Fnurban #43 Blogger issues: Jon F's work-around

You are all probably aware of the issue with Blogger in the past week or so - Blogger is not updating people's Blog Lists -  and the  resulting difficulties  seeing  recent posts by other bloggers.  Jon Freitag of Palouse Wargaming Journal  has come up with a work-around which seems to get people's posts 'out there' and allow followers to see them.  I thought I'd summarise what Jon has suggested as a work-around: 

(1) Getting blogger to publish your new post to others:   part of the issue seems to be that Blogger is not always  pushing out your recent post to the rest of the world. Jon thinks this is because it is using  a 'cached' version (stored in  memory somewhere, for speed of access) of your blog,  and the cache is not getting updated with your new post.  His suggestion to solve the issue is to refresh the cached data, so that blogger will see the new post  and publish it.  To do that, he has used Feedburner to refresh the cache.  

I admit I had never heard of Feedburner, so all credit goes to Jon for this one! Anyway it seems to be an app, which is part of the google environment ('universe'? 🙂 ) . You can find it here:

https://feedburner.google.com/      or if you google search for 'Feedburner'   you should find it easily.

IF you are already logged in to your Google account (e.g. because you are signed into Blogger)  the Feedburner page should immediately give you a list of your blogs.  There's a 'configure proxy' button and a 'three dots' menu for each one.  If you click on the 'three dots'  it gives a bunch of options, and you want 'refresh feed'  - here's what mine looked like     

 

When I clicked 'refresh feed'   I just got a 'feed will be refreshed in background' message, and that was that.   Hopefully that refreshes the cache, so if you do that after you publish your latest post, it should have done the trick. It may take a few minutes to refresh - due to that 'background' process.   

(2)  Reading other people's posts :  once you have published your post, other bloggers need to be able to read them.  Most of us use the 'Blog List' gadget to get updates of other people's blog posts. Jon noticed that there was an issue with some blogs on there too, in that the addresses of the blogs in the list are sometimes  prefixed 'http'  and sometimes 'https' .   You can see that on the 'Layout' page,  look for the Blog List gadget and 'edit' it . Again, I'll show you mine'  🙂

 

As you can see, some addresses start http and some https.  (I'm not sure why this happens - it may depend on the age of the blog, perhaps those more recently created have the 'secure' https prefix? ) 

It seems that if your Blog List gadget has a given blog listed as prefixed 'http', but the actual address being published is prefixed 'https' (or vice-versa), your Blog List won't pick it up.  

Basically you need to make sure the address on your Blog List for another person's blog  matches the address in their Feedburner settings.  Of course you can't see other folks' Feedburner, but basically it will be prefixed http or https, so if another blogger's posts seem to be updating on other people's  Blog List (so they're publishing OK)  and not on yours, then try editing their entry on your Blog List to change the prefix from http to https, or vice-versa.  

To edit, you use the 'pen' symbol next to the address in the list (see above)  - sorry if this is assuming you are a complete IT beginner!. Notice there are about 3 levels of  'continue' or  'save' to go through after you make the change; to the address itself, to the Blog List Gadget AND to the Layout page - if in doubt,  hit 'save' !

If this works, when you go back to your blog page ( and reload it, for good measure), you should see latest  posts - at least from people who have heeded Jon's 'Feedburner' advice, and where you have the correct address in your Blog List gadget.  There might be a few minutes delay, so if it doesn't work straight away, wait a bit and reload again..

 

For those of you following my blog,  I should point out the address that Feedburner is using to publish my posts, which is as follows: 

         https://russetcoatcpt.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default 

So hopefully there's no excuse for you to miss my sparkling wit and repartee in future... (!)

Finally,  a good tip is to include your own blog in your Blog List gadget - that way,  when you publish a new post ( and refresh with Feedburner if necessary) you can see when Blogger publishes your post to the outside world without having to go and look on other people's blog lists. 

I hope this is useful - assuming you actually get to read this post! I'll also email all the bloggers I have in my address book to alert them to this.  

Credit for all the above goes to Jon Freitag - he's done the legwork,  I've just tried to summarise it fairly simply and clearly in a form I hope everyone can follow (fair takes me back to my IT Support days - I'll admit I wasn't the techie expert, but I could follow simple instructions and recognise patterns and typo errors. Which puts me roughly on a par with 'AI' models nowadays..).  Many thanks, Jon, let's hope this sorts things out until Google can fix things properly! 

Back to proper hobby stuff next time; until then, keep well (and keep blogging)  everyone.  

 

 

 

Fnurban #42 Defending England : from Radar masts to Martello Towers

Amid the continuing heatwave, last week we had a day and a bit enjoying the sea breezes on the Suffolk coast.  Normally we might well have headed for Dunwich,  but the huge wildfire burning there made us think again, and we went for the Bawdsey/Felixstowe area. It's a nice stretch of coast and a bit less busy than places  like Aldeburgh and Southwold further North,  and it has the bonus of some military history,  too!    

Firstly,  there is the Bawdsey Radar Museum :  commemorating the fact that on  24th September 1937, RAF Bawdsey became the first fully operational Radar station in the world.  The previous year, the inventor of radar Robert Watson-Watt and his research team had taken over nearby  Bawdsey Manor estate as their base, and built the first set of transmitting and receiving masts there - the former being no less than 360 feet high! The station was the first of the 'Chain Home' installations built around the British coastline, which played such a vital role in the defence of the UK in the 1939-45 war, most  famously in the Battle of Britain in 1940. 

At Bawdsey, the 'transmitter block' building remains and has been made into a small museum - we had visited before, but since 2018 it has been completely refurbished and updated, to tell the story of the invention of radar, how it works, and the history of the Bawdsey site, which continued to be part of the air defence system until the 1990s,  and still has a radio mast belonging to HM Coastguard - albeit a mere 100 feet tall.  We paid a visit to the museum, which was interesting if not large - worth an hour or so of your time, I'd say, if you're in the area. I took a few (not brilliant, sorry!) pictures: 

  Here  is the transmitter block - heavily protected by sloping earthworks/concrete, the entrance passageway is between the earthworks and the building and feels a bit like walking along a WW1 trench, and the steel  main doors were apparently gas-proof.  The HM coastguard radio mast is only 1/3 of the height of the original radar masts, but gives you an idea - the 1937 masts were pretty much in the same place, with the transmitter block housing generators to power the radar transmitters.

