Book Review: Seven Men of Gascony, R. F. Delderfield

NB: Another one of my occasional archival updates. This was originally written around 2014, but then forgotten about. Posting it now after a thread on TMP about Napoleonic historical fiction made me think of it again.

Delderfield was primarily a novelist, famed for being the author of A Horseman Riding By and other such works, from around the middle of the 20th century. I was loaned Seven Men of Gascony by a friend of my dads, when I was around 11-12 years old, who knew I was passionate about Napoleonic history.

I really enjoyed it back then. So much so, in fact, that I also borrowed and read one of the author's contemporary romances, Diana. All these years later, and I find myself getting back into Napoleonic history. I've now read several other books by Delderfield, all factual and all on Napoleonic subjects, The March of the Twenty-Six, about Napoleon's Marshals, and Napoleon in Love (no explanation necessary!) being the most recent.

Another of Delderfield's non-fiction Napoleonic works.

Returning to things one loved as a child can be hit and miss. But on this occasion I'm relieved to find that I still enjoy reading this. Having recently read Tolstoy's much lauded epic War And Peace, as well as Thackeray's Vanity Fair, it's nice to read fictionalised history of the era told from a French perspective (the characters being French, that is, the author was very much an Englishman), plus this is very much easy-reading compared with Tolstoy (and perhaps even Thackeray?).

That Delderfield was steeped in the history of the period is very obvious. Anyone who's read any of the many Napoleonic memoirs, of which there are an abundance, will recognise numerous tableaux, woven into this well told tale. 

Delderfield is an intelligent, articulate, old fashioned writer, and, as just mentioned, very well informed on his subject, which makes this an enjoyable read. Sure, it's not part of the canon of great literature, like War and Peace, but it's a much easier read, taking itself seriously enough, but not too seriously (a harsher way to say the same thing is that Tolstoy is deeper, but Delderfield is less pompous), and at times even as reflective on deeper themes as Tolstoy liked to continually remind us he or his characters were.

Chortle!

One of my main areas of interest in the Napoleonic era at present is Russia, 1812, and Delderfield's characters pass through this appalling episode, giving the reader some very evocative and memorable scenes. Delderfield rather cleverly structures the book as a whole around the major rivers in each theatre: we start under the heading of The Danube, during which episodes the protagonists pass through the Austrian campaign of 1809 (Aspern-Essling, etc.); The Tagus covers events in Portugal and Spain; The Niemen is the central-European bridge into Russia; the Elster finds the voltigeurs we're following retreating through Prussia; and the final river is The Sambre, where the books reaches it's conclusions. There's even a section called The Otter, in which the 'file' of soldiers wind up as prisoners in the south of England!

The River Otter. 

One senses that Delderfield includes something of himself in the character of Gabriel, who's the most fully-realised actor in the story. The others, mostly the titular 'Seven Men of Gascony', but also Napoleon, various Marshals, commanders and others, including Nicholette, a cantiniere, are colourfully drawn, but in a fairly simplistic way. I haven't read any Bernard Cornwall yet, but as far as my limited knowledge of historical fiction goes (mainly limited to Cadfael and Flashman at present), this is a good solid read, and will be of most appeal to those like myself with a 'thing' for Napoleonic history.

In conclusion, the overall story itself is a brisk, breezy, easy read, albeit that the tale it tells is far more arduous than is the experience of reading about it. Not a golden work of literary genius, perhaps, but good solid fun, with the added benefit of being told from the French side for once.

The author.

Nostalgia/book reviews: L & F Funcken's Napoleonic Uniform Books

As a kid I'd take these wonderful books out on loan from the Cambridge Central Library, then in the Lion Yard (now the Cathedral of Capitalism known as The Grand Arcade), frequently running up fines, as I held onto them overly long, delighting in the artwork of Liliane et Fred Funcken.

Nice double page spreads as endpapers.

