Empire of the Moghul

Brothers at War is the second book in the Empire of the Moghul series by Alex Rutherford. This follows on from the story of the dynasty's founder, Babur, in the first book. His eldest son Humayun takes over but has to face the rivalry of his three half brothers who want the empire to be split up between them.

As a consequence they fail to unite when the Empire is threatened by a rebellion and Humayun is driven from India to seek support from the Shah of Persia. With military support from the Shah he recaptures Babur's original base in Afganistan from his brothers. When the warring factions in India break apart he grasps the opportunity to recapture the Moghul lands and reestablish their rule. The irony is that after this epic struggle he falls down the steps of his observatory and dies. Such is fate!

I raved at the first of this series and I cannot fail to do the same for the second. The history itself is of course truly epic and Alex Rutherford brings it to life with great story telling skills. I cannot recommend this series too strongly. Time to get my 28mm Moghuls out of the box ......

Albanich

I popped down to Dumfries yesterday for Albanich the first Scottish wargames show of the year.

This is a small local show that none the less attracts a good range of traders. I picked up a number of smaller items I needed. I had bought a very nice Spanish/Italian 15mm building at a show last year, very suitable for my SCW project. Some more would be good but I forgot who did them. And there they were, sold by Rif Raf Miniatures, so a village of them is taking shape. I also got some nice entrenchments for FoW along with grass tufts and some more bases from the excellent Warbases. Warlord Games had their latest and Aventine Miniatures had some very nice Republican Romans and Indians with some fabulous elephants.

The theme of the show was A Very British Civil War (AVBCW). This is produced by Simon Douglas at Solway Crafts who organises the show. For those not familiar with the concept it is an alternative historical outline of events of 1936-38 that begins with a decision by Edward not to abdicate. They have produced some excellent source materials, flags etc and you use whatever rules you like.

I have been attracted to the concept but have resisted. However, yesterday I gave in and bought the books. You can use Great War Warhammer rules for this and a number of my WW1 figures will be suitable for starters. I suspect a worker militias will be my starting point.

There were a number of well presented games on this theme to tempt anyone in, certainly someone as weak willed as me! Below is a snap of the South East Scotland game. The terrain surface is teddy bear fur. Cheap and robust according to the Edinburgh lads.

Again this was a good show, well worth the journey.

Open Days

Glasgow and District Wargames Society held its annual double header and open days this weekend. This is the opportunity to play big games that take longer than the normal afternoon. We also open the doors to any member of the public who wants to find out a bit more about wargaming and what the society has to offer.

I was primarily involved in testing the scenario Somerled's Last Stand that will be our main demo game this year. A big 5000pt WAB game based on Somerled's last battle at Bargarran in 1164. We learnt quite a bit about WAB 2 rules and how it impacts on fighting a battle in difficult terrain. We concluded that we probably made the terrain too difficult as it made the light infantry Islemen very difficult to beat and the outcome was a resounding victory for them. If that had been the historical outcome we would probably be speaking Gaelic not English today!

The above are my Iselsmen with the big man on the hill representing Somerled's right hand man Saor McNeil. They sent several units of Norman knights packing.

There was also a FoG competition using smaller 650pt armies on a 5' x 3' table. This provided quick games. There was also a big WW1 game using PoW, Blitzkrieg action in France from the WW2 boys and a couple of Fire & Fury games. George Dick's 15mm Arthurian army (see below) is one of my favourites.

Pyrrhus of Epirus

Just finished Jeff Champion's book on Pyrrhus of Epirus. His claim to fame is that he defeated the Romans in two major battles and was rated by Hannibal as the second greatest general after Alexander. His name lives on with the phrase 'Pyrrhic victory'.

The author starts with an overview of the Eastern Mediterranean in the 3rd Century BC and of Epirus itself. At this time the state was a loose combination of tribes with the King's role primarily that of war leader. Epirus covered large parts of modern North Western Greece and Southern Albania.