 

Not a very good (sorry!) picture of the main display room; it did do a good job of telling the story of Radar and the history of the site, and there was inevitably an 'interactive' feature which allowed you to test your potential as a 1940s radar operator,  turning dials to work out the range and bearing of a 'blip' on a screen (essentially an oscilloscope trace )  - it turns out that most operators were women, as they were more proficient.   

You may already know that Watson-Watt was originally asked to look into the possibility of 'death ray' weapons to actually shoot down enemy aircraft, but suggested that it would be more practical to use radio transmissions to detect targets by bouncing the waves off them.  What I learned was that he and his colleagues actually went as far as to calculate the energy that a 'death ray' would require, and concluded that this would be greater than the total electrical energy that could be generated in the whole of Britain at the time! 

 Rather a prescient quote from H,G. Wells as far back as 1902 featured in the displays - along with the inevitable 'The Bomber Will Always Get Through' of Italian General Giulio Douhet. 

And one most historic  piece of 'kit' - this is a Cavity Magnetron,  the device which allowed radar sets to shrink from filling a room to being able to be carried on ships and aircraft. It's been described as 'the most important invention to come out of the second world war' and was important enough to be offered to the US by Britain in the Tizard Mission in 1940.  

 

We also spent some time at neighbouring Felixstowe (see below)  which gave us a distant view of Bawdsey Hall, where Watson-Watt had set up his research facility.

 Finally a picture from the museum guide booklet : a postwar view of the radar station, with the transmitter masts in a line at the back, and receiving masts nearer.  

 As it says in the caption, multiple aerial cables were strung between the transmitter towers, and engineers had to swing out between them (at 300 feet!)  to do maintenance - it must have been terrifying! 

After an immersion in the defence of Britain from Hitler in 1940,  we took a walk along the coast path from Bawdsey to nearby Shingle Street,  which featured an important feature of the defence of Britain from Napoleon in 1805.  Within a stretch of a couple of miles, we passed a total of four Martello Towers.   I'm sure readers of this blog will know the story of these - inspired by a Genoese fortificd tower on Corsica, the Torra di Mortella  which put up a stout defence against British attack in 1794, a chain of 103 of them was built between Aldeburgh, Suffolk and Seaford, Sussex between 1804 and 1812, when Britain was threatened with a French invasion.  Wikipedia says that  of the 103 built, 

Fifteen towers were demolished to enable the re-use of their masonry. The sea washed thirty away and the military destroyed four in experiments to test the effectiveness of the new rifled artillery. During the Second World War, some Martello towers returned to military service as observation platforms and firing platforms for anti-aircraft artillery. 

They were given code numbers ( on the south coast ) and letters (on the east coast), and a list of them is available on-line, so we could identify the towers we saw.   Hence I can tell you that these were as follows: 

(above and below)  Tower 'W' at East Lane, Bawdsey - handy for a free car park by the sea wall from which we started walking. 

 then a few hundred yards North,  we have Tower 'Y'  ( it seems there was yet another one, 'X', in between but long-demolished )  which turns out to be rather special : 

 

This one has been extensively refurbished as a luxury home:  It underwent transformation by architect Stuart Piercy of Piercy & Company in collaboration with Duncan Jackson of Billings Jackson Design in 2010 into a three-bedroom home, winning the RIBA Award that year in the process.  And it has recently been  sold  ( advertised on The Modern House, naturally ), with the asking price listed at £1.25m,   Here's a  picture of the interior  'borrowed'  from the estate agent's pages: 

 I was fascinated by that brick column and vaulting, and it turns out that this is original and is of course there to support  the roof, which needed to bear the weight of artillery pieces installed on top. Given that  the walls are about 3m thick too, you can see what a feat of engineering these things were.  I wonder if the new owner is 'in to' military history? 

Moving right along, again only a few hundred yards to the North we have  Tower 'Z' which may be my favourite,  I'm calling it the Smiley Martello 🙂 

 Not sure if this is occupied, though there is a modern exterior staircase for access. The structure on top looked like a 1940s pill box, so I am assuming this one was one of those re-purposed during WW2.  

 We ended our walk at Shingle Street, a small village with a polyglot collection of homes ( I suspect mostly holiday/second homes) built right on the shingle, a very pleasant place lacking only a pub or teashop!  And here we found  Tower 'AA' ,  which is another conversion to residential use, albeit probably not quite as recent or as snazzy as Tower Y.  I suspect that what with the thick (and curved)  walls and the massive interior brick column, any rooms inside the brick structure are quite small (and hard to furnish!), which means that the roof area provides the main living area, with a sun terrace and  wonderful views, of course. 

 

So within about 40 minutes walk we had ticked four towers - sadly I forgot to take a photo (which would have been easily done) showing all four in a line along the coast.  Still, a pleasant seaside walk (we sat on the beach for a few minutes near Shingle Street, and a saw a seal swim by) , with a nice bit of military history included.

That however is not quite the end of the story - we also dropped in at Felixstowe, where there are two more Martello towers..  Here is Tower  U ,  at Felixstowe Ferry :

and here is Tower T,  guarding Felixstowe's golf course

 

Phew!  Now assuming there are about 50 surviving Martello towers,  the Bawdsey/Felixstowe area is richly endowed with them, having six within a handful of miles (actually seven, there's another one we missed!).  It's interesting that at the time they were built, Felixstowe itself was still quite a small settlement, not the important port that it has since become. But as Wikipedia says,   The Felixstowe area as a whole provided a linchpin in England's defence, as proved in 1667 when Dutch soldiers landed near the Fludyers area and tried (unsuccessfully) in the Battle of Landguard Fort to capture Landguard Fort due to its strategic location.
Which reminds me that a visit to Landguard Fort should be on the list.. 

 I should add that there was a link between the Radar and the Martello Towers - my partner's father was an electrical engineer who worked on  naval radio and radar during the war and continued servicing radar on ships for the rest of his career. The naval/maritime  connection probably means he wasn't at Bawdsey, since that was an RAF establishment, but it was nice to learn a bit about radar, which became his career (sadly like so many of the wartime generation, he never talked about his experiences, so we know very little).  And  the Martellos? Well, we have a picture of him, probably taken in the late 1940s or early 1950s, in front of - you guessed it, a Martello tower.    

