The (almost) Finished 1859 Armies

With apologies for the lack of posting recently, I wanted to wait until I had finished painting my 6mm Risorgimento armies for Italy 1859, but that took a bit longer than expected - 'real life', and all that. However, I have finally painted my way through the 'MDF pile' of the semi-flat Commission Figurines* figures I acquired at the Warfare show in November, and these combined with some  Baccus figures I had previously completed have given me ( I hope ) useable Austrian and Piedmontese 'starter' armies.    And here they are - Piedmont first : 

These are based for Neil Thomas'  19th Century Europe rules, with most units having four bases - I decided on 24 figures per line infantry unit ( 2 bases of 8 in line, and 2 bases of 4 skirmishing) and 16 figures per cavalry unit, with 8 figures in a skirmisher unit ( 2 bases of 4 ) and a single base of one gun  and 4 crew for an artillery unit.  The Piedmont army currently has (front to back of picture)  5 Line and 2 Grenadier infantry units,  2 units of Bersaglieri skirmishers,  2 line and 1 heavy Cavalry unit, and 3 artillery units.  

And if you'll excuse the slightly poor photography ( late afternoon sun a bit strong ), here are the Austrian opposition :

 

The Emperor's force comprises (again, from back to front of picture)  6 units of Line infantry, 3 of Artillery and 3 of Cuirassier cavalry. This is where the 'almost' in the title of this post comes in - having lined them up for the camera, I realised that I have omitted to include any skirmishing infantry in the army. So I need a bit more painting, of a couple of units of Grenze or Croat skirmishers. Back to the painting desk, I suppose.. 

I'm quite pleased with these, and found the painting less challenging that I expected - essentially there's no need to worry about trying to paint tiny details on the figures, because even if you could, no-one could see them at tabletop distances!  If you really insist on seeing the full horror of what I think I can get away with, here is an extreme close-up of Austrian Cuirassiers: 

I will admit I think the 'flock' I have used on the bases is probably too coarse for this scale - but again, no-one is ever going to get that close to these figures, and in the previous pictures at more normal distances, I think the basing looks good enough. I will try to improve that in future units, though, using a finer flock if possible.  The figures here are from  Commission Figurines Napoleonic range - unsurprisingly enough, Austrian Cuirassiers  ( for examples of much better-painted figures from the same ranges, see Richard's My Wargaming Habit blog ). 

 For background reading I found Solferino: The Birth of a Nation by Patrick Turnbull (1985) 

 

This was a good read and an nice introduction to the Italian campaign  of 1859, culminating in the bloody battle of Solferino and covering the engagements at Montebello and Magenta too. One of my main impressions from reading the book is that frankly the standard of generalship exhibited by all three main protagonists ( Austria, France and Italy ) left a lot to be desired - the three armies more or less 'bumped into each other' at Solferino, having encamped the night before very close together but unaware of each other!   All three were commanded by their heads of state - Emperor Franz Joseph of Austria,  Emperor Napoleon III of France, and King Victor Emmanuel of Piedmont-Savoy, but none of the three were suited to command of large armies.  The author says that none of them lacked personal bravery, and would have made really good regimental commanders, but no more!    If anything, Louis Napoleon perhaps comes across as the most sympathetic and human character,  beginning his first war  with hopes of attaining 'glory' like his illustrious namesake, but being shocked and horrified by the scale of the bloodshed and suffering involved in a big battle.  Immediately after Solferino he determined to make peace, probably to his credit as a human being. Of course, we can discuss why he had not realised just what his ambition for power was getting him into during his rise to the throne, and how far out of his depth he was when later pitted against Bismarck's Prussia.

From a hobby point of view I rather like the ruritanian ineffciency of the armies, it probably puts them on a fairly level playing field and may well suit my own level of tactical and strategic skills! 

Now I just need to acquire some suitable terrain - starting from scratch rather, as this is my first essay with 6mm. There are some buildings coming to me from Timecast, I hope, next we are going to need roads, rivers, trees etc. I also need to get some Austrian skirmishers painted, as mentioned above - the Commission Figurines ACW Confederates in broad-brim hats may come in handy for those.  Once that is all in hand, we'll set 'em up and see how they do, using Neil Thomas' rules for the period.   In the meantime, there may be some gaming in other periods which haven't had a good run out for a while -watch this space.  Until then keep well, everyone. 

 * It seems that Commission Figurines website is no longer available - I am wondering if this is bad news for them and their customers?  Is anyone aware of any news about them? 

 

First Show of the Year : Cavalier 2025

I will admit I've been rather inactive hobby-wise since Xmas,  Fellow blogger Neil Patterson started his latest excellent Aufklarungsabteilung blog post by saying 'My apparent silence on the blog is mostly due to a profound lack of wargaming activity and continued lack of focus and distractions' -  I couldn't have put it better myself (though I did have some hobby activity, thanks entirely to other people's generosity - Jon Frietag's remote games and Chris/Nundanket's PBEM Bohemia 1757 campaign, have both been fantastic ).  But I had something to look forward to, in the form of Tunbridge Wells Wargames Society's annual Cavalier show, which took place this  Sunday just gone. I went along, had a good day, and gave my hobby 'mojo' a bit of a boost. Of course I took some photos of the games being presented, and I will show some of them here, in more or less the order I came across them. 