The fact the authors/illustrators were French added to the charm and romance. I'm not sure why, but right from the outset I was more interested in the French, first and foremost, and their allies - especially the crazy patchwork of tiny states that was to become the Confederation of the Rhine - and then the Russians, Austrians, Prussians.

The Russians.

I don't know quite how or why, but from very early on I sensed that the English and their minions were something of a sideshow. And - despite Wellington's role/achievements, or Nelson and the Navy, or even our primary contribution to the Napoleonic Wars, as bankers to the several European coalitions - I still feel this way.

It wasn't until many, many years had passed, including my near enough two-decade break from military miniatures and history, etc, that I bought these fab books for myself, at one of the wargaming shows I now ocassionally attend. I can't recall which show it was - I have a feeling it was Salute - or exactly which seller I got them from. Most likely it was either Lanchester or Meekins.

An attractively done vignette of Baron Larrey's 'flying ambulance'.

As in days of yore, it's the pics I'm primarily drawn to. Although, unlike when I was a nipper, I do now also read the text. The peacock finery of military uniformology reached a kind of apogee at this point. The Napoleonic era was and remains my favourite for martial attire. And as splendid as these books are - and what a pleasure it is to no longer rack up fines as I endlessly pore over these - I now need to supplement and extend my knowledge, so I have numerous other similar titles, including series like Osprey or Blandford, or collections of particular artists, like Rousselot.

A handy black and white 'glossary' spread. [1]

I've also learned that the Funckens worked with Hergé, producer of the fabulous Tintin series, and also a man with an avowed mission to educate youth. In the latter capacity he had the Funckens, through studio Hergé and its numerous projects, frequently producing all sorts of historical material. On one of my visits to the Waterloo battlefields I bought a rather attractive hardback that compiles a number of these works on the theme of Waterloo. It's fantastic. The only drawback is it's in French, and my French isn't exactly tres bon!

However, this post concerns their two Arms and Uniforms titles [2] on the Napoleonic Wars: Volume one covers the French army, including Napoleon and his staff, and everything else except the various formations of the Imperial Guard. Then it goes on to cover the British, Prussian and Spanish armies. Volume two starts with the Imperial Guard, and then moves on to 'Allies of the French' (from Confederation of the Rhine to Italy and Naples, etc.), and the Swedish, Austrian and Russian armies. Unsurprisingly, it's the French army that gets the fullest treatment. [3]

I absolutely love these two books, as they were a powerful part of my early interest in the period. Consequently the Funckens also have a special place on the nostalgia map of my soul!

In the foreground, a personal favourite: Eclaireur, 2nd Regt.

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NOTES:

[1] There are numerous illustrations of equipment, badges, flags, etc. Mostly in colour.

[2] The Arms and Uniforms series covered everything from the ancients, through medieval, right up to the two World Wars.

[3] As a result of this fuller coverage I've always had a soft spot for certain more obscure branches of the French military machine, from the artillery train, or the medics, to the Eclaireurs. Often based purely on the aesthetics/colour schemes of their uniforms!

20mm WWII - Building Airfix German Tanks with Dad!

My Airfix Panther at the time of posting.

Like many figure collectors and gamers, I can't seem to confine myself to one subject area or project for too long (or should that be long enough?). Amidst all my tiny Napoleonic endeavours, my childhood interest in WWII armour, particularly German, has been re-born!

As a kid getting into all this stuff my two main areas of interest were 15 mm Napoleonics, and 1/300th World War II. In 15mm it was mostly Minifigs, whilst in 1/300th it was entirely Heroics & Ros. Another childhood memory is that of my dad and a lodger we had called Tim Seward, when I was very young, making model tanks together. These were exquisitely made and painted, or at least my memory says they were, usually being converted to show battle damage and augmented with 'on campaign' additions, all sourced from photographic reference.

I can remember some of the reference material my father and this fellow Tim used to use. There was a fantastic very slim-line paperback, in landscape format, filled with nothing but loads of black and white photos of the Wehrmacht at war. I think this might have been produced by Tamiya, but I'm far from sure of that! Anyway, it's not something I've been able to locate. Another title which was a constant reference, and has proven far easier to locate, was the first edition of Panzer Colours, published on the Arms & Armour imprint.