 

I do like this picture - everyone has some of these, don't they, with family members dressed rather formally while 'relaxing' at the seaside!  The past is a foreign country, indeed - or maybe it was just  a chilly Spring or Autumn day?    He did quite a lot of work at Felixstowe later, as it was a big port, and we did rather hope it might be one of the Felixstowe towers -  but from what we saw none of them matched the photo. So, we have only forty-odd more Martello towers to go and see, in our quest to work out where this picture was taken!   It's a very long shot, but does anyone reading this have a suggestion as to where it might be?   Note the line of beach huts and the groynes on the beach - it must be at a seaside resort rather than a piece of 'unspoiled' coastline.   Any suggestions welcome! 

In other hobby news, I've been plugging away at re-basing vintage Minifigs 25mm 7YW figures.Currently working on Russians, and eventually I should have six units of infantry (Line, Grenadiers and Pandours), and four cavalry (Hussars and Cossack lancers). I am hoping there are some guns and gunners lurking in the box of artillery from this collection, which might complete a nice 'pocket army', inspired by Norm Smith's examples on his Battlefields and Warriors blog. 

 

 

 

If all goes well, for my next post I'll be able to show the whole Russian force and its constituent units. I'd better get cracking with the PVA glue, MDF bases, green paint and making some flags! With another heatwave coming, I will probably be mostly indoors, so no excuses..  Until then , keep well everyone. 

Fnurban #41: General Knowledge

Among the worryingly large backlog of unread volumes on my bookshelves (worrying because one starts to compare the probable time required to read them all, to average life expectancy), there is a small but distinct category - that of biographies of  prominent British army commanders. This is a direct result of my reading John Keegan's  1991  Churchill's Generals a couple of years ago.  Keegan acted as editor for a collection of 17 biographical essays  by various authors, covering no less than 20 British generals from the Second World War. 

 I'll freely admit that I really knew very little about any of the subjects, so this book was a very nice introduction to the subject - and of course it left me wanting to know more about quite a few of them! In second-hand bookshops and charity shops I tend to find myself looking at the history/military sections of the bookshelves, and guess what?  Yes, you got it, I have been picking up biographies  and memoirs of some of these commanders. Here is the harvest so far: 

I found Alex , Nigel Nicholson's authorised biography of Field Marshal Alexander, in the excellent  Harris and Harris Books at Clare - and actually managed to read it! Well worth it, and very relevant given my interest in the 'D-Day Dodgers' Italian Campaign 1943-45, in which Alexander was allied C-in-C, and highly successful in commanding truly multinational forces. 

Viscount William Slim's Defeat Into Victory (an abridged, but still substantial tome)  came from Cuirassier Books, I think at the Re:Play show at the Royal Engineers Museum a couple of years ago. I like the 'career arc' of Slim : certainly not the usual public school educated product of a family of soldiers,  he was the son of a Birmingham ironmonger, working as a junior clerk before 'joining up' in 1914.  Defeat Into Victory is his account of his command in the Burma campaign, and according to Duncan Anderson in Churchill's Generals,  reveals 'an ordinary man, one often assailed by self-doubt, who made mistakes.. and did not consider himself particularly brave'.  

A charity shop find next:  Horrocks: The General Who Led From the Front by Philip Warner (1984).  I'll let the cover blurb give a flavour.  'Sometimes described as 'Britain's answer to Rommel', Sir Brian Horrocks was not only a charismatic and courageous leader of men but one of the most successful commanders of the Second World War'. His career spanned  Ypres 1914 (and 4 years as a POW) , Russia 1919, Dunkirk 1940, North Africa 1942/43 and North-West Europe 1944-45 (despite being seriously wounded in 1943), with 'retirement' involving the post of Parliament's  Black Rod, journalism and even presenting military history on 1950s  TV!   

On a recent trip to the National Trust's property at Calke Abbey (well worth a visit!), another little find came up in their second-hand bookshop : John Connell's 1964  Wavell:Scholar and Soldier (to June 1941) .  Much more than a simple soldier, Archibald Wavell was 'also a man of scholarly interests and attainments;  a biographer; an outstanding administrator...; and a Viceroy of India'. He may be better known as compiler of a best-selling poetry anthology Other Men's Flowers than as a soldier.  His misfortune was to be unable to build a good relationship with Churchill, perhaps partly  due to his taciturnity - eventually Churchill relieved him of command in the Middle East, at which point this volume ends.    His Middle East command was much more than just the Western Desert, also covering East Africa, Iraq and Syria, Greece and Crete - a huge responsibility with action in all areas, much of which will probably be new to me.  

 

And finally, the joker in the pack, so to speak - Sir Adrian Carton de Wiart's Happy Odyssey (1950).  An addendum sticker inside the front cover records that 'in this book General Carton de Wiart makes no mention of the fact that he was awarded the Victoria Cross'.  I think this may give an idea of the character of the man. In contrast to Wavell, he clearly had a very good relationship with Churchill, who has provided a foreword, and also appointed de Wiart  as his personal representative to Chiang Kai-Shek,  'to which he was not entirely suited' , as professor Gary Sheffield puts it in Churchill's Generals.  Multiply wounded (note the eye-patch) and famously courageous in 1914-18, in WW2 he led a British  military observers mission to Poland in 1939,  had an independent command in Norway 1940, and was captured by the Italians after a 'plane crash en route to Yugoslavia in 1941,  subsequently (aged 63) escaping from a POW camp via a tunnel and evading capture, in the company of fellow General O'Connor,  for several weeks. I think this is going to be a roller-coaster ride.. I had never heard of this gentleman until I read Churchill's Generals, and I was pleasantly surprised when a copy if this book turned up in Sudbury RSPCA shop a few weeks ago - snapped up for £5.  Amazingly, last week I was browsing  in our local Oxfam, and found another copy  - but they want considerably more money!        

Now it's very easy to buy books, especially if kidding yourself you are 'rescuing' them from charity shops, but the proof is in the reading, and I have all too many unread books. But I have a good feeling about these, and I think I will start with what looks to be the most straightforward and positive story, that of Horrocks. This is also a rather long-term project, and I won't be trying to get through them all in quick succession, more likely pick up one every so often, in between other reads.  Let's see how it goes.. 