Pyrrhus spent much of his youth in exile. This was the period of the Successors and war between them was the norm, dragging in other states. He developed into an brave and capable commander before returning to Epirus as King. He probably inherited a modern Macedonian style of army based on the pike armed phalanx supported by cavalry and elephants.

The rest of the book takes us through his main campaigns. Firstly his conflicts with neighbouring Macedonia and then, at the invitation of the Southern Italian states, with Rome. His famous 'Pyrrhic victories' at Heraclea and Asculum are covered in detail. He then campaigned in Sicily against Carthage before returning to Italy, this time to lose against the Romans at Beneventum. His final campaigns were in Greece, culminating in his death in battle against Argos and the Spartans. 

A fitting end for a King who was almost continually at war. Whilst he was undoubtedly a great battlefield commander his strategic outcomes were poor. Too many campaigns were not seen through to the end and his diplomatic skills in maintaining allies were weak, even allowing for the shifting alliances of the period.

This is a book I would highly recommend. The author has a good writing style and effectively deals with the limited sources in way that retains readability for the general reader. I have spent some time in the Epirus region and it is well worth a visit with plenty of sites of interest for the historian.

Russia's Balkan Entanglements

Another gift from Santa was Barbara Jelavich's tome on Russia's Balkan Entanglements 1806-1914.

This is a primarily a diplomatic history of Russia's 19th Century engagements in the Balkans. Starting with the Napoleonic wars and ending with WW1 and the subsequent collapse of both the Austro-Hungarian and Russian Imperial Empires. The period included no less than five wars with the Ottoman Empire from which Russia gained minimal territorial advantage at considerable expense. The author concludes that emotional commitments played a significant part in driving Russian policy. The irony is that an autocratic regime supported, what we would today call liberation struggles, at an economic cost that contributed to its own downfall.

I was about to say that the military operations are given cursory attention. However, that would be overstating the case. They are barely mentioned. Whilst this is not a military history, a reader not familiar with these conflicts would struggle to follow events.

This is not an easy read, not least because the author quotes primary documents at length. It does give a detailed understanding of both the internal Russian considerations and the diplomatic exchanges between the Great Powers. The author also threads the theme of the motives for Russian engagement throughout the book. The analysis is excellent, if the presentation is a little turgid.

One for the real Balkan enthusiast now it is available at a reasonable price in paperback. Not for the general reader.

Cross and Crescent in the Balkans

Santa was very good to me in the books department. The first to be read was David Nicolle's Cross and Crescent in the Balkans.

This is the story of the Ottoman conquest of the Balkans. He covers the early history of the Ottomans and the chaotic world at the time. The decline of Byzantium, divided Islam and distracted European states all contributed to the extraordinary rise of this dynasty from a small tribe to superpower status.

This is not a simple narrative military history. The author gives a fair amount of social history that puts the Ottomans in context and explains their resilience. Not least the loyalty of Christian vassals in the Balkans. He also gives some detail of the Ottoman military and administrative system as well as their remarkable comeback after the defeat by Timur at Ankara in 1402.

The military history is outlined and expanded with a somewhat selective treatment of the major campaigns. The Crusade of Nikopol and the Siege of Constantinople get several chapters each. However, the battle of Maritsa plus the first and second battles of Kossova are virtually ignored. This is a bit disappointing as this prolific author has written detailed accounts of Nikopolis and Constantinople in the Osprey campaign series.

With that exception this is still a good overview of the period, written in the David Nicolle's very readable style.

Punic Wars

Happy New Year! May your dice always roll 6. Well for most rules anyway.

It is traditional at this time of year to review projects and plans for the coming year. My main project will be Lord of the Isles as this will be our main display game for this year. Mostly Scots spearmen outstanding. I will no doubt add the odd unit to the WW1 Salonika campaign armies as particular figures catch my eye. I am also enjoying my first few games of Flames of War, so I anticipate some expansion of my Spanish Civil War armies and rebasing the Greeks and Italians. As for actual gaming there will be the club FoG, FoGR and WAB competitions. Plus I want to play more Black Powder, Warhammer Great War and FoW. That should be more than enough to keep me busy!