As a child I remember poring over Dad's Panzer Colours. 

I was able to buy Panzer Colours at a wargaming show a few years ago, and have subsequently added volumes two and three from the series, the latter via the web, I think. The internet is something else that wasn't around in my earlier phase in the mini-military hobby zone. And it can be a pretty fantastic resource, as we all know! So, I now have a complete set (see above), something that we never had at home when I was a child! 

As an adult I've decided to return to the theme of World War II warfare, but in a larger scale than I did as a child. In keeping with the title of my blog, I looked at all sorts of different scales, and was very definitely tempted by the more recent advent of World War II in 15mm. However, in the end what clinched it was a decision to embark on a modelmaking project with my father, Simon. 

This idea arose, in part, as a tribute to his efforts with his buddy Tim, all those years ago. But it was also intended to give us a way to spend some quality father and son time, now that we're both well and truly into advanced adulthood!

With this idea in mind, I brought my father a King Tiger model from the Airfix range, in 1/76 scale, along with paints, glue and, erm… well, I think that was it actually! For myself, I bought a Panther, possibly my favourite of the World War II German tanks. Every Monday we get together for a few hours to work on our tanks, have lunch and a cup or three of tea, a bit of a chinwag, and watch an episode of Ken Burns superb ACW documentary. It's all very enjoyable!

In fact I've been enjoying the whole thing so much - and I hope my father has to!? - that I have subsequently bought a number of other kits, with a view to us continuing the project. And (with something of an ulterior motive, perhaps?) I've even fantasised that together we might build a small wargaming force, and maybe even have a game at some future point.

Zvezda' 'snap-fit' 1/72 Panther, and ye olde (much maligned) Airfix 1/76 kit. [1]

In the last session or two I have found myself getting slightly ahead of my father, so I decided at a recent wargaming convention (Derby Wargames World), to invest in another Panther tank. Even though there is a small scale discrepancy, 1/72, as against 1/76, I decided nonetheless to try a Zvezda kit. I started this whole thing with Airfix kits because they were what I first made as a child, and I believe they are also mostly what my dad and his buddy built (although they may have used a number of manufacturers, I can't recall).

But, as I allude to in the blurb for my blog, there is nowadays - and we ought to be grateful - a bewildering array of choice on all fronts in the model-making and wargaming market place. Models by Zvezda (which means 'star'), a Russian company, almost certainly wouldn't have been available to my father or myself as a child, thanks to chilly relations stemming from the post-World War II Cold War. Time and history have moved inexorably on, and we have benefitted (let's gloss over the ageing aspect!) now that we can buy these Russian products easily.

An aerial view of the Airfix Panther. [1]

With reference to Panzer Colours and other (mostly online) sources, my dad and I are adding a few details to our tanks. The Airfix Panther is a very basic model - I think I may have read online that it is actually one of the earliest kits and has never been updated - so I've added stowage and various other bits and bobs, like wires, spare bits of track for armour, and so on, much of which I bought from Sergeant's Mess at the Derby show.

As a kid I collected my 1/300th German forces with the Ostfront in mind, but as I'm doing the Russian campaign in both my 6mm and 10mm Napoleonic projects, I thought perhaps this time I might explore World War II via the Italian theatre. The Italian theatre looks geographically, historically, and strategically, like a very interesting area of World War II (it was also the theatre in which Alan Whicker served!), and one that is often ignored in gaming, at least as far as I've seen. Like many WWII gamers in 20mm, I love the German three-colour ambush paint schemes, and that is what I'm predominantly going to use.

As far as adversaries go, I haven't really given it too much thought; they could be a mixture of American and British, and perhaps I/we might even involve Italian and partisan forces, although presumably the Italians might have mixed allegiances!

