ALY MORRISON'S "BUTTERFLY" ADVENTURES IN THE WORLD OF WARGAMES AND TOY SOLDIERS

Thursday 31 January 2019

The War of Spanish Succession... Cadogan's Regiment of horse.

Hurrah! Hurrah!... My second unit of British Horse...


Cadogan's...


They were first raised by Charles Talbot the 1st Duke of Shrewsbury as the Duke of Shrewsbury's Regiment of Horse in 1685...They became Cadogan's in 1703.
Renamed...
The 2nd Regiment of Horse in 1751,
The 5th Regiment of Dragoon Guards in 1788,
The 5th (the Princess Charlotte of Wales's) Regiment of Guards Dragoon in 1804 ,
The 5th ( Princess Charlotte of Wales's) Dragoon Guards in 1823,
And finally merging with The Inniskillings (6th Dragoons) to form the 5th/6th Dragoons in 1922.

They fought at Blenheim, Ramillies and Malplaquet.


Another nice colour combination of Red and Green...








Coats... Citadel... Evil Sunz Scarlet.
Facings... Foundry... Forest Green 26B.
Belts... Foundry... Buff Leather 7B.
White bits... Citadel... Pallid Wych Flesh.
Wooden bits... Citadel... Mournfang Brown.


Osprey's Marlborough's Army 1702-1711 gives the braid as silver... I wasn't sure about painting them in a 'bright' metal colour so I mixed in some white to tone it down... I am rather pleased with the final effect.


The horses were painted the same way as I did Lumley's.


The standard was again home made based on Robert Halls uniform plate... available from The Pike and Shot Society...
http://www.pikeandshotsociety.org/


The miniatures are as always Front Rank...
https://www.frontrank.com/product-category/18th-century/spanish-succession/
The paints are Citadel...
https://www.games-workshop.com/en-GB/Painting-Modelling
The Army Painter...
https://shop.thearmypainter.com/products.php?ProductGroupId=21
And Wargames Foundry
https://www.wargamesfoundry.com/collections/paint
Bases from Warbases...
https://warbases.co.uk/?product_cat=premier-bases-metric




All the best   Aly


























































Tuesday 29 January 2019

The War of Spanish Succession... Wyndham's Regiment of Horse.





One more cavalry unit finished...


Wyndham's Regiment of Horse...


They were first raised in 1685 as Lord Lumley's Regiment of Horse... later renamed The Queen Dowager's Regiment of Horse.
1692 they became The King's Regiment of Carabineers commanded by Hugh Wyndham.
1740 His Majesty's 1st Regiment of Carabiniers.
1756 3rd Regiment of Horse (Carabiniers).
1788 6th Regiment of Dragoon Guards.
1826 6th Regiment of Dragoon Guards (Carabiniers)
1922 The regiment was amalgamated with The 3rd Dragoon Guards to become The 3rd/6th Dragoon Guards.


They fought at Blenheim and Ramillies...


The facings are described as Sea Green...  not the easiest colour to define...
In the end I chose to use Foundry Teal Blue shade 24A which does look very nice with the red of their coats...










Coats... Citadel... Evil Sunz Scarlet.
Facings... Foundry... Teal Blue shade 24A
Belts... Foundry... Buff Leather 7B.
White bits... Citadel... Pallid Wych Flesh.
Wooden bits... Citadel... Mournfang Brown.

Like Cadogan's these guys also have silver braid...


The horses were painted Citadel Skrag Brown and then given various washes of Army Painter Warpaints Quickshade... Strong ,Soft and Red tone until I achieved a colour that I was pleased with.


The standard was again home made based on Robert Halls uniform plate... available from The Pike and Shot Society...
http://www.pikeandshotsociety.org/


The miniatures are as always Front Rank...
https://www.frontrank.com/product-category/18th-century/spanish-succession/
The paints are Citadel...
https://www.games-workshop.com/en-GB/Painting-Modelling
The Army Painter...
https://shop.thearmypainter.com/products.php?ProductGroupId=21
And Wargames Foundry
https://www.wargamesfoundry.com/collections/paint
Bases from Warbases...
https://warbases.co.uk/?product_cat=premier-bases-metric


Yet another very pleasing cavalry unit...
I will probably paint the next two at the same time...
They are the Scots Greys and the French Grey Musketeers...
Both on Grey horses and both with a lot of red and blue in their uniform.


