Rod’s Wargaming Website

Having been wargaming for over 60 years, a few years ago I created this website as a record of my activities.

The “About” page contains a history of my wargaming over the years, and since I grew up in Southampton, which many might regard as the spiritual home of wargaming in UK, you will notice some well known pioneers of the hobby mentioned there.

The other Top Menu pages are devoted to the different historical periods of my wargaming, in the main sections of Ancients and Horse & Musket.  The Ancient section has drop down sub-menus of Roman Era and Medieval.  The Horse & Musket section has drop down sub-menus of 18th Century, Napoleonic and Zulu War.  There is also a section on General matters, which includes sub-pages on Terrain, Planning, Modelling Tips and Wargame Accessories.

There is also a section on Military Historical Research, containing a number of items of straight (ie not wargaming) matters which I have researched over the years.  This section comprises two drop down sub-sections, one on Organisation and one on Tactics.  The former includes a paper on the Authorised Establishments of the British Army (1802-1815), which has details of the organisational structure of infantry, cavalry, artillery, engineers and supporting units.  It also includes a paper on British Converged Light Battalions, the latter formed by converging all of the light infantry and rifle companies in each brigade, plus several further papers.

The right end of the Top Menu has a Contact page and a Search button.

The postings on the Blog record my current model soldier production or wargaming activities.  I also use this to announce any new pages published on the website.  The blog postings below are in reverse chronological order, but can also be accessed by subject through the side menu.

Finally, I also have a website to give details of my portfolio of Military History Talks (currently 21).  This can be viewed here.

3rd Battalion Irish Guards

Shortly before Operation Market Garden, the Guards Armoured Division reorganised to form four Regimental Groups, each of an armoured battalion and an infantry battalion from the same Guards Regiment.  They were flexible in how they operated, but normally 5 Guards Brigade commanded the Grenadier Guards Group (1 Motor Battalion Grenadier Guards and 2 Armoured Battalion Grenadier Guards) plus the Irish Guards Group (2 Armoured Battalion Irish Guards and 3 Infantry Battalion Irish Guards).  32 Guards Brigade similarly commanded the Coldstream and Welsh Guards Groups.

The XXX Corps advance was initially led by the Irish Guards Group, commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Joe Vandeleur, who was the Commanding Officer of 3 Irish Guards.  I wanted to make a model of him in his scout car, looking a bit like Michael Caine who played him in “A Bridge too Far”.

2nd Armoured Battalion Irish Guards

In my last post I showed a picture of my first Paperboys tanks, modelled as No 1 Squadron 2 Irish Guards, who along with the Infantry of 3 Irish Guards were the leading element of XXX Corps during the initial Market Garden breakout.  I have now completed the rest of 2 Irish Guards and here is No 2 Squadron. 

Operation Market Garden

At the beginning of lockdown, I watched the film a Bridge too Far a couple of times and that inspired me to want to build a World War II set-up, based on Operation Market Garden.

I decided to use the new Rapid Fire Reloaded rules, which I really liked. Rapid Fire has been around for over 20 years but the new simplified A5 booklet Rapid Fire Reloaded rules were published in 2020.

Pontoon Train

I have modelled a pontoon train, suitable for my expansion into the War of Austrian Succession.   The French built three pontoon bridges over the River Main just before the Battle of Dettingen in 1743 as part of their plan to trap the Pragmatic Army.  I thought it was unlikely that two armies would be building pontoon bridges during the same wargame, so decided to just model one train, but with alternative walking drivers and pontoon companies, so it could be used with different Armies.

I already had some suitable pontoon bridges and carriages, which I had scratch built over 15 years ago, as a Napoleonic French Pontoon Train, but then Hät had produced their French Pontoon Bridge set, so I used that instead.

Blue Bonnets & Tricornes

I have not posted anything for a few weeks because I have been working on my new project of writing a set of wargame rules suitable for the Jacobite Rebellion.

They are still a “work in progress” but when they are finished, and playtested, I intend making PDF copies available to purchase through this website. There will also be free downloads to supplement the rules.