The recent heatwave has driven away any thoughts of hobby painting, or hobby anything much! (in Suffolk we managed to have the record-breaking highest June temperature)  Now we seem to be cooling down a bit, today I managed a tiny amount of painting - here 'on the bottletops' we have four Garrison command figures for my French 7YW infantry unit Volontaires Étrangers de la Marine.   

 They've had a coat of grey primer, and their uniform base colour of white - it's a start. at least. There's some 'real life' stuff coming up this week which means I might not get them finished  until the weekend, but I should get some of the basic details done. There are also various 6mm units for Risorgimento 1859 wanting finishing, and.. and.. and... just like the books, the painting backlog never ends!

I hope everyone reading this  in the UK has got through the hot spell without too much discomfort - I think we all need some decent sleep! Hopefully we can all get back to our hobby now, and I can report a little more progress next  time. Until then keep well, everyone.  

Fnurban #40 : Boxing Clever

I should give fair warning, this post is about storage boxes. I don't want any of my readers to risk  triggering  any adverse physical or mental health reactions due to becoming over-excited; so please, look away now if you are at risk..

I've been looking at storage options for the various collections of toy soldiers that I have accumulated, with the aim of standardising a bit and organising properly. As seen in my last post, the 25mm Seven Years War / AWI forces seem to suit A4 box files, which are widely available and cheap; the next challenge is the currently expanding collection of  6mm figures for the Italy 1859 Risorgimento  project. For obvious reasons, these can fit in smaller, and especially shallower, boxes. I've been looking around various outlets including supermarkets, DIY stores and 'Pound Shop' discount stores, and this week I struck lucky, I think. 

don't get too excited..

Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you the 'Crofton' stackable food storage range from Aldi supermarkets, here in the UK.  Aldi are a German 'discounter' supermarket chain with a special feature being the 'middle aisle' which has an ever-changing seleciton of homeware, clothing, DIY kit etc, which currently includes these boxes. There's actually a range of sizes, and this is the 'large', measuring  27.4 x 20 x 4.7cm   ( about 10.5 x 8 x 2 inches ).  Decent sturdy plastic, secure 'tupperware' style lid.  It looks just right for the 6mm chaps, and I  reckon I can get about a Division's worth of troops in each box. Here's an example, the temporary cardboard storage  'sabots' (actually just blu-tacked )  for two Austrian brigades fitting nicely in there, with a bit left for some artillery and/or  cavalry if needed

1859 Austrians : one complete brigade and one partly-finished

 

I will have four Divisions to accomodate (two Austrian, one Piedmontese, one French) so I ended up buying 6 boxes, allowing for 'extras' and expansion. Price  £2.99 per box which  seemed quite reasonable. Of course the collection may expand, and who knows whether these appear on that middle aisle ever again, but fingers crossed!  I should add that there is also a version of this size box with one internal partition, which might be worth thinking about if you're interested - but as I said above, I wouldn't want anyone to get over-stimulated by this, so please do just take care.

Having been looking around for suitable boxes, I also couldn't quite resist an impulse buy at our local B&M  (which somewhat confusingly has replaced a branch of B&Q) - they had a multi-pack of three Really Useful boxes 1.75 litre size ) at a good price (£8 for 3 boxes)   

Really Useful indeed..

 Really Useful seem to be the Rolls-Royce of storage boxes and priced accordingly, so bargain offers are good to find! I think these may be good for some of  the 20mm. WW2 D-Day Dodgers - I have found that their 2.5 litre box will hold a Rapid Fire battalion of infantry, and these will be handy for brigade HQs, artillery units etc I am sure.

I hope that's been interesting, and not too emotional for everyone - I just wanted to highlight these current offers, so if you are in the UK and these look useful, you may need to get down to your local Aldi ASAP..

In the meantime I have managed to put in a few more painting sessions on the 1859 Austrians - about 240 shakos, muskets and backpacks have been completed.  

from the front.. 

  

..and the back 

Each coffee-stirrer stick in these pictures holds a 24-figure battalion. The Commission Figurines figures pretty much oblige you to 'keep it simple' - there are features like cross-belts etched into the MDF, and moulded canteens and back-packs etc,  but that's about it detail-wise. The figures are in 'At Attention' with musket grounded and not projecting above the torso, so  I 'drew in' the muskets using a fine-line artists sepia pen - you'll have to look very hard for that!  Now just blanket rolls to paint in (optional, still considering it), flesh for faces and hands, and brass/gold splodge for a badge on shako front, and they'll be done - 'simples!'

Now after that thrill-ride of a post, I think I may need a lie down in a darkened room.. I hope this has been of some interest, at least, if you are looking for similar storage items. I'll try to do something slightly more interesting in my next post - may have even finished those Austrians!   Until then, keep well, everyone. 

Fnurban #39: Black Friday and the Middle Aisle

 Apparently it's 'Black Friday' today, some sort of made-up festival of what exactly?  So I won't bore you with lists of special deals ( that turn out to be not so special ),  but I did happen to be in a branch of the Aldi supermarket chain  today, and saw these in the famous 'middle aisle':    

Yes folks, a selection of 1/72 scale Airfix kits, selling at £6.99 each.  You can see some of them in my hasty 'phone picture,  but the full list appeared to be as follows: 

    Supermarine Spitfire Mk 1a

    Messerschmidt Bf 109E 

    Mitsubishi A6M 'Zero' 

    North American P51 Mustang

    DUKW 

That last one seems a little random, but there we are - I guess it's a job lot of whatever Airfix had a surplus of. If you are in the UK and a keen modeller of WW2 aircraft (and/or DUKWs ) in 1/72 scale, get down to your local Aldi 'while stocks last'.. 

I admit I didn't make a purchase, but it's nice to see them there, maybe a new generation of kids will experience the joy of sticking their fingers together with poly cement, or a few old geezers will re-live their childhood..  Actually I may go back for a DUKW - useful for river crossings by my 'D-Day Dodgers' British and Indians? 

One thing about them that made me smile was the presence of safety warnings etc printed on the boxes in several languages, one of which was of course German. So if you pick up the Spitfire kit, you see in very bold print the word  ACHTUNG... ( in the picture you can spot it on the topmost  'Zero' box ). Seems very appropriate, somehow. 

