1:2400 scratchbuild: Barbaros Hayreddin

My latest project has been inspired by two excellent posts on TMP:

1. An alternate history of the Ottoman and Greek naval build up in the years leading up to WW1 by Leadhead PhD: The War thet Never Was - The Greek-Ottoman War of 1914
2. The inspiring (to the point of being intimidating!) scratchbuilding of some 1:2400 pre-drednoughts by Austerlitz06 on TMP.

I wanted to try my hand at a little 1:2400 scratch building and have become increasingly interested in the naval actions of the Balkan Wars leading up to WW1.

As well as the 'what if' scenario around a wider Ottoman-Greek naval conflict, the plan is to build the necessary ships for some naval actions from the First Balkan War. Such as the Battle of Elli (16 December 1912) - an Ottoman defeat in the mouth of the Dardanelles - and the Battle of Lemnos (18 January 1913 - the Ottoman Empire's last ditch effort to regain supremacy in the Aegean by breaking the Greek blockade of the Dardanelles.

OOB for the Battle of Elli (with thanks to the Age of Steam and Coal)

OOB for the Battle of Lemnos (with thanks to the Age of Steel and Coal and Steel)

A quick trip to the model train store for a selection of PVC sheet, and I was in business. My first attempt was the Ottoman pre-dead, the Barbaros Hayreddin - a Brandenberg Class battleship of the Impreial German Navy (1890) sold to the Ottoman Empire in 1910.

My first attempt at 1:2400 scratchbuilding is not in the league off Austerlitz06's work, but I'm pleased with how it's shaping up.

Now, there is nothing like a photo of a miniature to show up its short comings!

The tube used for the funnels is too big and the wire for the main gun barrels is similarly a little too thick. This comes from wanting to finish the first one with available materials rather than holding out for the right stock. That said, I'm quite happy of the look of the masts - made from the 'teeth' of a fine hair comb.

The yards for each mast are next, then lifeboats and the secondary guns in the casements.

Perhaps I'm quietly declaring my bias by building the Ottoman Barbaros Hayreddin first! The Torgut Reis next!

Adobe buildings and some naval gaming from the Tin Shed

At last the Easter long weekend has come and a chap can spend more time in his tin shed!

Having the opportunity now to use larger war gaming tables brings with it the need to increase my terrain holdings. The first project was to construct some more Adobe dwellings (in 15mm) to bulk out my villages for ITLSU.

A few simple cork buildings and the corner towers for a Ottoman fort for use in Gallipoli (in particular Sedd el Bahr castle for V-Beach landings) and Middle East scenarios.

I've been using Woodland Scenics plaster cloth over the cork to give a better textured finish. Here you see the plaster laid over the roofs with the walls to follow.

With the new set-up in the shed, I've been keen to do a little naval gaming and in a moment of creativity decided to create a backdrop on canvas which I can use to improve the feel of the table. I was rather pleased with what was achieved with three acrylic colours and absolutely no pre-planning - I just mixed a few blues and greys on the fly and slapped it on. Now the base cloth looks rubbish - so that is next!

A set-up atmospheric shot of some Panzerschiffe 1:2400 ships taking advantage of the new backdrop.

Battle off Ulsan
A favourite encounter of mine (because it's the only Russo-Japanese War naval scenario I have the ships for!) is the engagement off Ulsan, Korea, in The Sea Of Japan, on 14 August 1904, 0500 Hrs.

I have played this scenario with a number of rule sets (see earlier posts), but this time I return to Coaling Stations, a set of quick play pre-dreadnaught rules by Twylite Games I keep coming back to. I really like the card mechanism for giving orders - it tends to add a little 'fog of war' to solo naval gaming.

Here's a shot of the opening salvo!

Through the light mist that persisted to midday (in this scenario) Admiral Kamimura (right) spots Admiral Iessen's Vladivostok Squadron at a distance of 3.2 nautical miles and opens fire with his 8-inch guns scoring a hit
on the Gromoboi.