Shepway wargamers brought their Dornier Down  Operation Sea Lion 1940 game; I had seen it before, but it is a rather nice setup. I particularly liked the large-scale Hurricane ( Airfix 1:24?) model 'flying' over the battlefield, and the beautifully-modelled town terrain. 

   

Another one I'd seen before, but still nice - Deal Wargames Society Gradual Sunset: Counter Insurgency in Thailand 1980-83. 

 

The game was played to the club's home-grown rules, which included interactions with jungle wildlife - including giant poisonous caterpillars... (another nice bit of vintage Airfix too, with that house on stilts).

Real Time Wargames were demonstrating their new The Ruin of Britain  rules for Dark Ages Britain, with a nice 10mm scale battle - I liked that village, though I forgot to ask where it might have come from.  I also like that Real Time usually include a campaign system with their rule sets - good for them. Dark Ages Britain is a bit of a 'wish-list' period for me, but not sure if I will ever get to it..      

 The Shed Wargames Club put on  A Song of Fire and Ice; Battle for Westeros,  a 28mm scale Game of Thrones battle with impressive  terrain and colourful troops. I think I saw Miniature Wargames editor  Jon Treadaway nearby, so I suspect this one may appear in a show report in his magazine, if he does one.   

 

 South East Essex Military Society showed a Peninsular War game An Affair of Outposts, using Rebels and Patriots rules with Flags and Eagles Napoleonic module.  It was a two-part game, using two linked scenarios taken from Neil Thomas' One Hour Wargames, which I thought was an interesting idea (OHW is endlessly useful). My first picture shows the second scenario, being played in the afternoon :

   ..and my second picture is from the first scenario, in the morning - as you do. I am told these nice (Voltigeurs?)  figures are old-school Minifigs, and well over 40 years old. 

 Warlord Games showed a  snowy Battle of the Bulge type game to promote their Bolt Action rules - note blatant 'product placement' of the rulebook, but you can't blame them, can you? Good to see a large trader like them supporting one of the smaller shows.  

Maidstone Wargame Society came up with a really fun idea for their game Battlezone - Futuristic Tank Warfare in 1980 .  

Who'd have thought we could get nostalgic about those really clunky early computer games?  Quite some feat of 'reverse engineering'! 

Now for some really 'old school'.gaming: the Little Wars Revisited Group's  Relief of Fort Pippin, 54mm and distinctly shiny toy soldiers representing 'Imagi-Nations' from c.1900,  but looking distinctly British and German.battling for possession of the titular fort,  using Bob Cordery's Portable Wargame rules.    

The very nice (equally shiny) gridded terrain was made from MDF, with ingenious gridded scenery pieces allowing troops to stand in woods, building etc - I had a good chat with their maker, who turned out to be none other than Mike Lewis,  host of the LittleWars1913 blog.  His current 'Siege of Dendermonde' project involves some amazing terrain-building and is well worth having a look at. 

ooh, shiny,,

  Note the armoured train, with trucks each occupying one grid area and capable of holding one unit - it's all been thought out very carefully. 

'Red'/British gunners closely assailed by Blue/Prussians

The Society of Ancients can be relied upon to come up with a decent 'big battle' game: this time of Sentinum, 295BC,  Romans vs a coalition of Samnites, Etruscans, Umbrians and Gauls  - played with Impetus rules. 

SoA : Sentinum 295BC

Clash in the centre :Legions vs Gauls (probably?)

Central London Wargames club demonstated their Emperor of the Battlefield Napoleonic rules, in 15mm scale :

Rainham Wargames club had a nice looking 28mm Wars of the Roses game with Never Mind the Billhooks rules :

 

 

Tonbridge ( note: not  Tunbridge Wells ) Wargames Club had a Sci-Fi game Tonbridge Marines vs. the Aliens using Xenos Rampant   rules

..and Guildford Wargames Club brought their impressive  A Zeppelin over Guildford  1915 aerial combat game in 1./144 scale

 

 And that's about my lot. There were several other games which I didn't quite get around to photographing - as ever, for a much more comprehensive set of pictures of the show I'd recommend Big Lee's excellent  video report. 

I enjoyed the day; I arrived just after 11am and stayed till about 3pm. It was pretty busy when I arrived, but distinctly quieter after lunchtime - I heard some grumbling about parking prices in the car park outside, which  was free in previous years, so I wonder if that had an effect ( I travelled from London by train, 45 mins journey then 5 mins walk to the venue). The venue is decent, with the sports hall of the local leisure centre as the main room for games and traders, and a second smaller room with more games and the Bring and Buy. The cafe upstairs is pleasant and did tea and coffee for £1, and good sandwich rolls too. I was pleased to meet a few friends old and new - I lunched with  old compadres Tony and Reg, and chatted amicably to Ray, Richard and Steve from Postie's Rejects despite being deadly enemies in a wild West Gunfight only the other week - good to see you all! 

 'In other news' : I have been slowly plugging away at my 6mm Risorgimento 1859 armies, and have now almost finished them - a further 5 Austrian and 6 Piedmontese units await only flags and green  flocking on bases, and after that I just have to paint an artillery battery for each side. Here are the almost-finished units, with Austrian Cavalry at the front - figures are semi-flat MDF from Commission Figurines.  

 

I have enjoyed painting them, except for the fact that I think I tried to do too many at once! Smaller batches, little and often, may be a better way forward. 

So, with these very close to completion,  there may be some actual gaming with them soon! Watch this space - meanwhile, keep well everyone

Postscript :  3 years this week, and how things have changed. 

No words, really..