About time for another post.

I suppose it's about time for another post.
The French-Italian wars project has not leaped forward at the speed I had hoped but I still have 5x48 figure pike blocks, 2x15 gendarmes, 1x15 generic Italian knights, 1x30 foot arquebusiers and the same of sword & buckler chaps and 1x9 stradiots. Nearly finished are 2x9 mounted crossbows and 4 artillery pieces. So that is ongoing...still and the holiday deadline is very rapidly approaching.

Now if you recall I said that I would not paint any of my Early WWII stuff until the above project is as complete as I have figures for and that is still the case...almost. It's true I haven't painted anything but sittinig in the garden during the gorgeous sunshine of our April summer I managed to clean up, sand and base everything and black spray undercoat the Germans. Took about a minute to do all 60 odd vehicles and 17 artillery and infantry bases. Then I used a grey primer spray on all the vehicles as a base coat. I know it's a bit light so I'm going to give them a couple of black washes to darken the grey, then do the dark brown element of the camo before another black wash to soften and do a bit of merging of the colours.

Reading a blog the other day, this one in fact:

http://ww2talk.com/index.php?threads%2Fthe-battle-and-massacre-of-wormhout-28th-may-1940.20061%2F

I recognised a number of places pictured from our holiday, so they will be revisited that's for sure. Also, we have since found out that May 8th is a national victroy celebration day with parades and stuff all over the place. I hope there's one in our area.

So, still all fired up for Early War while painting the F-I Wars chaps. There's dedication and discipline for you.

A bientot.

The older you get, the quicker time passes!

Well, flippin' heck, don't time fly when you realise you haven't posted anything for a while...a long while; very remiss of me. Life is moving on and the French-Italian Wars project is coming on slowly, so far I have:

2 units of 15 gendarmes
2 units of 48 Landsknecte pike
1 unit of 44 Swiss pike
1 unit of 40 Italian pike
1 unit of 15 Italian mtd knights
1 unit of 30 Italian dis-mtd arquebusiers
1 unit of 30 Spanish Sword and Buckler types
1 unit of 9 Stradiots

Each of the units is made up of 3 40x20mm bases and all are from H&R.

I've also now got about 95% of my WWII Early War British, German and French armies at 1:5 divisional strength but I am holding back on painting them until the French-Italian chaps are finished. This should take me up to the end of the year if everything pans out.
   However...
   About a year ago I was contacted by Stephan at Rapier Miniatures (known as Fredbloggs on the LOA forum) and asked if I had any research on the Mongols for an upcoming range. (Silly man, asking if I had any research on the Mongols.) Anyway, long story much shortened, the other day a package arrived from Rapier and inside were two of their Small Armies of Mongols. They were almost begging me to paint them and seeing how lovely they looked I offered to paint some for his trade stand so here are some taster pics. All are cklickable for a warts-and-all image.

 Army command

 L/MC firing bow

 L/M Cav with lance

 Unit command

 LC/MC loading bow

 Armoured chaps on armoured horses

 As above pianted as keshig

Now of course, I have a slight dilemma, do I carry on painting the Renaissance chaps, change to WW II or think blow it, I'll go with the Mongols. Seeing as I already have a Mongol 6mm army in Irregular I reckon they can wait and I will carry on with my plan for the year. But, if Rapier bring out Russians, Khwarizmians, Polish, Hungarians, Cumani, or Song Chines I might have to re-evaluate my position. 

   One thing that should ber mentioned is that we are going back to Wormhouldt in a couple of months for another break and, knowing me, I will be all fired up (pun unintended) for my Early War project. Enough of this idle chatter, I'd better get a wiggle on with the Rennaisance to get as many done as I can before the hol.

Sorry about the wait.

