Lest We Forget

This blog has always been about promoting our hobby, or at least, my own very small part in it. This post is a little different and I hope that you will find it of interest.

On November 16, 1916, during the closing phase of the Battle of the Somme, my maternal grandmother's brother Joseph Scarr, was killed in action defending the small village of Hebuterne, near Arras, some 50 miles south of Calais. He was barely 18 years of age. From the battalion history it seems that although there was little direct offensive action going on at that time, they were under extremely heavy shellfire and although I can't be sure, I think that was probably what killed him. Two of his comrades from the same battalion are buried on either side of him, the four of them also having been killed in the few days that they were in the line.

When I was young, my grandmother would occasionally talk of her brother, although it was clear that even 60 years later, it was still a painful memory. He volunteered for the 11th (Bantam) battalion of his local regiment - the Royal Lancasters, when he was only 17. Like many in the Lancashire mill towns of the time, he was below the regulation 5 feet 3 inches required to be accepted into the army, hence his enlistment in the regiment's "Bantam" battalion, composed of men over 5 feet but under 5 feet 3 inches. After training the battalion was sent to France, as part of 40th Infantry Division, a formation that was, I believe, composed almost entirely of Bantam formations.

Hebuterne cemetery itself has a slightly chaotic layout, where each of the sections that make it up contain casualties from a different phase of the war. The first seems to hold those from the fighting in 1915, another from the Somme battles and another from the 1917 operations. The village was fought over again in 1918, this time 53 of the casualties coming from the New Zealand division, including at least one Maori. In addition there are a number a gravestones around the edge of the boundary wall with the names of men who are "known" or "believed" to be buried there. There are also at least four Germans interred amongst their former enemies.

It was a very sobering experience to read the gravestones; no less than 10 of the soldiers were only 17 years of age and most of the rest, as one might expect, were in their early to mid twenties.

I was nice to be the first member of our family to visit his grave - as far as I know, my grandmother, her sister and parents never knew where he was buried or even if he had a known grave. 

 The only known surviving photo of Joe taken shortly before leaving for France.

The Commonwealth War Graves Commission does a fantastic job in looking after these places.

As we were leaving, we came across this plaque at the village church in memory of the Bradford Pals who fought and died there. As you can see someone had left a poppy wreath. In the cemetery's visitors book there were several entries for 2024, showing that some of those buried there are still remembered, which was nice to see.

More Continental Regiments

 

Over the last year or so I have managed to make a fair amount of progress with my American army for AWI. From only a couple of Maryland Continental regiments, the collection has grown considerably. Here are the newcomers:

First up is Hall's Delaware regiment, one of the army's elite units.

Below is my New York brigade, 5th Regiment in front, with the 3rd moving up in the rear.

Next is the 8th New Hampshire.

Followed by the Pennsylvania brigade, 7th Regiment in the first line and the 1st in support.

The last one is a composite unit of  light infantry, made up of 8 bases with three basic uniform colour variations (blue, grey and brown), with the odd hunting shirt thrown in. From what I can see, the unit (under Dearborn)was simply put together during the Saratoga campaign from companies detached from their parent units, retaining their own uniforms. Unlike the other regiments, these are in firing line poses.

The fences are homemade, the mansion is by Oshiro Models - a lovely piece.

Sorry for the long delay in posting - have been working overtime for quite a while now to finish painting commissions before retiring - which I have now done!! After a well deserved holiday, I hope to give this blog much more attention than I have been able to up to now. With only myself to paint for, I should be able to really crack on with existing and new projects and share them here - something I am very much looking forward to doing.

A Hessian Brigade

German troops of course formed a considerable proportion of the armies fighting for the crown. The most well known were the Hessians - a term often used to describe all German troops, whichever state they came from. Below are a couple of shots of the Leib regiment, one of the crack units sent to North America. This particular battalion has 32 figures (quite strong by Live Free or Die standards), made up of Perry figures. The flags are hand painted by Mark Allen. I particularly like the colour combination on these!

 The 2nd Regiment is von Bose, which fought well at Guildford Courthouse amongst other battles. Also Perry figures with Mark Allen flags.

And here is the brigade covered by a screen of jagers.

I am just putting the finishing touches to a battalion of combined grenadiers (and I may even add a second battalion in due course).

More British AWI

 

It is well over a year since I last posted pics of my slowly expanding British army - I have been much more successful in building up their American opponents. Below is the latest regiment - the 63rd Foot, which saw a good deal of action during the war. Perry figures (32) with hand painted Mark Allen flags.

Below are some British light infantry in skirmish order - I did a dozen in total on 6 bases. We tend to field close order battalions of 6-10 bases and have separate units for when they are deployed in skirmish order - simply leaving an inch between bases and saying they are in skirmish order just doesn't look right - especially if the figures are marching. It means painting a few extra figures but....  In LFOD a base can represent anything from 50-75 actual men, depending on the size of the battle being played, although we have always used a 1:10 figure scale, making a close order base of 4 figures represent 40 men, or around 240-400 men per regiment. We usually say that a 2 man skirmish or cavalry base represents around 20, so this unit would be around 120 strong - perhaps 3 or 4 detached light companies. The figures are once again from Perry Miniatures.

