Claymore 2013

Well, I managed to achieve something since I last posted and that was to get to Claymore 2013 in Edinburgh.  It's been somewhat of a tradition since our school days and Geoff and I must have been going to it since at least 1980 when it was held at Adam House in Chambers Street, through the Meadowbank years (I had a tenement flat right across the road at the time) and now at its current home, the Edinburgh College campus in Granton (on the old gasworks site).

Anyway, some interesting games were on (with fewer Very British Civil War offerings than previously).  A bit too many odd space battles in evidence though (surely that is what computers are for?): I'm afraid I take the historical wargamer bit seriously.  Anyway, here are some highlights.  First are some pictures from the 15mm SYW Zorndorf refight put on by the Gourock Wargames Association (GWA).

Prussian cavalry cross the Langer-Grund on their right.

Cavalry action in the woods.

View from behind Russian centre.

View of Prussian centre.

View of Russian centre.

Cossacks in the woods.

Overview from the Russian's right flank (the Zabern-Grund in the foreground).

Prussian artillery and infantry.

Figures were a mixture of Old Glory (mainly Prussians) and Essex (mainly Russians).  The GWA was using the Piquet ruleset and it seemed inspiring enough for me to go off and buy a copy afterwards (added to the pile, but more of that later no doubt).

The next game that caught my eye was the Glasgow and District Wargaming Society's 28mm WW2 scenario Raid on Tito, depicting the botched attempt by the Germans to mount a combined airborne and ground attack on Tito's headquarters near Drvar in what is now Bosnia.  Rules were Bolt Action and this game was particularly interesting to me as I have recently been reading Fitzroy MacLean's Eastern Approaches (amongst other things).

Tito's forces threaten to over-run the German LZ and glider.

Tito's headquarters.

Panzerschrek in the marsh.

Germans infiltrate the woods.

Partizans defend Drvar.

Overview of Drvar

Another interesting game was the Charge of the Light Brigade public participation event put on by Kirriemuir Wargames Club.  Rules were apparently based on the Tennyson poem of the same name (sub-titled Anyone for Tennyson?).  The aim, as you might expect, was to get (the remains of) your squadron to the 'safety' of the Russian guns at the far end of the Valley of Death.

What's that you say, Nolan?  Those guns over there?  Righto!

It'll all end in tears.

"Very interesting, but stupid."

Hurry up lads.  If we don't get there in time the pubs will be all shut.

Other games included some sort of barbarian attack on a Roman fort put on by Claymore Castings (excellent figures):

Oi, leave that testudo alone.

The Tyneside Wargames Club with a massive Great Captain rules demonstration:

Impressive.

And RAF Leuchars' participation game Banzai!  Looked like fun - although I thought the guy in the foreground moving the aerial sea urchins on sticks around had escaped from the kitchens at Pizza Express.

Met office forecast - Divine Wind, gale force 10, backing easterly.

The traders were out in full force and apart from impulse buying a copy of Piquet Field of Battle 2nd edition to try out (1700-1900), I added to my collection of unpainted Blue Moon 15mm Marlburians and got a copy of the Osprey book on Peleliu 1944, just for interest.  Anyway, overall not too bad and thanks again to the SESWC for keeping this show on and growing all these years.

Seven Years War Project No.1

I've been considering this for a long while and I think things are getting closer to fruition, in other words the commencement of a new period.  As usual I do a lot of planning and reading (for years sometimes) before ordering figures and getting started - mainly because I'm not that motivated when it comes to painting.  However, the SYW has been floating around in my mind, particularly since I read (and am currently re-reading) Franz Szabo's The Seven Years War in Europe (published by Longman, 2007).

I'd really recommend this book, well, for a number of reasons, although mainly it's because it's fairly recently published and has drawn on a lot of original sources in German: Szabo being a Canadian of Austrian extraction.  This latter point is of note because he is no apologist for Frederick the 'Great' and in fact sticks the boot in with gusto (occasional comparisons with the approach to foreign policy shared by Prussia and the Third Reich do not seem out of place in fact).

Some critics (for example on the TMP 18th century forums) ascribe this to Szabo's Austrian roots and desire to promote Austrian successes, but the account I think is more accurate and more critical than previous historians and times have allowed, where the supposed greatness of Frederick and his military 'genius' have been exaggerated either for political reasons or simply because a full and objective review of the primary sources was not previously available to scholars.

The Szabo book just covers Europe (as though that's not enough to be getting on with) but I was interested in what was happening elsewhere, so I also got Daniel Baugh's book, The Global Seven Years War (also Longman, 2011).

I've not read it yet although it looks interesting (and we get two extra years thrown in!).  I'm hoping it will cover some of the more interesting actions in the colonies (and not just North America) and I think there'll be a lot on naval engagements too.

Finally, I should add that not content with reading about the Seven Years War, I thought I needed a bit of background reading and in fact today received this nice hard-back copy of Reed Brown's The War of the Austrian Succession (St Martin's Press, 1993), from a second hand bookshop in America (via Abe Books), and hence the prompt to post something about it all.

There are more recent books on the WAS (1740-1748) but Szabo recommends the Reed Brown book in a footnote early on in his tome and then mentions in passing that, oh yes, there's also something in the Longman's Modern Wars in Perspective series by Anderson (damned by faint praise).  So yes, plenty of inches to wade through.

D Hewins of Grimsby

Apologies for the long hiatus since I last posted but I've been away in various places recently: some interesting and others... not so interesting.  I will concentrate on the former.

I'm not that well travelled in certain parts of England, being from North of the Border, but a current project at work (relating to offshore windfarm developments in the North Sea - there'll be 5,000 turbines on the Dogger Bank in 10 years, mark my words) has recently brought me to Hull, Scunthorpe and lastly Grimsby.  Of these, I was pleasantly surprised by Hull; Scunthorpe I didn't see much of and Grimsby I was a bit worried about until I discovered a gem: D Hewins Models and Hobbies at 7b East St Mary's Gate, unprepossessingly tucked away in a narrow brick courtyard behind an Italian restaurant. (It has no website).

I have to say that although it was well hidden ("You found us though," said Mr Hewins (I presume that it was he)) it was well worth it.  I love shops like that packed from floor to ceiling with models, books, soldiers, and yes, even railway stuff.

The great thing was that I found something that I'd been looking for for ages, which for some reason I had not been able to get hold of easily (or at least reasonably priced - perhaps it is out of print?): the Osprey Frederick the Great's Army (1) Cavalry.

Not that I have much in the way of Seven Years' War stuff, but it is an interest floating around somewhere.  There were a couple of other finds which I may blog about later (the 3 for 2 offer got me).  The things is, the proprietor clocked me for a wargamer right away, raising an eyebrow at my eclectic choice of books covering WW2, the SYW and the Crusades.  Well, I am the Wishful Wargamer, after all.

Anyway, a highly recommended shop and if you're in the area you should drop by and say the Wishful Wargamer sent you.  He won't remember me but he may recall the bald guy in the suit a couple of weeks ago with the massive suitcase barging about his shop grinning, and about to head off to Romania.....