2015 - A Review

The year started off promisingly enough, kinda tailed off a lot and then re-ignited at the end. Which was nice.

January
Ten posts. Two about a Mexican Revolution game and the rest were Pulps: figures and buildings.


February
Five posts. One post about my birthday the balance about Pulps.


March
Five posts. A book review; a trip to a wargames show; three Pulps including an actual game!


April
Nine posts. A trip to Salute; Pulps including The Lighthouse of Horror & new blog members.


May - November
Pretty much this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CUCLNPOjPZw

To be fair I did do some painting, modelling and wargaming during this period but the CBA was strong in me.

December
The return of The Mojo!

Six posts (including this one). Two about Iraqi forces in 1941; a book 'review' and two Pulps.

I'm glad I came back, the welcome has been 100% positive. Also flattered that my 81 followers stayed loyal during the hiatus plus views of the blog continued to go up despite lack of new content.

UATH!

Book Review - Famous By My Sword

In this book Singleton examines the role of the Royalist general the Marquess of Montrose in the British Civil War during 1644-1645. The author argues convincingly that this army, rather than being one that comprised
only Scots Highlanders, was composed of well-trained, skilfully led and highly motivated troops. Troops who were, above all, professional. He shows that Montrose's army used the latest battlefield techniques which gave it success after success. The myth of Highland charges carrying all before them in bloody rout is turned upon its head completely.

That the Covenanting armies set against him were not of the highest quality is not the fault of Montrose. In a series of battle descriptions the author shows that time and time again professional troops triumph over amateurs. This is not to say the Covenanting troops were all duds. Their best trained and led men were fighting in England at the time. In fact Scots troops, specifically lancers, brought about the Royalist collapse at Marston Moor battle.

The book also contains a number of colour plates. These are uniformly excellent and include several photographs of present day interpreters clad in authentic costumes.I felt these photographs were the highlight in a book that is excellent throughout. The appendix is a fascinating collection of first-hand accounts of the battles of Tippermuir, Aberdeen, Auldearn, Inverlochy. The first-hand accounts conclude with a description of Montrose's final defeat at Kilsyth. A defeat brought about by a lack of Royalist regulars versus large numbers of professional Covenanting troops returned from England.

In conclusion I enjoyed reading this book immensely. The author proves his case that professional, disciplined troops made up the bulk of Montrose's army and that the Scots Highlanders, despite the national myth, were useful only in the pursuit of an already smashed enemy.

UATH!

Book Review - 'Uncharitable Mischief'

'Uncharitable Mischief: Barbarity & Excess In The British Civil Wars' by Charles Singleton

The author of this fine booklet has achieved something quite brilliant. Firstly he makes it clear that the British Civil War was, like all other civil wars, extremely brutal. Given the Victorian mythology which has been caked over the War this is no mean feat. Singleton uses referenced case studies to show how, after the initial enthusiasm waned post Edgehill, several areas of the country became the victims of soldiers who were no more than gangsters.

The second part of the book looks at the New Model Army's campaign in Ireland. Again this part of the War is layered with myth and controversy. Singleton does an excellent job of showing us how the NMA actually operated and that Oliver was a real person and not a bloodthirsty mass-murderer. It is often, conveniently, forgotten that Cromwell was under the orders of The Parliament and worked within the existing Laws of War.

A well referenced and extremely readable work. I recommend this book as an excellent introduction to the truth about the BCW.

PS I discovered that this book is also available on The Pike & Shot Society sales page. About half way down.

Link to the original review page. 

UATH!

2014 - End Of Year Review

I have seen this done better on other chumrades' blogs but felt my own contribution would be an amusing diversion. Take the most popular post from each month of 2013 and publish a pic and a short write-up. At least I don't have a hangover and am looking at 2014 as a great big adventure.

January

The most popular post of this month was one on the Red Army for Megablitz. My first attempt at building such a unit, but not the last.

February

The Birmingrad Motor Repair Facility Number 1 starred this month. A post about reclaiming toy trucks from the scrapyard for use by the Glorious Red Army in Megablitz.

March

The Soviet run of wins was broken this month by two detectives from the Toy Town Police Force. I still haven't played a game of Geezers-Shuttit! despite having all the bits to do so. Think I'll sort this out in '14.

April

Soviets reclaim the top spot with this post and, to be honest, this post and the work associated with it is a personal favourite of mine. Much guns. Such boom. Wow!

May

The most popular post (MPP) for May was another Megablitz offering. This serious assemblage of hardware. Finishing it nearly put me off for good as did some of the comments on TMP. The good news is I rode out the storm, with some helpful advice, and all was well.

June

Tarbooshia! Tarbooshia!! TARBOOSHIA!!! Everyone loves camels. Right? Well in June '14 they certainly did.

July

A wargame, an actual wargame was MPP for July. Set in The Mexican Revolution and played solo with Struggle Against Everybody And Everything, I remember it being really good fun. Must do it again soon!