For starters, I just want to say that I have been extremely lapse in my postings of late and that is due to a number of factors, not least of which was being diagnosed with the dreaded ‘D’ –Depression. Not only did this take a long before it was recognised for what it was by myself but also time for the prescribed medication to take hold. So it was late December before I more or less had the damn thing under control but it wasn’t until I had to change my medication –with a two week lay off period to shift the old lot out of my system- that I concluded that some of it may have been psychosomatic in as far as I was on medication for Depression therefore I must be Depressed. As soon as I came off the first lot I started feeling better so the new lot are still in the bag, unopened, unused and happily to say unloved.
Because of all of that I have painted next to nothing in the last 6 months or so but I have been doing other stuff, albeit extremely slowly. The writing has been coming along in fits and starts, I am now on my third draft/re-write/proof read of the manuscript and am on the last couple of chapters now.
Also in the intervening period I made a couple of visits to mainland Europe, both in the guise of a holiday. My friend found a little place in Flanders which is absolutely perfect for chilling and forgetting the world in general. It’s near Wormhoult in Flanders and the first time the four of us went (my friend and his missus, Ma Subs and myself) we travelled to Ypres and we had a look around the WWI museum there (photos duly taken) before finding our place.
Now call me daft or militarily ignorant if you will but I didn’t realise that Wormhoult and the nearby town of Bergues (a Vauban fortress by the way) were on the retreat route of the BEF on its way to Dunkirk and the only reason I found out was because there is a local church in the village where not only are locals buried but there is also an area which is protected by the War Graves Commission and there are the graves of 61 British servicemen. The regiments are known as is shown by the carving on the headstones with the Welsh Guards being predominant but the individuals are not. Very sad place so I thought I would take a picture of the sun going down behind the gravestones as my mark of respect.

The small but very poignant graveyard in the village of West Capell, nr. Wormhoult in Flanders

On our second visit we had more time so we went to Bergues, which is a lovely place. As I said, it is a Vauban fortress with all the wall trimmings but what interested me the most was the Abbey in the centre. Now consisting of only two impressive towers and a marble gate, the place was destroyed during the French Revolution, damaged by fire in 1940, destroyed by dynamite in 1944 and rebuilt again in 1961 and is now a World Heritage Site as of 2005!

The Abbey Tower in the front, a dovecote in the centre and the belfry in the middle of town at the back.

I decided not long into our five day break that I would quite like to do the Early War period, specifically, the war in the Flanders region so I took photos of nearly everything that looked old enough to have been there in 1940 for future reference. Mind you, apart from farms, hedges and trees, other terrain will be a doddle –the place is as flat as a pancake, so the hills can stay in the draw! The only tricky bit could well be the drainage ditches that are along most of the rural roads but I might just wing it with them. Dunkirk and Bray Dunes were also given a visit and more pictures of the local architecture were duly taken. We arrived back in the UK yesterday evening after a great rest with very warm weather and after a lengthy wine-necking period. After all, at €1.59 a bottle (about £1.25 at the time of going to press) it would have been churlish not to, now wouldn’t it?
   So now to the wargaming side of things. Early last week I had an FPW itch that I felt needed scratching and before the holiday I had painted and based 8 blocks of Confederation troops with another 24 half way through. Then it’s the remainder of the commanders, artillery and cavalry and I reckon I won’t be far off done with them…for the time being anyway. And now I’m to do a little research on the BEF and Wehrmacht in 1940.

More Krakow pictures

Just thought I'd post some more pictures of pictures from various galleries and museums that I took in Krakow.

Battle of Raclawice. Jan Matejko (1838-1893) 

 Unfortunately I didn't note down the details of this painting.

 Blue Hussars. Piotr Michałowski (1800-1855)

 Somosierra. Piotr Michałowski (1800-1855) Obviously it should be the other way up but...

 Retreat from the Environs of Moscow, an Episode from the Year 1812. January Suchodolski (1797-1875)

Prince Josef Poniatowski entering Krakow on July 15, 1809. Michał Stachowicz (1768-1825)

 Fight for a Turkish Standard. Jósef Brandt (1841-1915)

Krakow trip.

