Sugar Islands on the Interwebs

 I'm on the Lead Adventure Forum, an excellent, inspiring and very friendly forum, and was sitting having my morning cuppa when I came across this rather lovely game based on the Madam Ducharmey scenario from the Wargaming the Sugar Islands book, played at the recent SYW convention in the US.

The scenery is particularly splendid I think you'll find. 

Juergen C. Olk does Guadeloupe 

A Catch Up.

It's been quite a while since Graham H and I have been able to have a game. The real world got in the way for a while but with the lifting of restrictions that changed at the weekend. 

Looking back through my photos it was August....2019!

We tested a set of rules which I have worked up for playing multi divisional sized 19th century games and especially the Franco Prussian War. This is a favourite period of mine, along with the 18th, (more on that in a minute). With the announcement of the Perry FPW range last year both Graham and I decided this was something we wanted to tackle, on a grand scale. 

The rules work on a scale of 1"to 50yds with large bases of figures as a battalion of infantry, each with varying strengths, Prussians more than French for example and Austrian regiments being 4 stands while Prussians are 3. They are a home cooked set, with activations a la Rebels and Patriots, etc and other bits borrowed from Volley and Bayonet and other rules. 

The game was an encounter battled with a French division bumping into a Prussian Corps with opportunity for the French to take and defend some high ground but not enough to cover the approaches effectively. 

Graham took the Prussians, 28's from Eagles of Empire with some of the new Perry cavalry providing divisional cavalry support. I had the French, Ironclad minis with some supporting EofE, Foundry and Gt War to flesh them out. 

Graham decided to get up the table as soon as possible, but I had time to take the hill and dig in around the farm, losing my screening Chasseurs in the process. On my left a line regiment and a battalion of Turcos held of Graham's cavalry and a Bavarian unit but were too few in numbers to threaten the centre. There Graham tried to assault the hill but was driven back by Chassepot fire at least twice before deciding that his artillery could do the job cheaper then his infantry. Three turns were needed to rout the defenders of the farm and that gave me just enough time to pull back my battered regiments and we called it quits. 

Chasseurs screen the french deployment

The Flank

Perry Drgaoons

The Hill

The rules still need a lot of work to bring them up to a full set, but the flavour is right, at least for the sort of games we play. More will follow.

We also had a chance to discuss a 40mm SYW display game of somewhat epic proportions which Graham is planning for Partizan. This will be something special. 

Finally Ive spent some time this week tweaking editing and finalising Against Spain. Being on Holiday has given me a bit of space and time. I promised a sneaky peek so....

More next time, as I test the scenarios.

Against Spain - Update

 I've been quiet for a while. Big changes at work, covid and a lot going on at home have conspired to keep me from posting. Like a lot of people at the moment, I've not had the headspace to do everything I want, or like. But this hobby gives me space and time to relax and be creative and with a little of that I've caught up a lot in the last few weeks. 

"Against Spain - Wargaming the Havana and Manila Campaigns of the Seven Years War" is almost finished.  The main text is done and most of the pictures I want in place. I'm currently checking my notes and making sure the sources and citations are correct and play testing the 6 scenarios which the book contains - 3 for each location. 

The book contains an overview of each campaign, the leaders and troops involved, a narrative of the campaigns with period maps and paintings and notes on figures and rules. Like the French Marine troops and Maroons for the Sugar Islands Campaign book Crann Tara, now owned by Caliver books, have figures for the Havana Militia, British Sepoys and Indian labourers available, sculpted by Andy Stadden. Once again the book will be in full colour and will be approximately 80 pages long.

Crann Tara's new Havana Militia

I should be finished everything by the end of this month and off to the printers it will go hopefully becoming available in August. 

New figures for Havana and Manila....and more besides

 I received some pictures from Graham at Crann Tara of new figures which Andy Stadden has completed. These will be prefect for the sieges of Havana and Manila.

Indian Labourers

Good for adding muskets and melee weapons to as well as for helping to dig the siege lines at Manila or for early in-uniformed sepoy peons.

British Sepoys 

600 of these at Manila and of course a staple of combat in India too. 

French Sepoys

It wasn't just the British who made use of Indian soldiers.

Manila Black Militia

The Spanish deployed 3 types of militia at Havana. White, multiracial and black units known in Spanish as "blanco", "pardo" and "moreno". The blancos and pardos wore a typical European uniform of coat, waistcoats and tricorn. The Moreno unit wore a simplified version of this with a cap with turned up flaps or sewn on panels and front and back. 

These uniforms were first recorded after the siege, but lasted through to the AWI and were worn by several of Spain's Caribbean and American possessions. These figures will be prefect to the 1760's through to the 1780's.

Andy has done a great job in sculpting these and Graham tells me they'll be ready in a couple of months. 

Can't wait to get my mitts on some!

Another Jacobite Fight

This time a straight across the table fight featuring 6 Jacobite clan unit's and a small unit of Royal Ecossais against 3 Hanoverian line and two grenadier units. 

A scrappy engagement with lots of fluffed initiative rolls and swapping back and forth between the two sides without either side getting a change to get the upper hand. It did however stop the jacobites for getting a couple of telling charges in and caused them to take some more losses. But they rallied and drove the redcoats back to the table edge, despite them getting reinforcements in the shape of a fresh unit. In the end though weight of numbers began to tell and the remaining redcoats sued for peace after suffering the loss of a further unit. 

The Jacobites didn't get their own way tonight and a few times were kept off by the shooting and bayonet drill of the government troops. But they in turn couldn't quite fend off all the clan units and their perimeter shrunk and shrunk until they had nowhere left to go.

This was the second of our club Jacobite battles. We plan a third next week. Stay tuned!