The dust up at Mansanar bridge

In this scenario the British need to capture the bridge across the Mansanar canal since the road across it gives the most direct approach to the besieged defenders of Salisbury house. 

In real life the mutineers beat the Crown forces on a number of occasions but were always hampered by poor command and brittle morale. In this battle I’ve attempted to reflect that - the mutineers have a bigger force, but, if the British actually get on to the bridge they will consider the engagement lost and immediately melt away.

They have deployed in a fairly random fashion around the canal bridge, intent only on creating a blockade of the garrison at Cawnpore. Morrisons mobile column trying to actually break out from the town comes as an unexpected surprise. 

All figures are Empress Miniatures 28mm and the rules used were The Men Who Would Be Kings. The British have 9 turns to capture the bridge before retiring to look for an alternative crossing point.

T1. Frobisher’s platoon enter on the lower edge of the board, moving at the double despite the heat. Ahead of them Mountjoy’s cavalry troop ride along the flank to flush out any hidden mutineers.

T2. Mountjoy’s troop find nothing to disturb the infantry as the canter past several potential ambush sites but just as they prepare to swing in towards the bridge itself…blammo… In the last position on this side of the board the dice revealed a platoon of the 28th Native Infantry who’d heard the cavalry coming. Mountjoy (whose die generated trait was short sighted) had succeeded in finding the enemy, though sadly with the loss of several of his troopers. The fire was from long range, so Mountjoy could not order a charge or return fire (he couldn’t see who was shooting) and instead ordered his men back the way they’d come.

T2. The men of the 28th let fly in a slightly uncoordinated fashion with their obsolete muskets, and cheer as several cavalrymen fall. 

T2. Secure in the knowledge that no enemy is present on their right flank the men of Urquhart’s platoon advance on the bridge along the central road - led somewhat superfluously by Colonel Morrison on his mighty steed - Maximus. 

T3. With their running shoes on (Urquhart is a fitness fanatic) the platoon managed to keep up with the colonel on his horse until they crossed the hump in the road and discovered mutineers on the ridge to their left.

T3. Oh bugger! A die roll revealed both potential ambush sites on the leftmost ridge contained mutineers. In the Indian turn the cannon and the shako wearing elite of the 28th fired into the British on the road. 

T3. The cannon fired and scored several hits. The chances of the leader going down are slim (a double 1 is required) so I rolled for it…and got… a double 1. Was this the end for colonel Morrison? Nope. The trait he’d rolled before game start was bulletproof bumbler so he could ignore the first hit. Perhaps the round shot took off his hat? Despite the musket fire from the soldiers on the hill he waved his sword and twirled his moustache to inspire the soldiers now pinned on the road. 

T4. Yet more of Urquhart’s men fell to musket fire and they became pinned again but the colonels moustache twirling was impressive enough to prevent them from running. Fearing for his short sighted leaders reputation Daffadar (sergeant) Kuldip Singh grabbed Mountjoy’s horses reigns and swerved the troop over the brow of the ridge towards the hurriedly reloading cannon. During the Indian portion of this turn another unit (of irregular horse) is activated on the bridge itself. All potential starting points have now been diced for so any unrevealed Indian units from their force pool can only enter the game from the far side of the canal.

T5. The Indian horseman charge off the bridge into the unsuspecting flank of Mountjoy’s troop. Brave Daffadar Singh and several others go down under the slashing tulwars but the fight doesn’t go the mutineers way and they are forced to retire. The rules allow for cavalry follow ups in this event so trying to catch up with some blurry figures he assumed to be his own men Mountjoy thunders close behind, his remaining troopers in tow. A second contact and skirmish causes the Indians to flee still further. 

T5. Still trying to catch those he assumes to be his own men Mountjoy makes it onto the bridge. The mutineers let out a collective moan of despair at the sahibs disregard for life and limb. Assuming he is protected somehow by the white queens magic they throw away their weapons and scatter. 

Game over and won within 5 turns! 

For a solo battle this turned out to be quite entertaining. I was convinced that the British would lose given the force disparity and the early casualties which pinned the assault force in place. The flukiness (is that word?) of the actual win and the fact that colonel Morrison should have been killed (except for his crappy character trait) made it a good, if fairly short, run out. 

So then the road is now open and Morrison’s mobile column is primed for a rapid march to Salisbury house. 

I think that calls for a quick huzzah don’t you? And perhaps a gong for Lt Mountjoy?

Huzzah!

Toodleooh. 