All the best   Aly








Sunday 27 January 2019

The War of Spanish Succesion... Lumley's Regiment of Horse.

Hurrah! my first regiment of British Horse...


Lumley's...


Originally formed as The Queens Regiment of Horse by Sir John Lanier in 1685.
After he was killed at the Battle of Steenkirk in 1692 the regiment was commanded by the Honourable Henry Lumley till 1717.
Renamed...
The King's Own Regiment of Horse in 1714,
The 1st(The King's) Dragoon Guards in 1751,
The 1st King's Dragoon Guards in 1921,
And finally merging with the Queen's Bays (2nd Dragoon Guards) in 1959 to become he 1st Queens Dragoon Guards.


They fought at Blenheim, Ramillies, Oudenarde and Malplaquet .


A lovely unit in a classic British look of Red coats and Yellow Facings.








Coats... Citadel... Evil Sunz Scarlet.
Facings... Foundry... Ochre 4B.
Belts... Foundry... Buff Leather 7B.
White bits... Citadel... Pallid Wych Flesh.
Wooden bits... Citadel... Mournfang Brown.


The horses were painted Citadel Doombull Brown and then given various washes of Army Painter Warpaints Quickshade... Strong ,Soft and Red tone until I achieved a rich dark colour that complimented the scarlet coats.


The standard was home made based on Robert Halls uniform plate... available from The Pike and Shot Society...
http://www.pikeandshotsociety.org/


I am not entirely happy with the definition on the cypher and crowns but I am very pleased with the colour.


The miniatures are as always Front Rank...
https://www.frontrank.com/product-category/18th-century/spanish-succession/
The paints are Citadel...
https://www.games-workshop.com/en-GB/Painting-Modelling
The Army Painter...
https://shop.thearmypainter.com/products.php?ProductGroupId=21
And Wargames Foundry
https://www.wargamesfoundry.com/collections/paint
Bases from Warbases...
https://warbases.co.uk/?product_cat=premier-bases-metric


All the best   Aly


Any errors in my potted history are of course Wikipedia's...











Thursday 24 January 2019

Yet another new book...




This arrived in the post today...




Armies and Enemies of Louis XIV... By my chum Mark Allen.


This lovely little book has been developed from a series of articles that Mark wrote for Wargames Illustrated way back in the 1990's (Gosh how time flies)...
It is also illustrated by the man himself and I must say it is really nice to have all that delightful artwork in one place.
Well written and informative... Nice one Mark, I look forward to volume 2.


All the best   Aly

Tuesday 22 January 2019

A New Book... But no new temptation...

Because I am already there...


Uniforms and Flags of the Armies of Hanover, Celle and Brunswick. 1670-1715.
By... Robert Hall.






This arrived in the post today....


Another splendid book care of the Pike and Shot Society and Robert Hall.


There are some lovely uniforms and delightful flags...


My intentions are to keep working on the British and French cavalry...


But there are some lovely uniforms and delightful flags...


I will resist this major temptation...


But there are some lovely uniforms and delightful flags...


Fortunately within the War of Spanish Succession... so, in my mind it wont count as butterfly behaviour...


There are some lovely uniforms and delightful flags...


I promise that I will finish the cavalry first....   Honest.


You can get this and many other Robert Hall books from...


http://www.pikeandshotsociety.org/


All the best... hmmm!... lovely flags... Aly

Sunday 20 January 2019

From my side of the table... The Second Battle of Porto 1809

Greetings...


This was my last battle of 2018 and in my opinion one of the greatest defeats I have had (and yes I have had a few).


The game was hosted by Alan Perry
Michael Perry and Adrian Shepherd took the command of the international forces of oppression.
I took the part of the forces of equality fraternity and liberty.


Alan explained to me my 'challenging French dilemma'


"You are going to loose"... nothing new there then... "your challenge should you wish to accept it is to get as much of the baggage and men as possible off the table "


This isn't going to end well... is it?




A beautiful peaceful morning on the banks of the Douro...