I've been working on improving the way I store gaming aids on the table. I've recently transferred all my markers into old tobacco tins as I feel they give a nice feel to the table. In this case, the Capstan Old Navy Cut tobacco tin seems quite appropriate (even if it hales from 30 years after the RJ War)!

Britain Detail and Herald toy soldiers -

Ahh the nostalgia. At the market today my young fella was tugging at my shirt ... "Dad, Dad! Soldiers." He has a good eye for a vintage item and sure enough there was a rag-tag collection of the Britain's Deetail (metal base) and Britain's Herald (plastic base) toy soldiers (circa 1970s-1980s).

They were a bit worse for wear, with a few missing arms (and thus weapons - sigh) but I could not resist for nostalgic reasons alone. I had a few of these when I was a lad - Paras and Modern Brits I seem to recall. They were obtained from a school-chum whose parents were English through one of the endless rounds of 'swaps' we did as kids.

I'd love to be able to get the missing parts - very unlikely - but great to have them for nostalgic reasons alone!

Scratch built terrain for WW1 Middle East in 15mm

There is so much to love about the festive season – family (tricky relations ... maybe less so!), holidays, excellent nosh, left-overs ... and time to get stuck into wargaming projects.

The main focus of this Christmas break has been consolidating my collection of (mainly scratch built) 15mm terrain for my WW1 Sinai, Palestine and Mesopotamia gaming with TFL's If the Lord Spares Us ruleset. Rules errata and list of scenarios here.

Here is a selection of the pieces I have created so far:

1. Entrenchments and wire
I have created stands of a simple wire entanglement (see below) using copper wire coiled around a rod, glued to a base and with tooth pick uprights. A dozen of these probably took no more than an hour from start to finish - I'm happy with the overall result from that fairly minimal effort.

Barbed wire entanglements were constructed using cold copper wire (some 1.5mm electrical wire stripped of its plastic insulation).

I am planning on using a felt base mat with a combination of hex-terrain underneath the mat to create different elevations and simple multi-layer hills made of cork. Trenches will be represented using Battlefield Accessories' Hasty Entrenchments as seen in this previous post. While it would be great to have trenches dug into terrain boards, I prefer the flexibility of this arrangement.

Battlefield Accessories 'Hasty Entrenchments' - 12 per pack with each piece individual.

My reading so far suggests that strongpoints and redoubts used by the Ottoman forces in the campaign were largely limited fairly thinly wired trench systems. Bunkers were rarely used with cement being a rare resource in the desert. It's hard to discuss such defensive positions without briefly recalling Tank Redoubt - the shell of a destroyed Mark 1 tank used by the Ottoman troops as a strong point at the Second Battle of Gaza (19 April 1917) – maybe an Irregular Miniatures Mk 1 could be used for this!

Incidentally, I found an interesting (to me, at least) newspaper article about the Imperial Camel Corps (with mention of Tank Redoubt) at Second Gaza here: http://trove.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/article/92736094

2. Buildings

I have created a series of adobe buildings for villages and oasis buildings. I have used Matakishi's building technique using 6mm floor tile cork for the base structure.

This time I've experimented with improving the texturing of the outside by using a layer of Woodland Scenics plaster cloth over the cork. I find the resulting finish worth the extra effort.

I've then painted the dry plaster cloth with Vallejo Iraqui Sand, followed by a wash of dark brown and a dry brush of off white to pick up the highlights. The result, in my opinion is a very passable building that is cheap, easy to make.

3. Wadi
The dictionary definition for wadi is:

• the bed or valley of a stream in regions of southwestern Asia and northern Africa that is usually dry except during the rainy season and that often forms an oasis :  gully, wash
• a shallow usually sharply defined depression in a desert region

While some wadi that were encountered during the desert campaigns of 1915-18 were obviously of the larger type – deep ravines and valleys cut by a seasonal riverbed, these are tricky to easily represent on the tabletop.

Margin of Wady Ghuzze at Shellal, Palestine, Australian War Memorial
Source: https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/J00461/

To represent the smaller wadi that were common during this campaign, I have adopted a fairly simple dry river bed made up of textured canvas (from an old terrain mat I cut up) with gravel lining the edges. I scattered a little flock over this and gave it a solid spray with matt varnish.