That's all for now, just a quick topical note. 'Real Life' and a bit of a mini-break has meant little or no hobby time this week apart from reading other folks' blogs - I hope to make some more progress next week, and report on it. Must start painting the figures I bought at Warfare the other week.  Until then, keep well everyone.        

UPDATE:  Reader, I succumbed...

 Jus the one, mind - maybe I should have got three, and hung them on the wall...

 

Fnurban #38: The Reality of Combat Today?

Almost the end of another month, and only two posts here - that needs to be rectified. But a bunch of real life has been happening, hence not so much hobby activity, and not so much to write about. This does not seem to have discouraged the 'bots' whose views of this blog have surged recently - where I typically had 2,000 views per month, in the past 30 days there have been 47,000. Of those, over 90% were from the USA - who knows why?   I gather this has been happening to many other bloggers too, of course - my various ramblings are not uniquely interesting to the AI learning models. Not sure what on earth they can learn from this blog! 

Anyway, as a break from the marchpast of vintage Minifgs 7YW / AWI figures, a quick one about a recent film release which I think should be of interest.

2000 Meters to Andriivka is a documentary portaying the current war in Ukraine,  made during the 2023  Ukrainian 'counter-offensive'.  Distributed by Dogwoof Releasing (a pretty reliable indicator of quality), it was made by Ukranian photojournalist Mstyslav Chernov, who had previously gained attention for his 20 Days in Mariupol, about the Russian attack on that city. 

This film concentrates on the men of the Ukranian army's 3rd Assault Brigade as they try to capture the village of Andriivka, This 'strategic position' is a small road junction settlement - the '2000 Meters' of the title being a narrow corridor of woodland which stretches out from  Ukranian lines to the village. The country around is open land, but inaccessible to the troops because heavily mined by the Russians. There is extensive use of bodycam footage made by the soldiers themselves, as well as filming by the 'embedded' journalists, The introduction is a quite terrifying set of rapidly-moving sequences of high-intensity combats in other locations - you get the participants view of 'suicide drones' crashing into nearby positions ( in which the viewers comrades are hit ) , being inside an APC which breaks down and has to be evacuated under heavy fire, etc.  Then we join the 3rd Assualt Brigade ( in fact only a small sub-unit,  perhaps a platoon )  on their mission at Andriivka, as they gradually traverse that 2000 meters of ground towards their target, and again the ( fantastically high-quality)  bodycam images tell most of the story. 

 

This is essentially a small-unit infantry assault, and the filming method places the viewer completely inside the action, Wierdly it reminded me of the view one gets in 'first-person shoot-em-up' video games, seeing the soldier's personal weapon and the terrain for just a short distance ahead -  but of course this is no game, and the enemy don't obligingly stand up and charge towards the shooter, as in those games. Mostly the defending Russians were invisible to my eye, even as the Ukranian protagonist emptied a magazine in their direction.  The Russian defenders are concealed in dug-outs and foxholes, which have to be cleared one by one,  in a style which has clearly not changed in over 100 years, and would presumably be familiar to Tommy Atkins in the trenches of 1917. Plaster the entrance with suppressive fire, lob in a grenade or two, shout for them to come out with their hands up.   At times this is happening and being filmed from a range of only a few yards, including a sequence in which a Russian does indeed come out,  but does so  lobbing his own grenade.  I found it completely involving, and absolutely terrifying. 

 

But of course this is the 21st Century,  and there is the strangest juxtaposition of 1917 and 2023 - not so far behind the attacking soldiers is the brigade's command post, which frankly looks like the control room of a TV studio, as the commanders look at a bank of multiple monitor screens showing the views from their  reconnaisance drones flying above  the battle. This really does look like a video game, but again is all too real - and bizarrely they can clearly see individual Russians evacuating dugouts and retreating, only yards from the assualt troops - cue frantic shouts over the radio  'they are getting away - get them, get them!'. Everyone is clearly linked by radio at all times, everyone is referred to by call-signs (the enemy is assumed to be listening in, presumably) - a luxury that Tommy Atkins never had. As an aside, I noted that the Ukrainians rarely refer to their enemy as Russians  -  the most common descriptor used is 'motherf***ers'.  

Of course it's a truism that war is 99% boredom and 1% panic, or some variation on that, and there are several sequences filmed as the men wait for something to happen, keeping in cover in trenches and dugouts,  just talking about what they did before the war, how they came to be here, etc. Inevitably, it seems, more than once a voiceover then tells us that the man speaking was killed a few months later. One man is pictured preparing to take part in an assault on the next Russian position, then seemingly minutes later filmed lying dead on the battlefield. The village, over which all this fighting occurs and for which many lives are lost , is reduced to piles of rubble. War - what is it good for? You know the rest of the line. 

I found this both totally engrossing and involving, and unbearably tense and difficult to watch. Of course it must have been reviewed and approved for release by the Ukraine government, so it might be painted as propaganda  ( I hear you, Reg.. )  and perhaps any such work has a propaganda element. But although it inevitably generates sympathy for the (Ukrainian) troops shown fighting and dying, it doesn't by any means  come  across as trying to glorify them. It seemed much more to be just saying 'this is what it's like to be there'. I suspect ( though I can of course never know) that this is the most accurate portrayal of combat that I will ever see. I'm not sure 'enjoy' is the appropriate word, but I am very glad to have seen it. I don't watch any of the standard Hollywood 'Action Thriller' movies where Tom Cruise et al run around manically  between huge explosions that don't seem to harm anyone, but maybe some of the fans of those films should look at this. Maybe I needed to see it, too, in order to get a very strong reminder of what our 'games' are very superficially representing. Lots to think about. 

Perhaps unsurpisingly this film didn't get a hugely wide cinema release (I had to go to the ICA in London, haven't been there for years!), but it may still be around on a few art-house or repetory screens, and of course these days I assume it will be available on streaming services. I presume a DVD and/or Blu-Ray will be available to buy in time, from the Dogwoof site shop at least.   

A couple of related links :(1)   The official Dogwoof website for the film gives you the trailer, if you're interested,  and (2)  Peter Bradshaw's review from The Guardian .. 

