Enthused by El Alamein

Enthused by anniversaries of El Alamein and Tobruk, memories of growing up in South Africa with stories from veterans that had been "Up North". A cousin's farm was even called Tobruk. These battles left an indelible mark on the psyche of the ANZAC and South African soldiers, who took part in the desperate defence of Tobruk and the First Battle of El Alamein in 1941, and the Second battle of El Alamein in 1942.

My first wargaming teeth were also cut on these battles, using Lionel Tarr and Donald Featherstone's rules. I have since repainted a lot of my armour to reflect the European theatre of war, only to now again become gripped by the Desert War.

Painting these guys in the desert khaki rather than the jungle green

Desert Khaki here too, and some conversion to represent Sikh or Punjab soldiers

I obtained a (rather large) box of 8th Army, Australian and Gurka troops off trademe (Ebay equivalent in NZ) and started painting these up. Decided to honour the memory of the Anzacs and S.African Brigade, and also to throw in a few Indian to flesh out a mostly colonial battle-force.The standard Matchbox 8th Army does form the core of this force. Another work in progress...

Historical Battles

The next 3 years will see the 70th Anniversary of some of history's most significant battles 

(Certainly from a WW2 Wargamer's point of view.)

Battles that have proved decisive as turning points in history, made great and famous generals, and ruined others. Battles that may have gone differently, if supreme commanders had not not interfered, if better lines of supply been available, if, if, if...

(Now that was a V for victory sign, wasn't it?)

The stuff that wargames are made of...The variables, the role of luck, the role of fate, the role of intelligence, the role of the weather, the role of...you know!

20th Century warfare's decisive land battles loom ahead, starting with the 2nd Battle of El Alamein.

Many wargamers are already getting ready for Kursk, the greatest tank battle ever!

I have purposely themed my repaint and expension of German Armoured Forces so that they will do for the North African, Italian and Eastern Fronts.

Get Ready, El Alamein is at hand!

More Militaria Gems

A few more Gems I acquired in the last month through the generosity of others:

Reference works with amazing detail and information on uniforms

Collectable Wargaming Rules and Manuals

I was fortunate to have recently been the recipient of a treasure trove of Militaria and Wargaming books.

 Among these were these two gems:

Perry's Wargaming rules for 54mm Miniatures

Probably considered too large a scale for most of today's wargamers, but ground breaking at the time (1977)

Blast from the past

I have been rearranging my book collection lately, having recently been donated some wargaming and military history gems.

I was introduced to wargaming in the late 1970s, by my friend Barry van Wyk. His father, the late Phillip van Wyk, was a keen wargamer, and at the time refighting the WW2 Desert War in North Africa, fielding an Allied Army (British 8th Army)

We were allowed access (as teenagers) to his prized books and 1/72 models, including the rules used at the time from Featherstone's Wargames  and Advanced Wargames, including those for airborne operations, published in 1977

Sometimes I wonder about all those Allied models that appeared in Barry and Hugo's Armies, and if Phillip knew that they were at times residing on the games table at our house to counter my growing passion for the Wehrmacht.

I trust Barry and Hugo (his brother) have preserved Phillip's collection of militaria and literature including the rule books.Of particular interest in one of these books by Lionel Tar and Donald Featherstone was a picture of Phillip umpiring a re-fight of the battle of Waterloo at the South African museum, captioned "South African wargamers refighting the Battle of Waterloo" or something to that effect. Napoleon won on that occasion.

These are the covers of the books that we used at the time:

(I don't have actual copies, unfortunately, other than the Complete Wargaming )

"War Games" is the book I cut my wargaming teeth on

Followed by this one once we'd mastered the basics of Featherston and Tarr's rules.

Both books had been liberated from Phillip van Wyk's collection, and lived at our house for weeks and months on end, where the two of us had built a landscaped gaming table. 

Philllip's sand box was probably a more suitable set of terrain than our first attempt.
Barry and I thought it a good idea to build a great big paper mache mountain in one corner.
This took weeks to dry, and left us with well on an  eighth of our gaming table only useful for mountain troops. I found it particularly a hazard to my Falschirmjaeger.

I did build a V1 installation up there on the Mountain once, (A modified 1/100 Kawasaki Hien) but Barry only allowed me to use it for one game. Funny that. I felt the same about his M40 SP  Howitzer.
So I got a Jagdtiger with my next pocket money. The arms race was on.

We got this volume from the local public library. 