Well, that seemed to come around really quickly, one minute it was Christmas, then my birthday -a landmark 60th if you must know the numbers- and then suddenly it was off to Kraków in Poland for the weekend with my daughter. She had wanted to do something special for the occasion and this was it.
   Now there are two things about Kraków (pronounced Krakuf), one I knew and one I didn't; I knew it was going to be perishing cold in January -it reached -6 C with snow- so that was no real surprise but I didn't know how nice both the city and the people are. Some of them who were trying to sell you tickets for a horse and carriage ride would quite happily direct you anywhere you wanted to go...and smile while they were doing it! My daughter had worked there in the summer so she made a pretty good guide -for pubs, zapiekanki (street food) sites and vodka bars...but she didn't know much about the museums. Luckily, Google came to the rescue and I found a few on there including Wawel (pronounced Vavel) Castle. I had previously made a list of interesting places -to me anyway- that I wanted to visit so we worked out a plan of action. We flew out of Gatwick at 0815 on Friday and arrived at 1215 (Kraków is an hour ahead). Friday afternoon -a walk around the old town on the way to Wawel Castle while checking out some of the local restaurants for an evening meal. Some of the buildings date back to the 18th Century and some churches are from the early medieval times. One, St Andrews, along with Wawel Castle, were the only stone edifices left standing after the ten day siege by the Mongols in early March 1241!

   

(I have other pics but for some reason it wants to display them as landscape rather than portrait).

About Wawel Castle. Hulking great place, quite a good museum with lots of armour and bits from the husaria period (Renaissance Winged Hussars to the non Polish speakers). Looks the mutts thinks I, got to give that one a look over. Walks in goes up to the ticket counter and sees a sign saying that the Castle Armoury section is closed until Jan 25th. If we had turned up the bl**dy day before it would have been open but... Not happy but nothing you can do; so I bought a guide instead. It was almost like a Bullseye moment when Jim Bowen used to say "Lets see what you would have won". Gutted, especially after looking through the guide. So this is as close as I got to husaria material in Poland -a model display in the shop!

But you have to be the bigger person and move on so we went to the Aircraft Museum (Muzeum Lotnictwa Polskiego) and boy did that come good!

Here is a link to all the planes they have there:

http://www.muzeumlotnictwa.pl/zbiory.php?w=a&zb=aeroplanes

These are just a few of the pics I took.

 No idea what this is but took it for the colour scheme.

 Spitfire Mk 26

 Me 109 G

 Junkers JU52 (Tante Ju)

Mig 29 (Fulcrum)

At one of the art museums (the Krzysztofory) -a converted palace, I found this which I was quite chuffed about.

Jósef Brandt (1841-1915) and entitled Fight for a Turkish standard, (Walka o sztander tureckie). Quite the action pic. There was also a famous painting by Piotr Michałowski depicting the uphill charge of a squadron of Polish Lancers at the Somosierra  Pass during the Napoleonic Wars in Spain but that only loads sideways as well. 

I found these in the courtyard of the Palace of Bishop Erasmus Ciolek (Palac Biskupa Erazma Ciolka). This place was full of religious paintings and statuary but in the central courtyard were these. Bit random.

The size of the mortar bore is anybody's guess but the size of the stone cannon balls are intriguing.

I took over 300 pictures of various buildings, churches, aircraft and all other sorts of whatnot, picked up a number of museum guidebooks with useful bits and pieces in but the prize was a book called 'Digital Reconstructions of the Historic Built up areas of Kraków'. 170 pages of larger than A4 size with fold out full colour pictures of the evolution of the city. Early timber frames, stone, the lot. Cost me 60 złoty (about £10) and was an absolute steal if you are interested in making your own, reasonably accurate terrain like wot I is. 
     Monday morning came around too quick. We had to leave the hotel at 1000 because our flight was at 1215. The temperature had dropped significantly overnight which is where the -6 comes into it but as well as that, while at the airport the snow started to come down in large flakes and we had to have the wings de-iced before we could take off! 
     Luckily we made it safely back to good old Blighty. It was a fantastic experience and I would definitely go again if the opportunity presented itself...especially to the displays at Wawel Castle!

What a marvellous present!