Next time, back to the Minifigs vintage figures, I hope. Meanwhile keep well, everyone.  

  

Fnurban #37 : Zulus, Sir - Paintings of 'em!

On Saturday afternoon I braved the torrential rain showers which broke our recent heatwave, for a trip to the National Army Museum, Chelsea. Their current exhibition is called Myth and Reality: Military Art in the Age of Queen Victoria , and a series of talks were run during the day in support of it. I booked for one of them - Military Art of the Zulu War, given by Ian Knight. As many of you will know, Ian is THE expert on  Zulu military history - I just checked, and found that I have a series of  articles by him starting in issue 16 of Miniature Wargames magazine, from 1984!  I am no expert on the Zulus (clearly I have failed to read all those articles!), but it's always worth hearing someone who really knows their subject - and so it proved.   Please excuse my poor-quality phone picture of Ian in full flow ( well, it was 'darkest Africa', I suppose)  

 

The museum website described the talk like this :

Ian Knight examines artistic representations of the Zulu War of 1879 and how they continue to influence our understanding of the conflict today.

The Zulu War was fought between the British Empire and the Zulu Kingdom in the furthest reaches of southern Africa. The Zulus demonstrated remarkable resilience, and the war became notable for its ferocious battles. Today, the conflict holds a prominent place in Britain’s collective memory of colonial warfare.

Artists of the time attempted to influence opinion of the Army and its exploits against the Zulus. Charles Edwin Fripp’s romanticised depiction of the British defeat at Isandlwana failed to capture the Victorian public’s imagination. But paintings of the successful defence of Rorke’s Drift by Lady Elizabeth Butler and Alphonse de Neuville proved more popular. Butler’s piece in particular attracted a ‘great crush’ of onlookers at the Royal Academy of Arts in 1881.

As part of our Victorian Soldier Spotlight, historian Ian Knight will examine the different ways that artists of the era portrayed the Zulu War, showing how their work has helped these events to enter British folklore.

Ian is a good, very articulate but unstuffy speaker and gave us a 75-minute tour of his subject (over-running by 15 minutes, but no-one minded!). I didn't take notes, but can remember some sailent points and will try to give them here. 

The Anglo-Zulu War of 1879 was essentially an unprovoked  invasion of the Zulu Kingdom by British forces led by Lord Chelmsford.  How was it portrayed back in Britain? Well, photography was possible but difficult, as photographers still needed to transport bulky kit and chemicals, and the war zone was isolated and undeveloped - and a war zone! So 'action' photos were rare, though pictures of British troops and some Zulu prisoners were made in camps well away from the front. Even if photographs had been easily available, the newspapers of the time could not print them; they relied on drawings and sketches sent back from the war, which would then be turned into engravings for publication in The Daily Graphic, Illustrated London News etc.  Ian showed us a pencil sketch (see below) made by Melton Prior at the battlefield of Isandlwana about a month after the event,  and the published engraving made from it - from  which the original's images of dead and decaying British soldiers were of course omitted.

 There was of course a lot of public interest in the war, and this soon led to the commissioning of paintings recording the main events - these would be put on public display and could draw large crowds to view them.   Ian took us through some of these, and pointed out salient features:

First out of the blocks was this, Siege of Rorke's Drift by William Henry Dugan:

From Art UK (Image credit: The Regimental Museum of The Royal Welsh ) 

 This was painted in 1879, quite soon after the event and when very little information was available -which explains why you little or no detail of the location!  Ian pointed out that the Zulus are not accurately portrayed - the artist just didn't have sufficient information. 

 As timew went by, a lot more detail of the events of the battle became available and could be included in paintings.  In 1880, French artist Alphonse de Neuville produced The Defence of Rorke's Drift 1879'  ( French artists seemed to feature prominently; it seems many had learned their craft depicting the events of 1870-71 ).   

 

Ian pointed out that this sort of picture works a bit like a film - it includes many different episodes which people would have read about in the newspapers: Chaplain Smith handing out ammunition; Surgeon Reynolds attending to wounded; Lieutenants Chard and Bromhead, the highest-ranking officers present; the hospital set on fire by the Zulus and wounded being carried out, etc. All these incidents are included in the picture, though they actually took place at different times during the 12-hour siege. Notice of course, that events are seen very much through British eyes - the Zulu attackers are barely visible, the focus is of course entirely on the heroic British defenders. 

However, it seems that Queen Victoria was not too impressed with a Frenchman producing the definitive representation of a British battle, so she commissioned a British artist to paint the same subject. This was Lady Elizabeth Butler, whose  The Defence of Rorke's Drift  was also painted in 1880.

 In many ways a similar approach to de Neuville,  with several of the well-known characters on view : Chard and Bromhead (both VC) right at the Centre, Chaplain Smith behind them,  wounded Private Frederick Hitch (VC)  in right foreground, also handing out ammunition,  Surgeon Reynolds ( in black) attending to wounded, his assistant  Storekeeper Byrne dramatically falling, shot,  and  Corporal Ferdinand Schiess (VC) climing onto  the barricade to use his bayonet (khaki uniform, to left of the officers ). Plus of course the hospital on fire, and wounded being escorted away,  and again of course the Zulus don;t get much of a look-in, all the focus is on 'our brave boys'.  Many of these men had been interviewed by Lady Butler, and showed her the uniforms they wore at the battle - though Ian pointed out that Bromhead and Chard would very likely have worn  full beards on campaign, which would then have been shaved off on their return to Britain.  The painting attracted large crowds when put on public display,  and you too can now see it 'in the flesh', as it has fairly recently  been cleaned and restored,  and is part of the exhibition at the NAM. Well worth looking at it full-size and in person! 

The final battle of the war, and  the final defeat of the Zulus, was at Ulundi, in July 1879, and of course there is a large-scale painting of it, which belongs to the National Army Museum collection; it was for some years on display on the wall of a corridor in the museum  This is The Battle of Ulundi by Adolphe Yvon  ( another Frenchman!)  , also painted in 1880.

