A Wargaming Odyssey' closely, as he has recently decided to try a Vietnam version of it (sadly I must wait as it's only one project among his many, just like any self-respecting wargamer!)

Back home in my own GHQ bunker, I've been doing a great deal of the 'donkey work' for my WOTR armies. I have worked my way through half of the boxes, clipping, glueing, and assembling eighty figures. I then glues eighty 1p coins to their bases, sat them all in a cardboard box in the loft (no small achievement in the freezing snow-bound cold) and spray-painted them a base-coat of black. I even took advantage of a trip to Ikea to get some storage boxes on the cheap.

I have now only just started out on the tricksy task of painting retinue colours on them, and my research largely consists of looking up other peoples' models on the internet plus a bit of Wikipedia. Here are my first set of liveried Retinue men, in a fetching blue and white. This should apparently make them lancastrians as these were (again apparently) the colours for Henry VI and/or the Duke of Somerset.

It's base-coat only, and I intend to dip them to get the finished result much improved. I'll paint up a lot more before I do that, however. For now though it's 12 down, 148 to go!

Wars of the Roses in 28mm

It's a red-letter day! A brand-new project has been started, and I thought I should blog it from the very earliest stages. First came the growing Medieval interest, with my 6mm armies, which was meant to be all about the Hundred Years' War. Then, I noticed my attention was slanting towards the end of the period, and the Wars of the Roses (WotR.) Next, came the Perry Miniatures' box of plastic 28mm figures, which looked marvellous - but I stayed strong, and held off(or went into denial, depending on your take.)

Next, there was The Perfect Captain, who brought out a Campaign game calles 'A Crown of Paper' and then followed it up with a tabletop battle set of rules called 'A Coat of Steel.' This set actually looked increasingly interesting as I read through it, and seemed much more suitable to do in 28mm.

Final straw - Warlord Games did a special offer for a 'Retinue Set' of four Perry Miniatures boxes bundled together, plus free P&P. So, I caved in at long last. They arrived last night, and here's a few snapshots to commemorate the starting project 'acorn' I hope will grow up nice and large - mind you, with 160 figures to keep me busy, I think I can relax on that score!

This fellow shows my planned basing system - figures individually glued to a penny! They are nearly/exactly 20mm in diameter, add a pleasing weight to stabilise the base, plus I can combine them as I wish on a movement tray 'base' of 40mm by 40mm.

A lord with his mini-retinue! By the scaling system of ACOS, this is a relatively minor noble with a group of 240 retainers (or potentially figures enough for 600 levies from Commissions of Array - scales and figures per base vary according to type.)

The working tabletop - assembling takes longer than I expected, but is actually also more enjoyable than I expected too!

The Retinue boxed set from Warlord Games - works out in total to about 34p a figure! Now there's just the minor matter of painting them...

A Coat of Steel

Not really a full post here, but a public service-style notice to any people with an interest in the Wars of the Roses. The Free resource site 'The Perfect Captain' has released a free set of battle rules for Wars of the Roses combats, as part of it's WOTR Campaign game. I'm currently having a look at them, and they seem very interesting - full of period-detail and colour. They're certainly a bit different from the normal run of things, but they've got my interest and I thought I should direct others to them. After all - when they're free, how wrong can you go?

Civil War Battles

Just to keep you updated, there have been some developments over the xmas/new year/january period in my Scotland-set ACW Campaign, and I thought I'd post an update. Under McClellan, the main Union army has finally made it's great advance, seeking to destroy it's Rebel counterpart. The scene for this fighting was Stirling and it's environs which - if the Union captured it - would lead to the Rebel heartlands of the Fife peninsula and the highlands being exposed!

Launching this attack were two 'Regular' corps (under Porter and Sedgwick) and a more inexperienced corps (Pope.) Also nearby, there was potential reinforcement from another untried corps (under BUrnside) down the Kilsyth road. Facing them were the rebel veterans under Beauregard now in the entrenchments around Stirling, plus an untried corps under Johnstone. A third, well-drilled corps under the eccentric Jackson was to the west, and would no doubt be recalled at speed once the attack began.

McClellan stayed true to historical type, advancing slowly up to the rebel defences and digging in himself. The Union couldn't turn the eastern end of the lines where they were anchored on the River Forth, and the western end had been secured with a small redoubt called Fort Burke. The rebels under Johnstone were concealed in the woods and hills to the west, to fall on the Union flank as they tried to encircle and destroy Fort Burke.

The attack was duly launched, and Porter's Union corps found itself being struck by the eager if inexperienced graybacks under Johnstone. The scattered woodland around Bear Mill became a battleground as the Union rapidly formed a line to repel the onrushing horde.

The attacks by Johnstone proved inadequate however, and the steadier Federals ultimately repelled the onslaught with heavy losses (I diced for destroyed units being recovered, and through bad/lucky rolls the Union units were able to largely reform while the Rebels seemed permanently lost!) However, although tactical disaster the battle did leave Porter facing west and turned the Union line into a salient, so strategically it had good results!

Next came the battle at Fort Burke itself, where Sedgwick's men had a crack at it.

No doubt the Rebs were shaken by the defeat nearby, because with a great display of enthusiasm, the Federals managed to storm the fort. The Rebel position was turned, and their centre threatened with collapse as their two wings were driven apart! To make matters worse, even the eastern flank began to look tricky as Pope's corps managed to ford a division over the river and threaten to take the overlooking high ground. Only Jackson's instant deployment could save the day!

Thankfully he made it in the nick of time, marching down the Stirling Road and hurling his compact little corps into the tip of the Federal breakthrough. Thanks to his sweeping advance and the Rebel cavalry raiding into the rear, the fleeing Federals were quickly routed and fled the field, abandoning Fort Burke and losing the battle of Kerse Farm!

Both sides paused to regroup, and the arrival (or non-arrival) of Burnside's fourth Federal Corps became crucial. The incompetent general seemed incapable of getting himself on the field however, while the Federals waited and the Rebels swapped Johnstone's battered corps with Beauregard's, giving the tired militia the benefit of fortifications while the two good rebel corps were freed up to become mobile.

They duly did so, racing south to cut the road link between Burnside's arrival point and the Union corps already present. With them in the way, Burnside could be crushed 2:1 when he arrived, so the two good Union corps moved southwest to keep the route open. The result was yet another battle at Cross Lines, where the Union and Rebel corps hit each other on the move, each flanking the other. However, while the Rebels couldn't rout the union they ended up in posession of a wood on the north of the battlefield, which blocked the Union army's return back to it's lines. Forced to withdraw east and back over the Bannockburn stream, the Union had lost it's chance of getting Burnside onto the field for a joint effort. McClellan withdrew, leaving the Rebels still in control of the Stirling area and victorious.

Overall, this was an enjoyable little mini-campaign, with lots of map maneuvering plus a good couple of colourful battles. Looks like the onset of the 1861 winter means both the Federals and Secessionists will need to start planning on an 1862 campaign!