Some of you may be aware that I have more than a passing interest in the Mongols, especially the 1238-41 campaign in Europe. Now currently my daughter works as a lead trainer for a medical assessment company and is in Poland teaching the Polish the methods that she uses. She has a weekend off so instead of coming home she stayed for a wander about. This morning she phoned and was telling me about her walkabout. Now previous instructions to said daughter involved taking pictures of old buildings and looking out for anything from the Mongol period. Later this afternoon while watching the Japanese v South Africa rugby she phoned again and said that for my 60th birthday next January she is taking me to Krakow for a long weekend of looking around the place. I'll be brutally honest with you, I was a more than a tad emotional.
Now Krakow was the fist major city the Mongols came to and destroyed but Wawel Castle they avoided because it was too strong. As I said to her, that's one place off of my bucket list...hmmm, I wonder if she is up for a trip to Mongolia or Japan for my 65th? 

History revisited

For all you Ancient wargamers out there I thought I'd give you some views of the 'Ribat' at Sousse in Tunisia -taken by myself in 2009- for colour, texture and construction details. The actual construction of the main building dates back to the late 8th Century AD with the watchtower being added in 821 AD. There was some more work done in 1722 and it is possible that the doors in pictures 3, 7 and 8 were added at this time. the only reasoning I have for this is that the lintels look newer than the rest. The whole Ribat was heavily restored after some serious bombing in 1942-43.

Originally a religious institution, in exchange for special privileges, the occupants were the watchers of the coastline to give warning of any approaching Byzantine fleet. Fires at night and smoke during the day from the watchtower could pass the information on to other coastline forts.

All pics are of course clickable for in-yer-face detail.

1. The Entrance Porch on the south face.


2. A closer shot of the Porch.


3. Detail of a small door on the eastern face.


4. Looking north-north-east, another shot of the Porch.


5. Looking at the north face.


6. Square Watchtower with circular tower above in the south-east corner.


7. Another small door either on the north or west faces.


8. Same door as in '3' but additionally, showing the battlements.



The next five shots are of the interior.

9. On the north wall looking south towards the entrance.


10. Circular corner tower battlement detail.



11. North-eastern corner looking south towards the Sqaure Watchtower. Nothe the crenelations on both sides of the walkway.


12. More tower battlement detail.



13. Showing courtyard. Taken from south-eastern corner looking to the north-west.



If anyone wants some more details just let me know, I have a copy of the Guide book from this ribat as well as the one from Monastir. Also have a copy of the official guide book from Carthage (whats left of it).

Something New

Above from top to bottom: The Ribat (or religious fort) at Sousse, ruins of Roman Carthage x 2, El Djem x 2. The last two taken in 2008
A new enterprise idea reared its head while I was kicking my heels in Tunisia...a book. Not just any book but an historical one. 'Sit down that heckler at the back shouting, What a novel idea!' Something Mongol, I thought, falling back to my favouritest military period of all time to date. Then I had more thoughts about what's already been done and what was still available. So I made a few notes and came up with -what I think is a workable idea- about one of the most brilliant but as yet largely unwritten about strategic campaigns in history. So there it is. Using my own not too small collection of Mongol material plus the huge resources of Britains Library system I should be able to put something together.
  Still painting. So far the unit of Chin heavy cavalry is painted and stuck down awaiting base colours and the last of my Chin infantry -a unit of crossbow men- is alongside the camels mentioned earlier, both awaiting undercoating. After that who knows, maybe some 10mm Ancient Gauls. This is for two reasons, a) While in Tunisia I visited Carthage and was impressed immensely, even though most of the stuff was Roman, so a Carthaginian Army is on the cards; and b) I already have a number of Roman cohorts painted to receive them. (I also have 3 x  500ml plastic water bottles with authentic Arabic writing on them filled with Tunisian sand ready for the bases. Anorak or what! Or could it be the purist in me? You decide.)
Another wargaming project for the future is a Khwarizmian Army in 10mm, (actually a generic Middle Eastern Army that will go from the Saracens to the Mamluks and possibly beyond a bit), again inspired by the visit to Tunisia. Hence the pictures of the Ribat at Sousse.
Who said wargamers have butterfly interests? Whoever it was got it bang on, especially if one is painting for oneself. Anyway, any unfinished projects will always get picked up again further on down the timeline of my wargaming life. I mean I have figures that havent seen the light of day in decades, then all of a sudden I get an urge -if you know what I mean- and off I go again at another tangent. Then again, I also have historical books that I have never read in periods that I don't know much about or I'm not interested in...yet, the day will come I assure you. Out of 900+ military books I've probably read somewhere between 2/3 and 3/4 of them, the rest gather dust until they become required reading.
On another completely different note I now have three parts of the beginning of a collection. When MO went to Rome he managed to smuggle back a small piece of the Colluseum. When in Tunisia last year I 'borrowed' a small piece of the El Djem Amphitheatre and this year I found a small piece of Carthaginian rubble in my bag when I got home. I would like to stress that as a dedicated afficianado of history, these pieces were not removed from any structure but were found lying on the ground.