 

Ian said he had been puzzled for a while, as the  picture seems to show the British force in a battle line, whereas in fact Lord Chelmsford drew up his army in a large square formation;  it seems that the painting was most probably painted as a 'panorma',  designed to be displayed on the wall of circular chamber, with the audience at the centre. That would explain, for example, the way that the smoke of battle seems to be drifting in different directions(!).   Also note one or two   dark-coated British lancers at the bottom left - these would be from the 17th Lancers, who charged in pursuit of the fleeing Zulus. A few years ago, he said, he was shown a painting in South Africa depicting the 17th at Ulundi, and  realised that it was probably a missing panel from this picture, showing the 17th about to charge.         

 Of course the other famous event of the Zulu War was the catastrophic defeat of Chelmsford's army at Isandlwana, on the same day as Rorke's Drift, and this too has been the subect of several artworks, the most famous being by Charles Edwin Fripp, first exhibited in 1885: 

 Perhaps unsurprisingly, this picture was not as popular as the Rorke's Drift paintings - the public were much more keen on the latter miraculous victory than this disastrous defeat!  Ian talked us through some interesting points.  As ever, the focus is on our brave boys, who must be seen as heroic even in defeat, hence the 'last stand' nature of the foreground group, though the background scenes of slaughter would probably be more like the reality,  One detail he pointed out was the young drummer boy in the left centre, when in fact the British drummers would have been adults. Also note that there are no officers shown - so the heroic  other ranks are left to 'do and die' by their incompetent (and fleeing ) officers?  This painting also belongs to the National Army Museum, and they have a web page about its recent restoration.     

The attempts to find consolation in catastprophe continued in several other contemporary  paintings which focussed especially on the story of Lieutenants Teignmouth Melvill and Nevill Coghill, who were killed attempting to save the Queen's Colour of the 1st Battalion, 24th Foot.- as Wikipedia puts it , the colour was carried off the field by Lieutenant Melvill on horseback but lost when he crossed the river, despite Lieutenant Coghill having come to his aid. Both Melvill and Coghill were killed after crossing the river, and received posthumous Victoria Crosses in 1907 as the legend of their gallantry grew. Here is Last Sleep of the Brave by Alphonse de Neuville (1881) - Lancers find the bodies of the dead heroes, united in death and still protecting the colours:. 

 Except,  as Ian Knight pointed out,  the bodies were found some distance apart, the colours were not saved but dropped in the river, and that's the wrong colours in the picture! 

And what about the poor old Zulus in all this? As stated already, the paintings tend to show the heroics of the redcoats, and ignore the zulus and their point of viw- at least partly, it seems because artists had little first-hand knowledge of them and their appearance and equipment. Ian as able to show us one image of Rorkes Drift,  drawn from a viewpoint amongst the Zulu army - I haven't been able to find a copy of that one, but it was, Ian said, almost certainly based on this watercolour  sketch made by Lieutenant Chard, who was  in command on the day :  

 

And finally, I think Ian said that this drawing, A Zulu Regiment Attacking at Isandlwana, again by C E Fripp, was a rare, good accurate portrayal of Zulu warriors - Fripp had been to South Africa and seen the battlefields, and met the Zulus. 

 So on that note, I'll finish - many thanks to Ian Knight for a really interesting talk, and to  the NAM for organising it. If you are anywhere near Chelsea in the near future, the exhibition is no doubt worth a look too - I only had a few minutes spare to look at it on the day, but  will certainly be  going back. 

I also noticed that if you are very keen on all this, you can spend 14 days in November in the company of Ian Knight, on a Zulu War tour run by Cultural Experience the historic tour company. But I should point out that it will cost you over £6,000 - I paid a fiver for the talk, that will do me!  Until next time, keep well, everyone. 

Fnurban #36 : What's in a Name?

There's been something of a pause in hobby activities in the past few weeks - largely just due to 'daily life' happening, really  ( 'Life is what happens when you're busy making other plans..' as a working-class hero may, or may not, have said ).  A little progress on painting 6mm figures for the Risorgimento project, but nothing finished and alas, no gaming.  But there has been a little 'military history' interest, with a common thread, that being my family name. 

I think I was slightly aware that one of Wellington's staff in the Peninsular bore the name Barnes - I think I remembered him being mentioned at 'No.1, London', Apsley House, which is of course well worrh a visit if you are in central London. But recently, and  possibly after Jon Freitag's ACW Shiloh game that I took part in,  I happened to search on-line for 'General Barnes'. There was indeed an ACW character of that name, commander of the Union army's 1st Division, who disgraced himself at Gettysburg, I'm afraid. However,  I was more interested to see some details of the Napoleonic officer, Sir Edward Barnes (1776-1838).  His Wikipedia page makes a good introduction.  He seems to have had a distinguished military career, rising to be Wellington's  'fire-eating adjutant general'  in the Waterloo campaign, and was wounded in that battle. Subsquently he spent seven years as Governor of Ceylon, and was Commander-in-Chief in India in 1832-1833.   Here he is, in a portrait by William Salter 

Need I say there is emphatically no resemblance to me? ( except perhaps what is euphemistically called a  'high forehead' )  And no evidence of any family connection - my ancestors were all  lowly farm labourers in Norfolk at the time.  But I was struck by a couple of nice coincidences in his biography.  Firstly,  that he was briefly MP for Sudbury at the end of his life - Sudbury being my adopted home town. As an aside, he was first elected in a controversial by-election in 1834, which was covered by a young newspaper reporter named Charles Dickens, and probably inspired Dickens' fictional election at  'Eatanswill' in The Pickwick Papers.         

And secondly, General Barnes died at his home at Walthamstow in 1838, and is buried in the churchyard of St. Mary's Church, Walthamstow. His gravesite is marked by a large monument, with an inscription giving details of his achievements in life.  It happens that before moving to Sudbury, I too lived at Walthamstow, for about 10 years ( I suspect his house was a bit grander than my Warner Estates maisonette ), and I must have walked past St. Mary's churchyard a good many times, all unknowing. It has occurred that I seem to be following my illustrious namesake around, and it might be fun to do a little research into his life and career. By way of a start, a few weeks ago I paid a visit to the church, and found the monument : 

 as you can see it's quite impressive, but alas the inscription is by no means easy to read

- but it's a start, at least. It might be nice to find out some more.  Perhaps my new friends at the National Army Museum ( well, I paid for a membership there, mainly to donate some money and to get a discount in the cafe when attending their talks! ) can help..