Shattered by the onslaught of a mob of beer, gin and rum drinking yobs... our yobs are much more refined ... wine and brandy.






My men are eventually aroused from their innocent slumber... and the baggage train containing tourist souvenirs, landscape paintings, wine, brandy, some delightful white port and a few specialist artistic etchings belonging to Marshal Soult start to slowly... very slowly... move out.





As more of the enemy approach, the boat guards attempt to discourage them... I think I made some very scary splashes in the water.





Oh! what a surprise... a blunder... and there they are racing past the baggage... which is moving at almost zero miles an hour...




The first of the enemy hordes hit the beach...




The boat guards decide to beat a hasty retreat... one of them may have accidently dropped some lit matches on the way out...




Here we see the baggage train and its 'escort'... not moving.
I managed to 'not move' quite a lot...
The forces of darkness, oppression and reaction moved a lot...




My biggest move of the game... the intention was to turn onto the beach and force the enemy back into the sea... you can see their flank being covered by my only other unit to move that turn.




Yup!... still there... maybe they are saving themselves for the 'big push'.




Michael's forces arrive and threaten my isolated brigade...




Adrian's troops begin to make their way off the beach...




I manage to form my men into a defensive chevron...




As the baggage train wanders towards the edge of the table, Michael waits to intercept them... he had better be patient.



Now these hussars may look dashing... but they are merely meandering...



Some of my men actually move forwards as the enemy start to leap from the beach onto the seminary hill...




My men fight bravely against insurmountable odds... and really terrible dice!




My cavalry attack Michaels cavalry in an attempt to keep the escape route open...




Unfortunately a bizillion more men have landed on the beach and prepare to leap forwards...



Michaels men are momentarily halted by beautiful French uniforms...



Unfortunately the pressure continues to build from Adrian...



As you can see the baggage train shows absolutely no urgency...




Adrian's massed phalanx's make contact with the rear of the baggage...



All control breaks down as a Mexican wave of surrendering arms are raised across the army...



Seeing the writing on the wall...



Marshal Soult shoves his specialist artistic etchings into his saddle bags and does a runner...


Only the Marshal and two cavalry units made it off the table....


At this point Adrian and Michael almost went to war with each other as they tried to grab as much loot as possible... I have no doubt that the delicious white port was simply wolfed down without understanding the subtleties of  its flavour... sigh!


This was a really enjoyable game... I was never going to win... but I should have lost a lot less.
My dice throwing was truly terrible...Michael and Adrian's on the other hand was spectacular... it seemed that for every single bound I got ... they got three!


Great company and lovely toys... what more could one ask for...


Victory?


A more glorious sounding version of this tale can be found here...


https://en-gb.facebook.com/perryminiatures/posts/1863932437062187?__tn__=K-R


All the best   Aly

Sunday 13 January 2019

Campaign Pictures... Leipzig.

Greetings...


So here are some of the pictures I took during the Leipzig campaign that Alan Perry ran just over a year ago...


https://en-gb.facebook.com/perryminiatures/posts/1408286899293412?__tn__=K-R


I... General Malchanceux...




Handsome or what...


Spent most of the campaign miraculously manoeuvring between hordes of enemies ...until...


The Battle of Fuchshain...




Our glorious leader General Riclue with his glamorous assistant prepare for battle ...




I am prepared...




The forces of darkness arrive...




Brace yourselves mes enfant...





Oooo! there is rather a lot of them...




Let me escort you to somewhere safe...



Hmmmm!... That really is a lot of reactionary devil worshipers...



You may need some help assisting this young lady...




Yup!... They all appear to be attacking me...





Some examples of my magnificent dice throwing...


A double 6 is of course a blunder in Black Powder...




And when it was pretty much over... the Prussians turned up...




It was a really enjoyable campaign... I found it quite intense trying to make my way towards my comrades while daily being informed how close the forces of darkness were near to me...


My final report in my rather badly kept journal states...


The Battle Of Fuchshain...


Attacked by overwhelming forces...


Austrian, British, Hanoverian, Dutch Belgian, Prussian, Dalek, Martian and Zombie...


Forced to retreat with high casualties...




All the best   Aly