Returning to the model kits, I failed pretty comprehensively to document the building of these kits, which was something I had intended. Nevertheless I can at least post a few images, showing my Airfix 1/76 Panther tank, almost completed, both alone and alongside the Zvezda 1/72 Panther, which is visibly larger and also is far less complete, paint-job wise. The Zvezda kit has far more detail, including some things I'll be adding to the Airfix model, and some I probably won't.

The two Panthers side by side.

In terms of ease of assembly, both kits were - or seemed to me as someone returning to modelling after more than two decades in the the wilderness - quite complex, and included quite a lot of detail, especially in the wheel and track areas, much of which will not really be visible once the models are completed. Indeed when I finished the Zvezda kit, I noticed that there were two tiny little wheels which I had completely overlooked. However as they were not visible by the time it was completed, the end result is not disastrous. Any such unused parts go into the spares box.

The Zvezda kit is far superior in terms of detail, and even moulding and build-quality. The Airfix kit - which gets a lot of stick around the interweb - is however, absolutely fine for my purposes, if admittedly rather basic. My dad and I have decided to buy some of the incredible model-making extras that are nowadays available, in this instance (in addition to the aforementioned Sgt's Mess bits, we plan to buy some tiny brass machine guns, because my Airfix Panther's machine gun is rubbish, and my father's Airfix King Tiger model appears to be lacking that particular component, bizarrely!

In the end I glued both kits together using typical model-making cement, such as is sometimes supplied with beginner kit sets, or is at least recommended by the manufacturers; the sort that binds the styrene by melting it slightly, and can be rather messy! The Zvezda kit loudly proclaims that no glue is required, as the kit is 'snap-fit'. Despite the fact that I did ultimately glue it together, to make it more robust, the Zvezda kit held together remarkably well without glue (I would often put the parts together to test fit, before glueing them). I was certainly impressed by both the level of detail in this kit, and also the ease of assembly and the fit of all the parts.

I think I may well buy another Zvezda Panther tank, for the fun of building it, to augment my forces, and because there was one small problem, regarding fit, but I believe that was of my own making. If you look closely at the unpainted tank, you might notice that the turret doesn't fit properly parallel to the body in the same way the Airfix turret does. I believe that when I glued part of the under-turret assembly on the Zvezda model, I didn't push it down sufficiently hard to click into place exactly in its proper alignment. Any fault there lies squarely with me and not the manufacturer.

I wasn't too sure if the discrepancy in scale would really register easily to the eye, but I guess that it does. Despite this I think I will field both Panthers in any forces that I do ultimately assemble.

Poring over Panzer Colours and reference materials on the Internet was enormous fun, as was the detailing of the Airfix kit (a process which is not yet quite finished). One of the photos I will be posting will hopefully show that, where necessary, I use a tiny drill to make a hole in the end of the plastic tank barrels which, in both cases, had no such hole at the end of the barrel. Rather interestingly, my father's King Tiger assembles in such a way that there is a hole at the end of the barrel, which is obviously more realistic and requires no further effort.

I remembered to drill this hole in advance of assembly, with the Aifix kit, but I have yet to do it - after assembly on the Zvezda kit. I forgot! This presents something of a technical challenge! One final thing I will note is that the material used for the Airfix tank tracks is, in my mind, rather horrible. Neither the normal styrene cement nor superglue seemed to help it bond, or at least bond easily. Both my father and I were rather exasperated as our fingers and various other bits of the model became cemented together, only for the tracks to come away as soon as we released our grips.

In the end we had to rig up various contrivances using pliers, tweezers or other such grips, and wait a while in order to keep the glued parts together sufficiently long for them to bond. The Airfix tank tracks are also made of a rather stretchy material, barely long enough to get around the wheels, resulting in this stage being fraught with the danger of potentially damaging them, or even breaking them off. Obviously we were returning to kit modelling as near-as-damn-it modelmaking virgins, and we will no doubt get better with more experience. In fact the results so far for both of us have turned out looking pretty tolerable, and the tight-fitting tracks do you have some advantages regarding flexibility and a snug fit.