Another thread of research is a bit closer to home - I have done a bit of family history investigation  over the years, and have recently been passed copies of  the RAF service records of a relative (with whom I also share surname), who was a mid-upper gunner in Lancaster bombers in 1943 and 1944. I  have his service record document which records his joining up in 1942, and then the sequence of postings to various reserve, reception and training establishments, finally arriving at No. 57 squadron  at RAF Scampton, Lincolnshire in late 1942.  Scampton is famous as the base at which No. 617  'The Dambusters' squadron was formed in early 1943, and several crews joined no. 617 from no.57 squadron, so my relative may very well have been familiar with many  'Dambusters', though he remained with No.57.  He stayed with the squadron until July 1943, so I assume he completed a 'tour' of operations, and then transferred to various OTUs (Operational Training Units), perhaps as an instructor, before joining no.9 squadron ( the RAF's senior bomber unit ) in July 1944.  

All that information is interesting enough, but what is really fascinating to me, is a series of copies of  the squadron's Operation Records, for operations which my relative took part in. These give the date and target of the mission, the number of the squadron's aircraft involved,  and a summary of how the operation went - and then a separate section for each aircraft, giving details of crew members, time 'up' and 'down', whether they reached the target, time and altitude of bombing, whether results could be observed, and bomb load carried. 

As an example, here is the squadron's summary for the operation undertaken on the night of 3rd/4th March 1843 :

BOMBING OPERATION: TARGET - HAMBURG
Seven aircraft were detailed to attack HAMBURG. All took off, but one returned early with rear turret u/s and an oil leak in one engine. The other six aircraft reached the target area. Visibility was good and all saw the River Elbe and the dock system. The P.F.F. markers were clearly seen and bombed. All crews report a good concentration of bombs on the markers and report huge fires which could be seen over 100 miles away on the return journey. All returned to base except 'M' which was sent on to Wittering to land on the long runway there because of the inability to get the flaps down for landing. It landed safely there. Photographs taken on this raid show a large mass of fires with little ground detail. Those plotted (in all squadrons in Command ) show that the main concentration of bombing must have been on the little town of Wedel on the Elbe about 12 miles West of Hamburg. 

And for the aircraft in which my relative flew : 

Time up : 19:15, down 00:31. River Elbe identified and T.I. markers seen. Bombed concentration of markers at 21:35 hrs from 20,500ft. Bombing was concentrated around the markers. Bomb Load:  1 x 4,000lb H.C. + 96 x 30lb I.B. 

[  'P.F.F.' means Path Finder Force,  'T.I.' is Target Indicator, 'H.C.' I think means 'High Compression' (i.e High Explosive )  and 'I.B.' is Incendiary Bomb ]

I have Alfred Price's excellent introductory book Battle Over The Reich about the RAF and USAAF bombing campaigns over Germany, and he specifically discussed this raid - stating that the Pathfinder Force aircraft had problems with their new H2S centimetric radar sets, which were supposed to give an accurate picture of the features on the ground over which they were flying. The H2S operators were confused by low tides uncovering sandbanks which 'produced the appearance of  a river narrowing far downstram of Hamburg' . Also at Wedel 'Army engineers had dammed a small mill stream nearby to produce a large lake resembling in shape the Alster Lake in the centre of Hamburg... the majority of the raiders released their loads on the decoy, obliterating Wedel itself and several of the nearby villages' .  It seems from the squadron summary above that the failure of this mission was very soon known to Bomber Command.  No consolation to the unfortunate inhabitants of Wedel of course - and those of Hamburg had only a temporary reprieve before the horrors of the highly successful ( from the RAF point of view )  Operation Gomorrah in the following July.

I think the above gives a flavour of the information I am looking through - and perhaps the mixture of fascination and unease which they give.  I suspect that a big factor in our interest in military history ( or any history come to that ) is to consider 'what was it like to be there', and the sort of details available here help hugely in creating a picture in the mind of what the young men ( my subject being only about 20 at the time ) involved were going through,  and also, it must be said, of the destruction that they brought to the cities and people of Germany (look at the 'bomb load' details for just one aircraft,  multiply by several hundred aircraft  per operation, and think of the effect of them on the ground: huge fires which could be seen over 100 miles away ).  The amount of information available on-line on the RAF bombing campaign is impressive, including  from the  International Bomber Command Centre at Lincoln, which I now hope to visit. The records I am looking at give the ID number of every aircraft involved, and so far  a simple on-line search has easily turned up information on the fate of each one of them - suffice it to say that the operational life of a Lancaster bomber in 1943, even if not actually lost in action, was usually  measured in months.  Very sadly, the same goes for the crews, and the fascination of following my late relative's tour of duty is overshadowed by the knowledge that he 'failed to return' from a mission in July 1944, aged only 21. 

 

As an illustration of perhaps the 'small world' of Bomber Command and the amount of information available,  the above picture is from Wikipedia's page on 57 Squadron, and depicts  Flying Officer R.W. Stewart, a wireless operator on a Lancaster of No. 57 Squadron based at RAF Scampton speaking to the pilot from his position in front of the Marconi T1154/R1155 transmitter/receiver set :  it so happens that my relative flew on one mission in the same aircraft as F/O Stewart.  I am gradually reading through the records I have been given and transcribing extracts involving my late relative - it really is a very interesting, and sobering, exercise. When I was 20, living at a university and doing the final year of my degree seemed fairly stressful - I really didn't know I was born, did I? 

Aside from that, there has been a tiny bit of hobby activity, as I have made very small steps forward with painting my recently-acquired  Commission Figurines figures ( from their Napoleonic and ACW  ranges) for the 1859 Austrians vs. Piedmontese war in Italy, 

 

Here they are on the coffee-stirrer painting sticks ( always keep your coffee stirrers, I have a bundle of 'em ).  So far they've been primed, the infantry have been given their tunics/greatcoats and the cavalry horses have been painted. Still quite a long way to go, and xmas shopping, card-writing  and socialising has been getting in the way a bit, but  I will try to keep finding some time for them. 

I'm hoping to squeeze in one more post before Xmas, even if it's only a picture of a small Xmas tree - and maybe a little more painting progress. There is even a rumour of possible remote gaming.. we shall see.  Until then, keep well and enjoy the mince pies, everyone.