I think I may hold the record for the most successive renewals of any book in their collection ever !

The ideas in this book got me going, given what an important role the rail system played during WWII. 

We could never afford to play any rail based games as teenagers. The Lima and Hornby  train sets that were for sale then were way out of the reach of our thin wallets; and no-one was parting with theirs second-hand.I particularly lusted after Lima's "Leopold" Rail Gun. 

I'm living out that childhood desire now, having recently acquired a train set off Trade Me (NZ equivalent of Ebay) that is just great for the purpose. 

No Leopold as yet though, as nice as it is, it is only good for a  scenario in a table-top WW2 game.

We have had one rail-head skirmish battle at the Kapiti Wargames Club so far, set in the desert. 

Wonderful thing, disposable income at last...

 This book is still on my shelf:

I believe Donald Featherstone is in his 90s (if he is still alive.) Thanks Donald, wherever you are; and all of those gamers that came before (and after) you, that have made wargaming such an absorbing and enjoyable hobby!

Of Cabbages and Kings: Gotta brag a little

"The time has come, the Walrus said, to talk of many things:

 Of ships, and shoes, and sealing wax

Of cabbages and kings..."

Have to brag a little, know this has absolutely nothing to do with wargaming, but my wife's catering company, PartyPerfect, catered for the Prime Minister of New Zealand yesterday.

Link:

PartyPerfect Catering Blog

Puma Days

Puma Days

Puma Days or Puma Daze?

Still building up my Summer WW2 German 1/72 Force. 

Refurbished an old Matchbox SdKfz 234/2 puma, and built and painted an Italeri Kit.

At the weekend I obtained a turret-less 234 matchbox body at the KWC swap meet, that I intend to convert to a 234/1 command vehicle. The body has already been undercoated in grey, and I'm working on the open top turret. The two 234/2s with the 50mm gun in the turret have already been painted in the grey/dark green camo of the rest of my force and given a wash or two to weather them.

It was a strange sense of familiarity to hold the Matchbox kit and box in my hands again after 30-odd years. Funny how the brain works...

Quite a difference in size between the two kits. The matchbox may actually be 1/76. 

Lower on it's chassis too (But maybe that's just that my modeling skills have improved over 30 years)

Someone else's interpretation of the 234/1 to inspire my scratch-building the turret.

The difference between the 234/1 and 234/2 (FoW models 1/100)

Wiki info: The combat experience of the existing 8-wheeled armoured cars during the German invasions of Poland and France, indicated some deficiencies in the current design. Therefore, in August 1940 an improvement program was started, based on a new set of requirements learned from these combat experiences. The result was the SdKfz 234.

Developed from the Büssing-NAG SdKfz 232, design of the Sd Kfz 234 began in 1940. It was to have a monocoque chassis with eight wheels, like its predecessors, and an air cooled engine for use in North Africa.

Chassis were built by Büssing-NAG in Leipzig-Wahren, while armoured bodies were provided by Deutsche Edelstahlwerke of Krefeld and turrets by Daimler Benz in Berlin-Marienfelde andSchichau of Elbing, with engines from Ringhoffer-Tatra-Werke AG of Nesseldorf.

[edit]

Potracted engine development meant the desert campaign was over before the 234 arrived, but it nevertheless proved useful on the Eastern and Western Fronts.It was quite formidable, but not many were built before it was replaced by the simpler 234/1, with a 20mm gun, in 1944.

[edit]Variants

SdKfz 234/3 with 75 mm L/24

234/4 with 75 mm L/46

There were four main variants.

• 234/1 - 1 x 2 cm KwK 30 L/55 autocannon, 1 x MG34 Machinegun. This design featured an open-topped turret. Around 200 were produced.

• 234/2 "Puma" - 1 x 5 cm KwK 39 L/60, 1 x MG34. Employed a fully enclosed turret originally designed for the VK1602 Leopard light tank. The turret front was protected by 30 mm armor set at an angle of 20° from the vertical. The sides and rear had 10 mm armor set at 25°, and the top plate was 10 mm armor. The gun mantlet was rounded and was 40 to 100 mm thick. 101 were produced between September 1943 and September 1944.

• 234/3 - 1 x 7.5 cm K51 L/24 in open-topped superstructure replacing the turret. 88 built between June and December, 1944.

• 234/4 "Pakwagen" - 1 x 7.5 cm PaK 40 L/48 in open-topped superstructure replacing the turret. 89 built between December 1944 and March 1945.