Just completed the monthly update for Balkan Military History. The main new piece is in the outside the Balkans section with my 28mm Punic Wars armies. The Carthaginians were my first proper wargames army, although I was somewhat shocked to calculate that this was some 40 years ago.

Those Garrison figures have long been sold off and replaced with a bit of a mixture of figures and units gradually picked up or painted when the mood took me over the last ten years or so.

These Spanish foot are some of the best. 

and these Libiyan spearmen are not bad. Later additions from the 1st Corps range I think.

I suppose we have to show some miserable Romans as well........

Spanish Civil War using FoW

Thank goodness for the Xmas holidays and a chance to get some figures onto the tabletop.

Had my first serious effort at playing Flames of War using my new Spanish Civil War armies. A fairly simple scenario to start with. The International Brigade attacking a Nationalist held village, right out of Ken Loach's film. Land and Freedom for those not familiar with his SCW film.

The attack started with the T26 platoon supported by infantry advancing on the centre. The aim was to pin down the fascists while the remaining infantry platoons attacked the flanks. However, the T26's were quickly knocked out by the Italian ATGs and artillery and the infantry went to ground, so offering little distraction. The right flank did reach the hill and I therefore tried out the assault rules. But the Nationalists were too strong. Heavy Machine Guns are very effective!

I really like the rules. The mechanisms work well, fairly simple once you work through the sections in the right order. The SCW has few of the later complications so I haven't had to tackle many of the annexes. I am playing a larger game at the club on Sunday so we will see how that goes.

Austrian WW1 Hussars

Bit of a fill in job this. I picked these Hussars up from the Geordies at Under the Bed Enterprises in the Summer to strengthen the Austrians for my Salonika project. These figures from their Reiver Castings range, are a bit more slender than many 28mm, but others would say more proportional. Either way I like them.

I went for early war uniforms albeit with the grey linen shako covers. Probably stretching it a bit, even for early 1916, but the later uniforms are very drab and a bit of colour was needed. These lads wouldn't look out of place on a Napoleonic battlefield!

There were 16 Hussar regiments at the outset of the war. However, remounts became scarce as the war progressed and a number of regiments were dismounted. I used the fine colour plate in the Osprey MAA 392 as my reference.

Somerled

A bit more work completed on the Lord of the Isles project. 

I have re-read Andrew McDonald's book on the subject. This is a more academic study that discusses the sources for what we know of Somerled and his life. The sum total is not very much. A bit disappointing in one respect, but for the wargame point of view it gives a bit more license!

On the Bargarran battle scenario I am planning, he concludes that the cause of the conflict was probably conservative opposition to the expanding Anglo-Norman fiefs in the West of Scotland. Their Lords, knights and castles would have been viewed with increasing unease by Somerled and other rulers on the western seaboard. He therefore views the battle as a pre-emptive strike against the expanding Stewarts.

This author argues for two possible sites for the battle. Landing at Renfrew and a battle at Knock. Or a landing at Greenock and a battle at Inchinnan. However, there is no firm evidence for either but we know the broad area.

On the figure front I now have a Somerled. Of course we have no idea what he looked like, so I have gone for the Gripping Beast representation of Ragnar Lothbrok, with some conversion.

British in Egypt

And the final units (for now at least) for the British in Egypt project. I now have a balanced force for Black Powder. The Highlanders are plastic Victrix rebased from a purchase on EBay. The Generals and artillery are Front Rank. 

You would never guess I photographed these outside in several inches of snow!



Kosovo 1448

There is an excellent article in this month's Wargames Illustrated by John Bianchi on the second, and less well known, Battle of Kossovo in 1448.  John is the primary author of the WAB supplement Vlad the Impaler that I, and fellow WAB players at GDWS, gave some modest assistance with.