Morrison marches forth

Readers will recall that the redoubtable Mr Morrison sent me 36 beautifully painted Empress Miniatures (1st Madras Fusileers) last year, which acted as a massive boost to my nascent Indian mutiny project. The lads were accompanied by a mounted officer whom I’ve named Colonel Morrison in his honour. The following game will be his first run out using The Men Who Would Be Kings rules. 

The story so far. 

Indian mutineers had risen up in the fictional town of Jullundpur, forcing a small garrison of the 64th and the Weatherby-Blythe family to seek refuge in the Salisbury House EIC compound. Captain Lawrence of the 64th, disguised as a woman, managed to slip through the mutineer lines in the back of a cart and raise the alarm at Cawnpore.

Despite the rebellions occurring all around them, General Wheeler (officer in command) felt his position was quite secure and he ordered Colonel Morrison to form a movable column in order to relieve the Salisbury House defenders and return with them to the greater safety of the Cawnpore garrison.

The movable column is an adhoc force comprised of the 1st Madras Fusileers escorted by several troops of irregular cavalry. Morrison’s intention is to secure the bridge over the Royal military canal at Mansanar and reach Jullundpur in a rapid 3 day march. Other crossing points of the canal are available but securing any of those instead will lead to unacceptable delays and stiffening resistance. 

The scenario

The action is centred around the seizure of the bridge across the canal at Mansanar and the following 16 point British force is pitched against a defending 24 point Indian mutineer force. For easy of play all Indian units are led by officers with no traits and have a standardised leadership value of 8+ while the British units had the diced for characteristics as follows. 

OC - Colonel Morrison: “Bullet proof bumbler” (sorry Aly) Leadership value 9+. Luckily for him, if not his men, this Jonah leads a charmed life. Re roll (once) every successful leader casualty he falls foul of. 

Colonel Morrison - will add +1 discipline to any unit he is attached to. 

1st Platoon, C Company, 1st Madras Fusileers: Captain Frobisher - Fine swordsman. Roll 2 extra dice in melee. Leadership 5+ (very good).

Captain Frobisher - flashing blade extraordinaire.

2nd Platoon, C Company, 1st Madras Fusileers: Lieutenant Urquhart - Jolly sporty. This unit may add +2 inches to any at the double actions. Leadership 7+

Lieutenant Urquhart - All those hours spent at “rugger” are about to bare fruit.

2nd Troop - Prendergast’s Irregular Horse: Lieutenant Mountjoy - Short sighted. Cannot give order to charge or fire beyond short range. Leadership 7+

Lieutenant Mountjoy - What enemy? Where? Are you taking the pith (helmet). 

The British may enter anywhere along the leftmost board edge, though I’m minded at the moment to try a run along the bottom of the picture. No point engaging everything on the table, what! 

Special scenario rules

There are 12 possible locations for enemy units to be encountered, each will be diced for / revealed when line of sight is established. Any units absent from these positions will automatically appear beyond the bridge at location 12 which will always be the last location to be revealed. 

The British need to have a unit on the bridge before the conclusion of turn 9 to secure a win. 

All retreating Indian units must fall back towards or across the bridge. 

All stands of jungle terrain are impenetrable and block line of sight.

It is hellish hot (and not a dry heat either, lol) so all British infantry lose 1 inch movement / activation.

Any Indian defenders will immediately disengage and retire if a British unit makes it onto the bridge. 

Okay, I’ll be giving this a bash in the next day or so, so I’ll try and produce the batrep before month end - with any luck.

Toodleooh. 

P.s. if anyone knows where I can get my mitts on river terrain at least 15cm wide I’d be grateful of the heads up. I made some myself but it really didn’t cut the mustard. 

New arrivals and a home front update.

The recent loss of two of my garden friends (Bancroft and Mable) to a Stone Marten has come as quite a nasty shock but in the spirit of “getting back on the horse” and all that I recently acquired these two little bantams to build the flock back up to four. 

Edna and Elsie have expressed an interest in editing the blog. I may take them on as interns and see how they shake out.

The white fluffy one is called Edna, and the mottled grey one is called Elsie. She immediately put me in mind of the Ostrich that Bernie Clifton used to ride in his “variety” act but it turns out that I was another innocent victim of black and white childhood TV and the damned thing was apparently orange.

Black and White Bernie Clifton circa 1970. Funny what passed for entertainment back then. He’d be jailed for that these days.

Painting progress has been slowed by the inexorable growth of l’herbe but I’ve still managed to knock out six Perry men at arms which I present here for your scorn and ridicule. 