By way of a taster, the Preface and Index is below.

Liverpool Blues and additional British Command Figures

There were a number of additional units and commanders at the Second Siege of Carlisle, which I have now modelled.

The first of these is the Liverpool Blues.  My main source regarding them is “The Town of Liverpool in the ‘45” by R C Jarvis, which I found online.  They were a Volunteer Regiment raised by the town of Liverpool,  were raised much more quickly and were much more effective than the Lancashire Militia.  As the Jacobite Rebellion gained momentum the town petitioned the Government to be allowed to raise a volunteer force.  The Secretary of State wrote to the Deputy Mayor on 23^rd September 1745 authorising the town to form troops and companies of inhabitants who were willing to take arms and to grants commissions to suitable persons to command them.

The town raised £1,000 by subscription to pay for this force and the Liverpool Blues was originally proposed to be formed of 1,000 men, however this was later reduced to 800 men organised as 8 companies.  A regular officer, Col Graham of 43^rd Foot was appointed to command them, assisted by Lt Col Gordon and Maj Bendish.  The town appointed “some persons to be Officers in the Companies who had already behaved well in his Majesty’s Service, the others will be chosen out of young Gentlemen of the Town who have sometime payd old Sergeants to instruct them in the Military Exercise”.

The Liverpool Blues received their uniforms and weapons by 15^th November and then marched into Cheshire to help to defend or demolish bridges in that county.  On that same day the Jacobites took Carlisle.  Several Militia Regiments refused to serve outside their counties but the Liverpool Blues had no such inhibitions.  They later joined Oglethorpe’s Brigade at Clifton and marched with them to Carlisle. 

This print of their uniform is a composite one, created by putting together elements of three prints to show the key features of their uniform.

Orders for the uniform of the Liverpool Blues were placed by 5 October. “These goods will be wanted in a fortnight or a very few days”, the order read. There were “52 Doz. of full-sized Men’s felt Halts … 50 doz. of them bound with white Galloon (lace) and white mettle Buttons … the other two Dozen let be of a better kind and come without being bound” (the latter presumable for the officers who would have silver lace added later). Three thousand yards of kersey were ordered for the coats; thirteen shoemakers in the town were directed to set about making 626 pairs of shoes and “50 Doz of strong White Stockings” were ordered from Wales.

It is clear from this uniform purchase that the final proposed strength of the Liverpool Blues was 600 men (plus officers) rather than the higher figures of 1,000 or 800 proposed earlier.

There is no mention of waistcoats or breeches, so presumably the volunteers would have worn their own as shown here.

Noblemen’s Regiments

The Jacobite Rebellion created a need for a rapid expansion in the size of the British Army.  This was facilitated by members of the aristocracy volunteering to raise regiments.  A total of 13 Noblemen’s Regiments of infantry were raised, plus two Regiments of Light Horse.

Four of the infantry Regiments are recorded as being in red uniforms, with yellow, green and red facings (the fourth facing colour being unknown).  Most, if not all, of the remaining Noblemen’s Regiments seem to have worn blue uniforms with red facings, as illustrated in this print of the Marquess of Granby’s 71^st Foot.

Grenadier caps exist of two of the Noblemen’s Regiments (including Granby’s) and it seems reasonable to assume that they all had Grenadier Companies.

Website Upgrade

I have been running this website for over six years. I have now decided to upgrade it to an ad-free version, so that readers do nor get annoying unrelated adverts inserted in my posts. It helped that WordPress were offering a 30% reduction in the first year’s subscription.

1st Foot Guards Brigade

My next project is to model all of the troops which took part in the Second Siege of Carlisle, conducted by the Duke of Cumberland from 21st to 30th December 1745. I already had modelled all of the Jacobite defenders and now needed to complete Cumberland’s troops.

First Siege of Carlisle – 9-15 November 1745

Having beaten Cope at Prestonpans and taken Edinburgh City, but not the Castle, Prince Charles recruited more Regiments into the Jacobite Army then decided to march south into England to claim the throne on behalf of his father. His Army commenced its march on 1st November 1745.