Unlike in the first battle of 1389, the Serbian leadership remained loyal to the Ottomans and it was left to the Hungarian's led by Janos Hunyadi, with Wallachian support, to do battle on the Field of Blackbirds. The plan was to join up with the Albanian leader Scanderbeg, but the Ottomans moved quickly to bring the Hungarians to battle before the Albanians arrived. They were only a day's march away.  Despite being outnumbered Hunyadi nearly pulled off a famous victory. However, it was Sultan Murad who triumphed and the Christian cause in the Balkans was on the defensive for the next 250 years.

The battlefield today, not surprisingly as the monuments were built by Serbia, focus on the earlier battle. But you can still get a good view of where the action took place as can be seen from the pictures on Balkan Military History.

John's article is well illustrated with 28mm figures from a number of ranges including the fine Kingmaker war wagons that represent the wagonburg in the Hungarian centre. He also presents a scenario for WAB that I look forward to trying out soon. We have done the slightly later Vaslui 1475 as a display game. It was fought in the fog, in case your wondering!

Siege

This is the first novel from Jack Hight and is based on the siege of Constantinople in 1453.

The book weaves the story of Sultan Mehmed, Longo the Genoese commander of the city's defences and some love interest with the Princess Sofia. The author keeps fairly close to the historical events whilst developing the characters in the best traditions of historical fiction.

He also adds to the history a range of plots and conspiracies that make the story much more than a retelling of the famous siege, epic though that was in its own right.

This is a great read and I look forward to more by this author. His current project is a trilogy about Saladin.
 

British in Egypt

Working hard to finish a few projects before Xmas so I can do some gaming rather than painting.

The British in Egypt army is close to completion, or at least a balanced force. The latest addition is a regiment of Light Dragoons and a unit of riflemen. I picked up most of the rifles at a show and the rest are Front Rank along with the cavalry. Artillery, Generals and few more Highlanders still on the workbench.

Viking vignette

Done a bit more on the Vikings for the Lord of the Isles project.

Firstly I have read Magnus Magnusson's book Vikings!. I picked up my copy from my local Oxfam bookshop for £2.99, that really is a bargain! This is a sympathetic study as you might expect from an Icelander, validly pointing that they got a bad press from Saxon monks. Dark Age spin doctors it would appear. It is a well illustrated book and very strong on archaeological evidence in particular.

Inspired, I have finished one of Gripping Beasts stunning vignettes. Nor sure Magnus would approve of this. Obviously the boys at the Beast have been taken in by the spin doctors!

Maida 1806

I have been working through my reserve book pile in anticipation of an xmas restocking, he says with a broad hint to the nearest and dearest. The Battle of Maida 1806 - Fifteen Minutes of Glory by Richard Hopton is a book I bought some time ago. It covers Sir John Stuart's British victory in southern Italy over a French army commanded by General Regnier. 

The year is 1806 and the Third Coalition is falling apart after Napoleon's victories at Ulm and Austerlitz. The British are forced to abandon southern Italy, the mainland portion of King Ferdinand II's Kingdom of the Two Sicilies. Napoleon's brother Joseph is installed as King and Ferdinand and the British retreat to Sicily.

Taking Sicily is a much more difficult task for the French. The roads to the launch ports for an invasion through Calabria are almost non-existent and the French are harassed by the Calabrians. The Royal Navy rules the waves following Trafalgar. With his base reasonably secure Sir John Stuart decides on a spoiling expedition and lands near Maida in the Bay of St Euphemia with a small army of around 4000 men.

General Regnier gathers his somewhat larger force together on the high ground above the Bay. As Stuart decides to advance, Regnier, who had a poor opinion of British troops following his contact with them in Egypt, also decided to attack and came down to the plain. His best Brigade was shot up by disciplined musketry and artillery and the others lost heart. The British had no cavalry to effectively follow up but still mopped up the French garrisons in Calabria.

So a famous if modest victory, indeed the only victory that year, achieved for once by the army. Sicily was secured as a British base in the Med.  Despite this the battle is not well known, unless you live in Maida Vale!