I’ve kept the heraldry somewhat light since much of it would be beyond my capability painting wise.

I was of course intending to post another Indian Mutiny battle report instead of this blether but I’ve had a bit of a problem with terrain (needed a none European 28mm compatible bridge and some river sections too) so that’ll have to be later in the month. 

Okay right then I’d best be offski, I can see the grass in the north 40 is over 5cm high again. Sigh. 

Toodleooh.

We few…we happy few.

Well it’s been three years but I’m doing English archers again, (though admittedly in 28mm this time rather than 15mm). What goes around comes around, eh.

Lovely thing about the 100yrs war is that only one side used a lot of cavalry and that should speed up painting progress. I hope. 

Here’s a few pictures of ‘em so you can see where I’m at. They’re Perry’s of course and lovely sculpts to boot but darned fiddly to glue together with my fat fingers and clumsy hands of death.

I probably should have titled the post “look ma no flock” since as you will observe… there’s nary a whisker of the stuff to be seen.

Once again digital photography proves it is not your friend. They look okay from a distance I promise.

 

And here’s the back of them, which is probably the view most opponents will have since I hope to command the French…and lose every encounter with panache. They’re in the colours of John Mowbray by the way, which you probably already knew. 

Lack of flock is heresy I know, but while these lads are intended for Billhooks - they may get a few runs out in Boathooks and I suspect they’ll look a bit daft on board ship with a small garden plot around their feet. I’ve gone with the Kenneth Branagh Agincourt “grubby as fuck” look for the peasantry on the basis that it’s hard as hell to look squeaky clean when you’ve got dysentery and been sleeping under a hedge for several weeks. We’ve all been there…am I right!?

What? Only me?

Cripes!

The blog title obviously refers to the words Shakespeare stuffed into Henry V’s mouth from his play of the same name but it’s also an acknowledgment that after several years of steady posting I’ve finally achieved the magic number of 40 blog followers. Wow. Slightly chastening to think that one of those is my granddaughter (hi Ella) whose only really interest is in finding out what her barmy grandpa is up to and another follower is manifestly dead (R.I.P Graham) ((though I guess he could still be following?)).

Seems like I emotionally invested in the Betamax of content platforms when the world had already moved on to the VHS of Facebook. The wife keeps telling me that size doesn’t matter…and it’s kind of her to reassure me that the number of blog followers isn’t an issue… but still. Too much France? Too much crazy? Too many flights of fancy into new genre’s? Let me know, on the reinstated comments section if you can be arsed. 

Toodleooh

Chicken Korma / Chicken Karma

As a rule you should never post when under the affluence of inkerhol but I’ve been round mes voisines today and Christ that Pastis of theirs is strong stuff.

I’m conscious that I owe the blog a post, but gaming has been scant of late and miniature painting has to unfortunately come second to me endlessly cutting l’herbe dehors. Fortunately the Pastis has opened a couple of the doors on my advent calendar of troubled youth, so I’ll regale you with an anecdote from the past in lieu of anything actually relevant or interesting.

Buckle up.

The Current Mrs Broom planted hundreds of Euros worth of new plants last year and within 48 hours the four new chickens I’d just purchased had dug most of them up. “Why chickens.” she demanded of me, (in a most fearsome bate) “and why now?”

It was a good question. So in concert with my recent interest in all things Indian, I consulted various Hindu and Buddhist sacred texts and burned a bit of incense. You know, like you do. The unexpected outcome was a trip in the BroomCo Time Machine (pat pending) to the long lost land of Worcestershire in the grim old winter of 1977.

Though it no doubt stretches credibility, the young Jolly Broom Man (miserable brush boy?) was nothing like the handsome strapping chap I am today, all quivering whiskers and steely gaze…no sir, I was a girly milk sop with greasy hair, a brace, and was still wearing flares when my peer group had all moved on to drain pipe jeans. 

My parents had bought a small holding and gone “back to the land” in 1974 but after a couple of years the realities of stoop labour were beginning to tell. We didn’t have much cash (to put it mildly - you try paying your rates with goats milk) and so pater would sometimes come up with the occasional wheeze in order to generate emergency lucre.

Apropos the post title - from a mixed farm perspective, cockerels are pretty worthless but my dear father had chanced upon 50 going cheap, (sorry). After injecting them with female hormones in order to make them nice and plump (for reasons I didn’t immediacy fathom) they became my charge down on the farm. 