Simple wadi terrain

4. Oasis
The oasis and desert wells were locations of strategic importance during this campaign – obviously, due to the limited water supplies carried by the troops. Ion Idriess, in his memoir of his time in Gallipoli, Sinai and Palestine with the 5th Australian Light Horse (The Desert Column), provides many accounts of riding considerable distances to engage the Ottoman forces with only a canteen of water to last a day or more – often shared with their horses! The accounts of infantry mad with thirst is horrible to contemplate.

The groundwork for the oasis was built up using acrylic brown mastic over a textured polystyrene sheet with gravel, flocking and some small stones around the edge. I added some dry grass tufts for a bit of character. The water is just painted at present.

This project has finally provided a use for a pack of 100 plastic palm trees purchased from a supplier on Ebay (for only a few dollars). They could do with a paint job, but don't look too bad.

5. Hills
I've opted for a simple hills made up of layers of flocked and painted 6mm cork tile in the style of those pioneered by Major General Tremorden Rederring's Colonial-era Wargames website - sadly no longer being maintained. I formed the shapes by breaking the cork sheet by hand, giving a rough edge that paints up well as exposed rock and overcomes the issue of getting miniatures to stand up on slopes.

I will also use the wooden hex terrain which I have used for Great War Spearhead II – see this previous post.

6. Terrain mat
This is still a work in progress. I'm planning on using a felt mat from a local (Melbourne, Australia) supplier of felt: http://www.jjdavies.com.au/decorative-felts

JJ Davies can provide felt in widths of up to 180cm and will cut to order. I'll provide a review once I have purchased it. I will probably use colour # 311 or 318 and may use a few patches of spray paint on it to give some variation. More to follow on this.

That's about it for now. The next step is to get to work on the mounted troops (Australian Light Horse, Imperial Camel Corps and Ottoman cavalry), artillery and some irregular Arab infantry. And, maybe some gaming! Ha ha.

Thanks for dropping by – I hope the festive season has been good to you and thanks for your support in 2015.

Dash for the oasis

With a busy end to the working year and the demands of the silly season, wargaming becomes a late night affair!

I've been dead keen to give If the Lord Spares Us a run now that I have a regiment of British infantry and the equivalent for the Ottoman Empire. However, every time I get a game set up and have done the obligatory quick re-read of the rules, it's well after midnight.

Anyway, here's a few pictures of the last attempt - abandoned after a few turns. A full British brigade was assulting an Ottoman force of two under-strength Taburs (battalions) entrenched on high ground in front of an oasis.

It's late in 1915, and the British infantry are faced with the job of carrying through the assault or being stuck without water.  A wadi snakes across the board just in front of the British deployment zone. I've included the 'Water, water!" card as a part of the deck to introduce the impact of limited water supply for the troops. This seems to have been a constant feature of the Sinai campaign.

Both Ottoman taburs were rated as 'Johnny Turks' and the assaulting British had one battalion of 'Jolly Good Fellows' (regulars) and two battalions of 'Saturday Boys'. (territorials) All units were deployed as blinds with one dummy blind added to each side.

A Turkish blind was placed on the entrenchments near the oasis in the foreground, but early British scouting only encountered patrols in the area. The advance continued in ernest.

Quickly the British infantry occupied the wadi, providing the last cover before the assault on the high ground. 

Small arms fire from Hill 175 (on the far right) caused some suppression of the British centre - but a fortunate turn up of the 'stiff upper lip' card, overcame this early reverse. 

On the British left, fire from the wadi started to tell on the defenders of Hill 150 (on the left) suppressing the defenders.

The battalion in the British Centre had orders to assault the oasis between Hill 150 and Hill 175. Poor timing by the battalion commanders (due to the order of the activations cards) resulted the centre advancing ahead the flanks. However, being the only regular battalion, they weathered the enfilade fire being directed from the high ground.