Mind you, next to Zvezda tracks they are very poor and unrealistic! I infinitely preferred the wheel and track assembly of the Zvezda kit, which I thought was a masterclass in model kit design. The tracks in this kit are a slightly more flexible material than the main body of the tank, which in itself is not as rigid a styrene as the Airfix model, but they are far more solid (and certainly not at all stretchy) than the Airfix ones. The Zvezda tracks folded around the wheels and clicked into place via small male and female socket parts, and met perfectly at either end, in a very satisfying manner. Also, thanks to the type of plastic used, they glued (although that is not strictly or entirely necessary) in a much quicker and more satisfactory style.

Note the absence of rear stowage bins on the Airfix model.

Before I finish, I'll add a few final thoughts about the level of detail on each model. The Airfix one is donkeys years old, and the moulds have never been re-tooled. The biggest and most glaring omission - to my eyes - is the complete absence of the rear stowage bins.

The Zvezda has these, of course (as all Panthers had them!), but it also has side-skirt armour, turret mounted smoke dischargers, much better and more realistic tracks, including spare track on the body, two towing cables, the gun barrel rest, all kinds of minor details (including internal fans that are almost visible through the upper body grilles!), a decent selection of tools, and a jack. I have a few tools in my spares box, and sets of such stuff can be bought. I'll definitely be adding the rear stowage bins, some tools, and one or two other oddments to the Airfix tank, as the old dear needs jazzing up!

My father's Airfix King Tiger is in a slightly more basic state than my Airfix Panther, but he's added some extra track as armour (looks like it might be facing the wrong way tho'... that may have been my fault!?). I'm hoping that once these are all modded and painted, they'll look good enough to display or game with!

Dad's King Tiger, and my unfinished Wehrmacht light vehicles.

I do have some other WWII stuff: a Kubelwagen, Kettenkrad (both visible in the above pic of the King Tiger), and even a Willys Jeep (which I finished assembling this evening), all three bought as a set some year or two back. I got a yen recently for some Nebelwerfers... who knows why? Because they look kind of cool, perhaps? I now have four of these unusual looking artillery pieces: 2 ex-Esci Italeri plastics (mit crew), and two ex-Skytrex white metal models (mit-out crew!), the latter from The 20mm Zone [link?]. I bought some crew for the metal guns from, I think, Grubby Tanks.

I've also bought a few more Airfix kits to build with dad, this time opting for the same kit for each of us: I've got two Pak-40s with trucks, and two Stug IIIs! Amidst this slight frenzy (can you have a slight frenzy?) of WWII German action, I also succumbed to the temptation to buy some 20mm plastic figures. The first I've bought since owning a load as a nipper! With packs from Airfix, Italieri, and Caesar (this last a new brand to me), I now have a couple of hundred infantry, as well as the tanks and other vehicles.

Still, as fun as all this undoubtedly is, it also makes me a tad worried as to the progress of my reasonably sizeable Napoleonic Russia 1812 projects!

---

NOTES:

[1] I've read that the latter product is over 50 years old - not mine obviously! - and may even have been the model that launched the scale, tanks wise. Can anyone corroborate this?

[2] Some extra track armour has been added, plus a box and some coiled wire. The MG-34 is not fitted yet. I'll probably add a machined-brass one. I have a set on order from Aber. 

Book Review: Achtung Schweinhund - Harry Pearson

Unleash the geek! A wonderful book. No wargamers bookshelf is complete without it!

I absolutely lived this book.* I'm not normally one for slim populist looking paperbacks, give me a weighty hardback, or if it has to be in paperback, then make sure it's like an overweight newsreader, fat and factual. Nor do I necessarily normally warm to that kind of quick and ready journo-style wit Pearson has such facility for - I believe his chief income was derived, formerly, from working as a sports columnist and such like, for, amongst others, the Guardian - which, when it comes off as glib and facile, can as easily annoy me as tickle my funny-bone.