The book is well written and gives a full background to the battle and the consequences. The battle itself is interesting in so far as it is likely that the French fought in line and were still beaten by disciplined British firepower. A prelude to the successes of the Peninsular War.

Bulgarian Legion

Latest figures off the workbench are not from one of my current projects. They are 28mm Bulgarian Legion figures from the Russo-Turkish War.

These are from a new range by Outpost Miniatures. I first saw them at the Claymore show in the summer, when their stall was next to our display game. There is a mouthwatering vignette with their display. I resisted them most of the day because I have this army in 15mm. However, one my my pals, in the finest tradition of the drug dealer, sucked me in by buying me a couple of packs.

I have based them as skirmish figures because I am not going to build full size armies. Famous last words!

Bulgaria at this time was part of the Ottoman Empire and the Bulgarian Legion were volunteers fighting with the Russians to liberate their country.The Legion consisted of six rifle battalions and was attached to General Gourko's flying column, tasked with capturing and holding the Shipka Pass. In an epic battle they succeeded although with heavy losses.

Siege of Khartoum

Plenty of train journeys this week because of the weather that enabled me to finish the latest John Wilcox novel, Siege of Khartoum.

This is in the Simon Fonthill series. Fonthill is an unusual Victorian character who manages to be at most of the late nineteenth century colonial campaigns, as all good heroes are of course. Unusual because the author has given his hero plenty of 21st Century values. Respecting the role of women, natives etc. If a bit incongruous it makes easier reading for a modern audience.

So here he is trying to reach Gordon in Khartoum before the Mahdi closes in. He gets captured and is rescued by his fiance and a Sudanese warrior, who are the real heroes of the book. Not quite the Four Feathers, and to put it mildly stretching credibility, but a good read none the less. 

It was all a bit predictable but saved by Wilcox's pacy style. As one reviewer put it "Boy's Own stuff".

I sold my 15mm Dervish and British armies earlier this year so I wasn't tempted back to the period with this book. Mind you the Perry's do some very nice 28mm .............

More Nationalists

These will be the last of the Nationalists, for now at least.

First we have the regular Moroccan infantry. These troops formed the backbone of the Nationalist army. Volunteer troops recruited from Berber hill tribes they were hardy and courageous soldiers.

And then a few Nationalist cavalry.

Roll on Xmas, when hopefully I will find some time to learn and adapt the rules and get these armies onto the tabletop.



India's China War

My interest is easily aroused when it comes to obscure conflicts. Whilst browsing through a second hand bookshop last year, I came across Neville Maxwell's weighty tome on the 1962 Sino/Indian conflict. It sat in my reading pile until recently.

For those not familiar with this war between the two largest countries in the world a brief summary. India's border with China runs from the Himalayas through the Karakorum Mountains - probably the highest border in the world. The precise border line had never been agreed and diplomatic attempts to settle the dispute failed after the 1960 summit between Nehru and Chou En-Lai.

In 1961 India adopted the 'forward policy' that involved a direct military challenge to China and led to the border war the following year. However, the Indian army was ill equipped for fighting a war at 16,000ft+. Lightly armed, poorly supplied troops, most in their cotton summer uniforms were sent in penny packets to confront around three Chinese divisions. When the Chinese counter attacked these units were caught in isolated positions. Heavily outnumbered they fought bravely, often to the last man, against properly equipped Chinese units, but the outcome was never in doubt. The Indian army was shattered and routed to the plains of NE India.

The book gives a very detailed account of the diplomacy and Indian internal politics that led to the conflict. The main interest for the military historian, the war itself, gets lighter treatment. The absurd Indian command structure and the frequent leadership changes in key units is described in detail, but the actual fighting could have done with a few more maps and diagrams. Whilst the book is very balanced, the author did not have access to the same level of papers for the Chinese side.

For the wargamer this conflict presents a few challenges in terms of terrain. However, for figures Korean War Chinese would probably be fine and the Indian army doesn't appear to have moved on much from WW2.

Overall this book is hard going, but if you want a detailed understanding of this conflict, this is the book for you.