Plastics For and Against

 

As a fully paid up member of the Old Farts Alliance, I have always had a bit of a thing against plastic figures. Whether this is age-driven snobbery I am not sure, but plastic figures were what I played with as a child and since then I have gone on to better things. Hmmm. In my earlier post about Partizan last year, I did confess to buying a few boxes of ACW Perry plastics in a moment of weakness following a beautiful display game that I saw there. And I must admit I was pleasantly surprised. I didn't however think that they would make their way into the holy of holies: Napoleonic. Wrong again. Having been working hard on my Napoleonic French army for a few months now (more to follow), I decided to try out the Perry French chasseurs a cheval box. Quite a revelation.

So, for and against. Negatives first - they are quite light and you feel that a mis-judged sneeze could send a whole regiment flying in an uncontrolled charge across the table! That said, a Really Useful Box with half a dozen regiments inside is a damn sight easier to move around than the metal equivalent. I also worry about the weapons, although they do seem a lot more robust than I would have expected. Even so, the first two regiments have the sword shouldered, apart from the officers, just in case! The case for the defence is pretty solid; they are relatively cheap, very nicely designed (as one might expect from the Perrys) and are easy to convert, quite apart from the incredible variety that you already get in each box.

Below are a few photos of my first two completed light cavalry regiments: the 4th Chasseurs and the 12th Hussars. Such is the detail and ingenuity of this particular box, that you can not only assemble units of chasseurs in a variety of dress, but you can also make them up as hussars in the Kinski coat - a simple and practical alternative to the dolman and pelisse that we normally associate with that arm. A really nice alternative. 

You get 14 figures in a box (my regiments are usually in 12s); so by getting five boxes and an additional 2 figure command sprue, you can get 6 full regiments (I am going to do 2 hussars and 4 chasseurs). Not only that, but by judicious use of all the spares in each box, you can easily make up another regiment's worth of riders and then buy spare horses and another command sprue and make up a 7th regiment (in my case a regiment of Neapolitan chasseurs a cheval, which fought in the 1813 campaign). No true born Yorkshireman can ignore economies like that! 

The three photos above give a good indication of the campaign variety that you can build in to your units, with the odd rolled manteau and forage cap to break thing up. A really nice and unusual unit.

The same with the chasseurs - I even did a bit of minor surgery on one of the horses and riders, to have a trooper tumbling out of the saddle due to enemy fire. This is much easier to do with plastics as you can imagine.

And here is the full brigade of 24 figures.

So, am I converted? Yes, I think I am. I will certainly complete all the regiments I mentioned above and am seriously considering a regiment of carabiniers and 4 or 5 of cuirassiers. I do particularly like the Perry metal dragoons in rolled manteau, so I may opt for them, rather than the plastics - not sure yet. I would also be a bit wary of doing lancers as I really wouldn't feel comfortable with plastic lances. That said, they are a really convincing alternative to metal figures and this old dog perhaps can learn a new trick or two.

Napoleonic French Army - A New Beginning

 

Having sold my previous French army to fill the wargaming coffers for future campaigns, I was determined to re-build it as quickly as possible. Question was how? My Russian and Prussian forces were composed of mainly Wargames Foundry infantry, due to my reluctance to "go plastic", whilst most of the cavalry was Perry. Having looked at what was available (and the Christmas 25% sale!!), I decided to go the same way with the French. Although the figures are a little "retro", they are full of character and there is a LOT of choice, with loads of in-pack variations. If you want that scruffy campaign look, it seemed a good way to go.

At the time of writing I have just finished a couple of  French line battalions, bringing the total to 8, with an additional 2 light and 4 Italian line, making 14 in total. This Christmas just gone, I took  advantage of the annual sale to add a further 4 French line and 2 Italian light battalions (still to be painted). I also bought enough French line  artillery to furnish all the batteries I will ever need.

I have also done a couple of regiments of light cavalry to round out phase 1 of the army. These will feature in a later post.

Here are a few photos of the infantry. They are organised in "battalions" of 24 this time - I just couldn't face painting a load of 36s again!! I am intending to cobble together a quick play set of Napoleonic rules which will allow us to play medium sized games (20 units a side) in an evening and larger games (35-40 units a side) in a day. A unit of infantry will represent around 1,200 men and a unit of (12) cavalry around 600. The idea is to be able to field up to a couple of infantry corps per side, supported perhaps by a cavalry corps and maybe the odd guard or grenadier division. I will keep the blog updated with my progress (and maybe even the odd after action report!).

                                        Above - one of the Italian line infantry units.

                                                          French light infantry.

And finally French line infantry.

They don't have the table "presence" of 36 figure units, but they are so much easier to do! Will hopefully get the total up to 20 this year. Also hoping to add a load of cavalry units, lights and heavies, using heresy of heresies - plastics! so stay tuned to see how I get on.