The British infantry on the left lined the dry banks of the wadi in preparation for an assault to draw fire away from the centre. By this time the 'Water, water' card was in play and the British infantry was slowed down to 8" move per turn. It would be a slow and costly advance to the Turkish trenches on Hill 175.

A sweeping view of the British Brigade awaiting the whistle's call to advance again.

At this point, I realised I'd given no thought to using my off board artillery (for either side). That was going to lead to more rule reading, and so exhaustion got the better of me and I called it a night. 

Even in these early turns, I could see the difficulties caused by assaulting fixed positions – with the Turkish machine guns able to fire on every activation.  The British MGs were largely silent having moved each turn on which the battalions were activated (thus, unable to fire). Some artillery support would have balanced up the situation, somewhat.

Summer holidays begin this week. I'm sure to get back to this scenario soon. Until we meet again, if the Lord spares us!

Tea Break!

It feels like time for a tea break. I've spent what few spare moments I could muster in the past week painting what Messrs. Skinner and Clarke of Too Fat Lardies tell me is an Alai (regiment) of Ottoman Infantry for If the Lord Spares Us.

With an almost military sense of precision, the deck of cards for the aforementioned ruleset arrived today paving the way for some introductory infantry vs. infantry bouts. The cards were purchased from Arts Cow created and uploaded by a gent by the name of Joe Collins. Well done that man!

The deck cost about US $20 to get out here - but there's nothing like custom made cards to add a bit of colour to a game.

No ... no time for a tea break ... I'm off to re-read the rules and settle down to some biffo among the shifting sands.

"A man will never need a grave dug if he is shot in this desert"

After reading Wavell's rather dry "The Palestine Campaigns" (pardon the pun), I needed to get back to some history told 'against the grain' - a personal narrative of this theatre of war.

I'm now 'enjoying' Ion Idriess' raw and gritty account of his time with the 5th Light Horse, AIF, in Gallipoli, Sinai and Palestine. A very worthwhile read to get a sense of the horrors endured by the common soldier in this theatre of war.

Having been wounded twice on the Gallipoli peninsular, Idriess find himself convalescing in Egypt. As Gallipoli had been evacuated by this time (March 1916) the 5th finds itself stationed near the old battlefield of Tel-el-Kebir (1882):

Close by is the old battlefield of Tel-el-Kebir. Remnants of buttons, bullets, bayonets and cartridge cases are littered there while yellowed skulls show where the Khamseens have blown the sand away. The scurrying winds have uncovered old bodies in an uncanny state of preservation, surely due to some chemical preservative in the sands. Several boys looked mustily young and sleeping. It was a shock to see them, so still and quiet and old. They gave me an uneasy impression that from some aloof world they were accusing me-and really I never knew they once existed. Our boys buried them deep.

A few days later, while drilling in the sand-swept desert, an officer remarked, 'A man will never need a grave dug if he is shot in this desert."

Ion Idriess, The Desert Column: Leaves from the Diary of an Australian Trooper in Gallipoli, Sinai and Palestine, Angus and Robertson Ltd, 1934, Sydney, pp. 69-71.

Anyway, with all this wonderful inspiration, I've managed to get my first British infantry brigade together for If the Lord Spares Us. It's nominally a brigade of the 42nd (East Lancashire) Territorial Division. Here's a few of my typically fuzzy (Sorry! Must buy a decent camera) pics:

The armoured car is from Irregular Miniatures (Improvised Armoured Car IRR-NC099) with a lewis gun from a Peter Pig 'Home Guard' (WW2) figure and the head and torso of an Eureka figure.

I cut the weapon and lower arms from the Lewis gunner, and gut away the same portion of the Eureka figure. Then I cut the legs off the Eureka guy and glued the torso with Lewis gun to the legs of the Irregular gunner. The figure seated in the back of the armoured car was cut out (drilled, actually).

Here's the result. The paint job leaves a lot to be desired - I hope to add some detail and better AFV-style weathering when I learn how to do it!

Ottoman infantry next! Thanks for dropping by.