They were a decent bunch them chucks, with the female hormones eliminating their usual urge to fight or fuck everything in sight - instead they were good with colours and partial to musical theatre as I recall. They lived in an old refrigerated van only slightly less tatty than the family home and though they were relatively well fed the conditions they lived in were generally poor. I felt bad for them but at 13 (ish) there was bugger all I could do about it.

In the winter of 77 pater got the nod from a bloke who owned the Grand Tandoori on the Soho road and the purpose of my gaggle of gay chickens became suddenly and horribly clear. On a cold and wet November night daddy got a couple of crisp new fivers and by the light of a sputtering Tilly lamp I got a lesson in how to kill a chicken by breaking its neck. Thrusting the still twitching corpse into my cold little hands he nodded to the rows of roosting birds and muttered.  ‘There’s another 49 of the bastards in there. You’d best be getting on with it.’ 

Lovely bloke my Pa. 

On reflection I’d have been better off strangling him. (Oooh girl got daddy issues!)

So as you can see, karmically speaking, I had a great wrong that I obviously and unconsciously needed to address. Once I’d explained matters to the Current Mrs Broom she became a lot more understanding. I find there’s nothing like a bit of childhood trauma to grease the wheels of forgiveness. 

Makepeace, my bearded Favorol, gets human breakfast granola every day along with fresh blueberries and raspberry’s from Intermarché. The flock wanders where they will and live in a state of the art insulated coop that cost over a grand. Karmically speaking I may not now be re incarnated as a toilet seat.

One of these days I’ll tell you about the great goat caper in which a 14yr old me had to illegally drive the green family VW 1300 beetle through Birmingham to the abattoir with four billy goat kids on the back seat. Happy days - and nary a Fonz in sight.

Oh crap, I almost forgot this is a wargaming blog. 

Here’s a picture of some English 100yr war lads I’ve been working on. Proof if proof were needed that digital photography is not your friend. lol. 

Just noticed the chap in the middle has a bit of a droopy arrow. We’ve all been there.

Toodleooh mes amis. 

The siege of Salisbury House

I played a game the other day that went undocumented on the blog but the upshot of it was that the British retreated to the safety of the Salisbury House compound and sent out a message asking for help from the Lucknow garrison (Captain Lawrence disguised as a native and hidden in the back of a cart). 

The next game involved an attempt by the mutineers to storm the compound and was played over a week ago. Although I’ve lost my notes the following pictures will hopefully give a flavour of the action. The rules used were The Men Who Would Be Kings and all the miniatures are Empress 28mm. Both sides started the game with 25 point forces and the winner would be who controlled Salisbury house itself after 9 turns.

First up - a view of a part of the compound which is assumed to extend off board in several direction but is bounded in its entirety by a 12ft high rendered mud brick wall. Seen here are the main entrance (centre) and the tradesman’s entrance (snigger snigger) on the right.  The modular perimeter wall was badly and hurriedly scratch built but serves okay for now. In the background is another bungalow, to the left a tented field hospital and in just behind the wall in the foreground a walled croquet pitch.

I think this shot was taken around turn 2. The sneaky sepoys used a cannon to blow a hole in the perimeter wall - only to discover a British cannon looking back at them. Several waves of sepoys attacked the main entrance, the tradesman’s entrance and the left most portion of the wall itself. 

The defenders of this portion of the compound were two platoons of the 64th Regiment, a 9lb artillery piece and a platoon of Sikh Police. The Sikhs covered the rear of Salisbury house while the gun and the two platoons of the 64th covered the front. Despite complaints from the ladies the 64th took up a defensive position within the walled croquet area and made a right mess of the lawn as a result. 

Backs to the wall… Thankfully the battle was paused at this point for several hours while the servants came out and removed all the unsightly rubble from the smashed wall. Good job everyone.

The sepoys attacked from four directions, through the hole in the wall, below…

A mob entered via the tradesman’s entrance (sorry I still want to snigger) and tried to get onto the croquet lawn.

Began climbing over the wall itself…

And even snuck into the compound from the off board right flank. Definitely not cricket.

After some horrendous sepoy losses, they managed to secure the bungalow and control of the croquet pitch. 

The forces of colonial oppression still occupy Salisbury house, so they won, but the 12 wounded European soldiers that were the cost of holding off the horde are now being treated in tents that are constantly under desultory fire from the bungalow. 

Meanwhile, 40 miles to the west a small relief column under a colonel Morrison has been despatched from Lucknow. We can only hope he arrives in time! There’ll be no bullying off for the final chukka until the mutineers can be cleared from the croquet pitch, that’s for sure.