A Commando comic, such as I might've been reading in the early 1980s.

But thankfully his slick writing skills are balanced by a degree of self-effacement, and anyway, are here put to the service of a very noble cause, the unleashing of the geek. Ranging across quite a wide field of territories, taking in wargamers, figure sculptors, re-enactors and board-gamers, as well as model kits, war comics and war films, his central or axial concern is little toy soldiers.

I, like Pearson, or any other boy-man of at least moderate self-awareness and intelligence, might well baulk at the connotations of the term toy soldiers, and prefer, for example, miniature figurines, whose extra syllables and Latinate derivation sound altogether more mature. But, amongst the themes upon which Pearson harps, and I mean that in a sunny lyric Greek sense, is that of the earnestness of play, and our need for it.

One of the books chapters starts with a quote from French writer Anatole France: "Children worship their toys. They ask of them what Men have always asked of their Gods: joy and forgetfulness." An excellent little maxim, so good another wargamer is using it as the title of their blog!

A recurrent theme throughout Pearson's book is the history of the hobby, something I also get more and more interested in as I grow older.

My recent rebirth into some of the passions of my youth - which includes collecting and painting wargaming armies, building model kits, and reading vast amounts of military history - has had a radical effect on me, chiefly in my allowing myself to have some pleasure as an adult. And, like Pearson, I find I derive a strange yet powerful joy from my hordes of little men, and all that goes with them, from attending such bizarre gatherings as wargaming shows to buying endless books on Napoleon in Russia, 1812.

A personal favourite from my large-ish and ever-expanding 1812 library.

Not only does Pearson celebrate his present loves, there's also an element of social history, partly through autobiography, and partly through exploring the historical threads of his subject. And this latter aspect I absolutely love, being a kind of auto-didact intellectual archaeologist of sorts myself. As a writer of a classic album column, for over a decade, for Drummer magazine, I had long been developing an already latent proclivity for delving into the back stories of my interests.

Gilder in 1975. I found out in AS that he did some time in the clink! What for exactly appears to remain shrouded in mystery. Perhaps it was his dress sense?

And now that I was getting really into toy soldiers and military history again, I suddenly wanted to know about such figures as Peter Gilder and Marcus Hinton, the former a living legend in my youth, as I grew up reading Miniature Wargames, and the latter a shadowy semi-mythical figure I'd only recently discovered, combining aspects of Mr Ben, Sir Henry at Rawlinson End, and a Greek satyr. Pearson was already sleuthing his way down a trail that I wanted to follow, looking into the such tap-roots of the modern hobby as the Zinnfiguren of Germany, and H.G. Wells' Little Wars.

A particularly fine looking edition of this venerable auld classic.

The right reverend Wells doing his thing in the garden. In his book, Wells makes jocular mention of turfing his kids out of their play room to provide indoor space!

One thing that makes me a touch sad tho', in an abjectly sorry-for-myself kind of way, is that, compared with me, and despite his oft-professed tendency to separate this side of his life from other parts of it, such as his public persona, Pearson seems to have enjoyed (and I hope is still enjoying) a very richly connected life in wargaming and toy soldiering. Thus far I have always been, and remain, an almost entirely solitary figure, pursuing my path solo.**

A lonely looking Napoleonic type (sketch by Albrecht Adam).

In some ways this suits aspects of my persona, but I must confess, I am perhaps more than a mite jealous of the apparent bonhomie and camaraderie that Pearson appears to have enjoyed via the hobby - mind you, I recently chatted to a master figure-maker for over an hour on the phone, so things may be looking up in this area - even if, as he somewhat ruefully admits, his wargaming friendships may have been fairly narrowly constrained around the hobby itself.

Still, rather than putting away these childish things, as I thought I was doing when, about twenty odd years ago, I sold off my 15mm Minifigs French Napoleonic and Heroics & Ros 1/300th German WWII Ostfront armies, I'll do as Wellington did, according to his legend, and put away instead my tiny, broken violin, and bask in the virtual companionship this book has offered me.