August

More Megablitz related fun this month with the MPP being about this splendid little anti-tank gun!

September

Megablitz again! Anyone would think I was being paid a retainer......So, September's MPP is one about the 7th Armoured Division in its Western Desert Force incarnation. Again the models were great fun to build and paint and I am justifiably proud of the results.

October

I didn't post a single thing in October.

November

Back on track for this month. The MPP here was, by some distance, my take on The Western Desert Force

December

The second of the two games that made MPP this year. First time I've played Hordes of the Things in ages but despite making some daft errors with troop placements and the rules it was an immensely enjoyable game. It hung in the balance right to the end despite the absolute hoofing The Peasants' Revolt chaps had received. More please in 2014!

Conclusions: carry on painting and building but PLAY MORE GAMES!

Thanks for reading and all the best to you and yours for 2014 and the future.

Blog's First Anniversary (Official)

I set the blog up in mid-August 2012 but I didn't 'go live' until 31st August with this post. Since then I've made 158 posts on various subjects but mostly of a wargaming nature. Some posts which I was certain would be surefire winners were not as warmly received, in terms of views, as I imagined they would be. Others which I believed were a bit iffy were big hits. I've learned a lot over the year in terms of presentation of posts and from advice from other bloggers, some of whom have been inspirational. That compliment, of being inspirational, has been paid to me on a number of occasions which was really wonderful.

I have also made a lot of friends through the blog. In fact I have a worldwide audience now; some of my new friends I will almost certainly never meet but that's ok. Others have become friends in real life and they have introduced me to new ways of playing wargames. One thing about blogging I really love is the free exchange of ideas and information and the general decency of everyone.

After literally no requests for information I thought I'd do a top ten posts for the year. Some of them, as I said above, were a genuine surprise. So here we go:

Meaningless Stat #1: 158 posts & 402 comments = 2.5 comments per post.

Top ten posts by views 
10=. Outskirts of Menton 1940 100 views
10=. The Buildings of Vim Fuego 100 views
8. B'ham Toy Soldier Fair 107 views
7=. New Stuff 121 views
7=. Tarboosh Music 121 views
5. Recce Time 129 views
4. USN Pre-Dreadnoughts 149 views
3. For Sale 183 views
2. The Peasants' Revolt 216 views
1. The Army of The Nutcracker.224 views

Some of these posts are from way back when but not all of them. It will be interesting to see what makes this list in a year's time because some of the newer posts are rapidly approaching three figures.

I have 44 followers who are all stout-hearted chaps & chapettes who clearly like(??- Editor.) what I do. But the view count on the blog is now almost 22,000 and there is no way they could have done all that by themselves. I decided to do another top ten but this time by world audience and this really brought home to me the global nature of what we all do.

Meaningless Stat #2: 402 Comments & 44 Followers = 9.13 comments per follower. (This is made up like most stats. See British Government for details)

Top ten audience by views
10. France 190
9. Spain 215
8. Canada 222
7. Finland 262
6. New Zealand 592
5. Germany 766
4. Australia 1042
3. Russia 1113
2. USA 5175
1. UK 9658

Which is pretty much what you'd expect but it is nice to see I'm becoming a bit of an underground hit in China, Poland, Pakistan and Latvia!

Meaningless Stat #3: 22,132 Page Views & 402 Posts = 55 Views per post.

Right! That's enough boring bloody statistics. Sorry if I've put anyone to sleep with this drivel; normal service will be resumed shortly.

UATH!

Book Review: 'War Correspondents'

I recently acquired a copy of this book. I got it from a remaindered bookshop for £3

It is a hardback, with dust-jacket and it's large. Very large, so much so with four legs it would make a fine side-table. I'm not going to do that, it's far too good for that. The book is 593 pages of photographic journalism dating from the Crimean War to the Libya Civil War of 2011. The colossal scale of the book allows it to cover all of the conflicts in between: major and minor. Images from the Russo-Japanese War are fascinating and include some pictures taken during combat by Italian journo Lorenzo D'Adda. The collection of images from the Spanish Civil War are also of a high standard including one of an International Brigader leaping into a shell hole as an ME109 passes overhead. Wherever possible the photographs are credited which is itself interesting since war photographers are generally unknown or unremembered.

The book is a fascinating collection of action shots, group photographs and posed pictures. Its great breadth means that it can only give a sketch of any given war but what a sketch it gives! I rate it highly as a wargaming and information resource. But be warned, the photography does not flinch. There are numbers of pictures of the victims of atrocities as well as the battle dead and the maimed.

Here's a sample of the photographs in the book:

Front Cover

Russo-Japanese War - Troops attacking

Captured British International Brigaders

Legionary of The Spanish Foreign Legion in Teruel

A Damaged U-Boat & A Spitfire on HMS Vindex

War Correspondents

Published by Scala

ISBN: 978-88-87090-74-1

All the best!