An army nearly done?

Cast your mind back several months to a rant about camera's and sunny days and how I only managed to get a few piccys. Well, after an intervening period of about an eon, MO has finally sent them to me via electronic means. One is quite good, another is reasonable, the rest are blurred and frankyl c**p. I have posted the two good ones.  The top one is of some Lybian Spearmen as per WRG Mack and Pube 1st ed. that Mini Figs based their range on back when both Noah and I were both young. The second has my version of Greek mercs on the left with Carthaginian citizen spears on the right, both Lamming. In front of them are some archers from an unknown manufacturer. (Bear in mind these figs have been in the high tower for millenia so memory is a bit iffy). Head, shield, and boby swaps abound. All terrain pieces made by Yours Truly. Carpet tile courtesy of an old, condemned building.
The title is somewhat misleading...a wargamer never really finishes an army, he just finishes painting what he has at that time. I mean so far I have 12 units of 10mm Sung/Xin/Hsi Hsia Chinese. that may not sound like a lot but remember there are a minimum of 50 figs in an HI unit (3 of); 27 figs in a MI unit (6 of); 12 LC (2 of); 21 HC (1 of) and a rocket unit. That totals over 300 inf and 45 cav...so far. On top of that there are 11 units of Mongol cavalry -1x24 EHC, 2x24 HC and 8x12 LC. Enough for a small game pitting one aganst the other or a large game taking on someone else. So now I may have to move onto the 10mm Celts...until I get some more Asiatics that is.
    Anyway, just come back from an unusually hot Bank Holiday weekend in north Wales, between Conway and Rhyl to be a bit more precise. Weather as I said was good as was the company -wife, friends from over the road and their daughter. Caught the sun quite nicely thank you (dig at pundits et al spouting on about ET waves). Now, overcast and windy. As  Billy Conolly says, if you don't like the weather, wait around for fifteen minutes, it'll change.
At least the Irons finished a highly creditable 9th considering the almost season long injury problems with First Team players. Nice to see Kieron Dyer back and well done to Scott Parker for being voted Hammer of the Year. To use a much over-rated but somehow pertinent Americanism, Zola Rocks!.
Keep your bristles straight,
Mick

Amazing Thing Weather

Nothing whatsoever to do with wargames but I woke up this morning (blues riff if you please), looked out of the window and IT WASN'T RAINING! Now I know this won't mean much to anyone who was born 'offshore' but, believe it or not, even us Brits get mightily narked off with an almost constant vertical river. So it was an extremely welcome change to get up to sunshine. A bit of sunshine makes one want to do all sorts of crazy things, like go out. Mind you, brought back to earth with a bump when Middle Offspring (MO) phoned and informed me that he and his girlfriend had arrived in Tunisia where apparently it's silly hot. He's havng a well earned break from the West End, I've seen the show five times (The Buddy Holly Story, brilliant. Go see it. That's it, plug over.)
I know all about silly hot  coz me an' missus were there in June in the middle of a heatwave -a Mediterranean country with a heatwave, sounds wierd- but believe me it was a nice and warm 44 C (that's 111 F in old money, I know, I checked). Suddenly the whole world -well the bit where we were- was populated by two legged lobsters, amazing sight, I didn't know people really could go that colour! Whereas at this moment England it's currently a nice and sultry...19C.
Not difficult to see why people go abroad is it?