I'm stepping out of the shadows, Humbrol enamel tinlets in hand, the geek... unleashed and lovin' it.

The ancient German tradition of Zinnfiguren - or 'flats' - lives on, in such work as this drummer, by Alexander Mitelev

But seriously, thank you Harry Pearson for a truly lovely book, I might even say a great book, that warmed the cockles of this peace-loving table top warmonger.

In case you're interested, Harry and a pal set up this site (they are no longer involved directly in the running of it), dedicated to the older wargaming figures they grew to treasure.

* That's a typo, fairly obviously, but such a serendipitous one I feel I ought to let it stand. One, because it's true, I not only loved this book, but part of why I loved it so much is that I have also, verily I say unto ye, lived it. And two p, because it gave me a rare but valid chance to use that awkwardly portentous word, serendipitous.

** Well, I did persuade few school friends to buy small collections of Minifigs to battle with, some 30 odd years ago! And we even started a Wargames club at my secondary school, albeit a rather short lived affair. I recently found out that one Russian contingent from that era is still at the family home, unpainted. Might see if that pal would either consider selling it to me, or perhaps even join me in reviving past passions, and get back into it himself.

Nostalgia Pt. I

Exploring My Roots - Or, Hazy Memories Refocused

Cartoon from Miniature Wargames #20, Jan. 1985.

At one of the shows I attended in the last year or two, possibly/probably Salute 2013, I discovered a cache of old wargaming magazines, including a tranche of Miniature Wargames dating back to the time when I began buying that magazine. This was the first wargaming magazine I ever saw (The only other similar mag I'd seen prior to this was Military Modelling, but I'll go into that another time.), let alone bought. In a fit of nostalgia, something that I see from my time online and at shows appears to be fairly commonplace amongst us, I bought all the issues that I believed I may have formerly owned.

MW#20, Jan. '85: the first wargaming magazine I ever bought. The cover show the French attacking the Redoubt at Borodino. Did this, my first wargames mag, sow the seeds of my current 1812 obsession?

Reproduced Above is cover of the earliest issue I have in my current collection, which was also, I believe, the very first issue of the magazine that I ever bought, way 'back in the day'. It's issue #20, from January 1983, the month in which I turned thirteen. My oh my, how long ago and far away that now seems! Actually it was 29 years ago, and a little shy of nine miles away, the latter according to the AA's online route planner.

Reproduced below is an advert for Minifigs, from the same issue, and of a kind I saw regularly and grew to be enchanted by. I liked ads that featured decent pictures of the figures, as I felt better informed thereby about any potential purchases. I still prefer to order figures knowing what I'm getting. As is explored by others in an interesting thread on TMP (In any scale, what's the worst Napoleonic figure?), I too was stung once or twice, in my callow youth, by buying sight unseen. Once I started buying this mag regularly (-ish), Minifigs were to ultimately become the main source of my Napoleonic figure collecting.

A Minifigs ad from the same issue. I love their title font, with the figures in the I's.

Miniature Wargames often featured figures by or from the collections of guys like Peter Gilder and Doug Mason, both as cover art and feature illustrations. I usually only bought copies of the mag when Napoleonic scenarios were featured on the cover. Anyway, in the last few days I've been consumed by an obsessive passion for the history of the hobby, and also the history of my relationship to that. I was amazed and intrigued, for example, to find out that Salute is the same age as me, both having 'started' in 1972.

I was even more amazed, dumbfounded even (well, almost!), when, turning the pages of this first copy of my first ever wargaming periodical poichase, I came across the following feature:

Is there where I got the title of my blog?

The article, by Mike Blackledge*, is excellent, addressing all the themes I intend to address here (in the fulness of time) very succinctly.

... had this lain dormant in my mind, seeding the idea that ultimately gave me the title of this blog? I have no idea, if I'm honest. But I do like the almost evolutionary-cum-genealogical feeling that finding and reading this gives me. I feel as if, in digging deep into the past of the hobby, I'm rediscovering myself. It's a great feeling!