And finally. 

I’ve had a blissful three weeks or thereabouts without exposure to any news or current events. I strongly recommend it. Apparently the world still turns without me worrying about it. Who knew? No mushroom clouds on the horizon so all must be okay.

Music is and always has been a great soother of the noggin. Painting the Empress miniatures was largely accomplished while listening to an Indian themed sound track. Here’s an example which you won’t like and will skip out of after the few bars but which greater minds than mine have described as the best Beatles track they neither wrote or performed.

A bit of Tatva…

And this which is just a great laugh as well as a great song…

Look after yourselves mes amis.

Mrs Fanshaw’s hat - game report + exciting crisp news

Well it was quick and very bloody and a little anti climactic. 12 turns in 30 minutes which would have been 20 if I hadn’t had to keep reminding myself of how the rules work. [long time reading - first time playing]. Somehow the gloss has gone off solo play these days.

Captain Napier plus six soldiers and the two Weatherby-Blythe girls entered the table on a mission to recover Mrs Fanshaw’s best hat before the beastly mutineers could get their grubby paws on it.

Mrs F’s bungalow had been randomly surrounded by groups of militant soldiery (represented initially by playing cards) and the playing area divided into 6 outer zones and 1 central zone containing the bungalow and the hat. 

Night had fallen. A dice roll determined that Napiers force came on in zone 3 and their arrival caused the playing card for the zone to be immediately revealed. If the card had been a black suit then Napier would have been unopposed but it wasn’t it was red with a value of 5 - meaning 5 sepoys had been surprised by the groups arrival. 

Not exactly fair odds as it turned out. They probably should have tried the “hug it out” strategy.

Despite Napier having a number of initiative advantages over the leaderless sepoys they unexpectedly got to go first - shouting angrily as they moved towards the imperial interlopers. Note - All firearms start the game unloaded, the Sepoys weapons by omission and the imperial troops by design. Any gunshot would alert the entire mutineer force to the interlopers presence and cause them to move towards  the sounds location.

The mutineers moved into contact with Napiers men and sprang straight into melee. Despite being outnumbered they put up a stiff fight. On the right of the imperial line Havildar (Sergeant) Kuldip Singh barely managed to parry his assailants bayonet while in the centre the extra imperial numbers and the poor training of the sepoys caused the mutineers assault to only cause the death of one defender. The only other person to come a cropper was Captain Napier who went down with a bayonet in the belly.

The imperial response was swift and deadly. Havildar Singh knocked his assailant to the ground with his rifle butt and finished him off on the floor while the other troops in the centre quickly overwhelmed the remaining mutineers. 

Dukin’ it out mano a mano. 

Kuldip, now in command, ordered his force to close up and consolidate near the corner of the bungalow. Once everyone was in place they rushed over the balcony railing to find…

A black card indicating no one was in the building!

The hat was quickly located and since they could now return across an uncontested route it was pretty much game over. As it turned out they had a very lucky set up since post game I turned over all the cards to reveal that there were 21 other enemy soldiers in the zones adjacent to them. Captain Napier was pretty far gone when his men found him but they managed to drag him back to the district office compound where he became the first occupant of the defenders impromptu field hospital. 

Salisbury House - district office for the Honorable East India Company at Jullundpur. The tented area on the left is the impromptu field hospital. Occupants 1, staff 0, medical supplies erm… 1 x packet of Bile Beans and a jar of camphorated oil.

Mrs Fanshaw was presented with her hat and she tried to hide her displeasure at the way it had been crumpled as she boarded the last passenger carrying boat upstream to Lucknow.

Results wise the imperial side scored 20VP for getting the hat back off the board and a further 10VP for killing 5 mutineers. For their part the mutineers scored 10VP for “killing” Captain Napier and 2 points for the poor Sikh fella they chopped up. 

I call it a resounding win for the forces of the white queen though I suspect Captain Napier’s family might view things differently.

And so dear reader there are two life lessons for you in this little game, firstly “never volunteer for anything” and secondly, “no good deed goes unpunished”. 

Take heed.

So the game was a bit disappointing over all but fortunately the real excitement of the day came about from a late visit to Carrefour. 

My letter last year to President Macron bemoaning the sorry state of France’s crisps brought about the immediate release of curry flavour. Now they have gone one step further and doubled down with…

Clearly, when the honour of France is at stake anything is possible.

Walkers…you’d better pull your finger out.

Next battle report will be the siege of Salisbury House. 

Toodleooh.