* Can anyone tell me anything about Mike Blackledge? Searching for him online has proven fruitless, in terms of finding anyone of that name with clear wargaming links.

Shiny 'Toy' Soldiers

Part of Peter Gilder's amazing Napoleonic collection: Boney himself avec lancer escort.

One of the many things in these magazines that I always loved, but in this instance was also perplexed by, was the gloss finish on Gilder's Napoleonic figures. I note now (not sure if I'd spotted this back then) that his WWII stuff didn't seem to have undergone the same treatment. Ruminating on these themes over the past few days lead me to discover some delightful blogs, such as DC's superb 'unfashionably shiny', which in turn lead to me finding Doug Mason's blog.

A parallel line of inquiry was developing, regarding the decline of the wargamer's high street shopping options. In my home town of Cambridge there have been, over the years, several shops selling 'toy soldiers'. The ones that chiefly figured, if you'll pardon the pun, in my life as a youth were, a model shop whose name I forget, on King Street, where I could buy Airfix 20mm plastics (and Tamiya 1/35th, etc.), Games & Puzzles, on Green Street, which sold Citadel fantasy stuff, and The Toy Soldier, the most short-lived of them all, on Bridge Street, where I could even get, for one blissful if short period, packs of Minifigs Napoleonics.

The only shop of this ilk that remains anywhere near me, at least as far as I know, is the wonderfully old-fashioned Ely Cycle Centre, which sells all sorts of stuff, from bicycles, to Lego, dolls, model kits and yes, even wargaming figures. When I went looking for pictures of the shop online, to illustrate this post, I found a fellow calling himself Fraxinus, and one of his blogs has an excellent little photo-essay tribute to the shop. So, having borrowed one of his pics to show you the shop-front, I'd suggest you click the foregoing link if your interest is piqued.

In Blackledge's brief but fascinating article, he discusses how things stood back then, enthusing about the massive range of options the gamer had. Right now we have even more to choose from, in every sense, from figure-scales to periods. All of this was swimming around my brain at the same time as the parallel line about disappearing shops of yesteryear. And in this connection I discovered that the London shop Tradition, which only closed very recently, had an affiliated factory in Royston, just down the road from me.

Did I ever actually visit this shop?

All of this makes me somewhat rueful about my long absence from the hobby, as I'd dearly have loved to have visited the London branch of Tradition before it closed. I might have done so: I have dim memories of visiting a shop selling toy soldiers (one of the strongest aspects of my memory is of a dark reddish coloured shop-front: but I remember walking between the museum and the shop, and I don't recall the river intervening... hmmm!?) when I once visited the Imperial War Museum.

Also, as a freelancer with my proverbial finger in several pies, I'd love to have spent some of my time earning money painting figures for the Royston-based production wing. I did actually do some paid figure painting in my teens, for a company that was based in Wisbech. Who would that have been I wonder? If only my memory was less foggy!

All this nostalgic exploration eventually lead me back even further, to stuff that predates my own involvement in the hobby. And I find now myself, somewhat to my own surprise, quite drawn to some of those older figure ranges - I spent quite a bit of time exploring Peter Laing figures, a development initially sparked by the above-linked thread on TMP, where they get a thorough drubbing - like early Hinchcliffe, Minifigs, and Hinton Hunt. When I found the following picture of Marcus Hinton outside his shop I felt as if I was entering some kind of sublime Mr Ben fantasy wargaming world!

I Intend to explore this 'olde-worlde' of wargaming by buying some copies of the Tradition magazine, which is being reprinted (quite probably via print-on-demand), and perhaps even getting a Hinton Hunt collection started. The above picture comes from a brilliant blog on things Hinton-Huntonian: Hinton Hunt Vintage Wargames Figures. For all that we've lost the high street shops themselves, it is wonderful that modern technology is making finding out about all this stuff and connecting with other enthusiasts that bit easier.