Miniature Wargaming

           Five years have passed since I last posted something about miniature wargaming. One of my several hobbies, I enjoy playing games with my toy soldiers, painted or unpainted. At the same time I try to simulate the tactics of the historical time period to make it accurate and playable. It is equally important to create a game which is challenging and, depending upon how many players I can accommodate, as loud as possible.  I used historical simulations in the classroom to motivate students and to get them excited about history.

      The following photos are from a current solo game. The playing board is a Civil War battlefield in my basement on a series of 2.5’ X 6’ tables. The playing area is divvied into 10 distinct areas of entry, randomly numbered from 1 -10. A corresponding deck of 14 cards numbered 1 – 10 with 4 No Entry cards, when drawn by the players determine the time and points of entry on the board.

      The following photos represent 7 turns of play in which the Confederates have committed all of their forces (36 regiments numbering 200 -300 men each on the board) and 4 artillery pieces (1 battery) on 6 0f the 10 entry points. The Federal forces have 6 brigades, numbering 27 regiments of 400 men each and six guns. By this time in the game, they have committed 17 regiments and 2 guns on the field.

     In this particular action a Union regiment, in the foreground, despite incoming small arms fire and case shot screaming overhead has driven a Confederate regiment from the rail fence to their front through another Confederate regiment coming on the field. (Note the Confederate flag in the right foreground heading away from the fighting.)

    While that action is going on, one Confederate regiment has successfully disrupted and flanked two Union regiments while one of them is engaged in a firefight with the Confederates along the rail fence. Simultaneously, in the foreground a small Rebel unit is flanking the Union position unobserved.

     A short distance to the right, in front of the same road (previous photograph), 2 Yankee regiments have successfully halted 2 Confederate regiments trying to break their lines in a charge by column of fours.Note that the Confederate regiment moving by the oblique has come under fire from the stonewall on the left.

     This is an overview of the  field including all of the previous photos. It gives the player an idea of how complicated a battlefield could be. Note the creek with the pole bridges in the foreground. The individual figure on the opposite side behind the rail fence among the trees are Rebel skirmishers. They are taking pot shots at Yankee officers.

     From the opposite end of the field looking toward the creek which is marked by the bridge and the tree line to the right behind the log buildings. The two puffs to the right of the cabin in the right are from two Rebels guns firing at the two Yankee guns to the left of the cornfield. A Union regiment has flanked the Rebel regiments in the valley below while Rebel skirmishers are popping rounds at the Union officers in that regiment. Also note the cavalryman just to the right below the cornfield.

         A fresh Confederate brigade has flanked the Union line near the church and the school house.

     The casualties are what one would expect from frontal assaults and regiments getting hit by flank fire. Union losses: 1 artillery lieutenant, 2 aides de camp to a brigadier, 10 regimental line officers, 400 enlisted men to the Rebels' 11 regimental officers and 350 rank and file and the action has just gotten started. The Union forces still have 10 regiments and 4 guns to commit to the action.

     Lessons learned: skirmishers, when used effectively are hard to eliminate and costly to officers. Regiments can break at inconvenient times. So far and additional 200 men (1 Confederate regiment) has quit the field with their commanding officer in addition to the other casualties. A Union regiment of similar size will probably run from the field if it cannot be rallied by its officers. Nothing is predictable and the outcome it "up in the air." It is a nasty brawl with large caliber weapons beyond the control of the commanding generals, who are not on the field.

How Did They Do That?

            Watching World War II movies and TV shows were mandatory in our household. Dad, being Marine Corps veteran of the Pacific Theater, never left the Marine Corps or Guadalcanal. Watching a movie with him was a participation event. Every time John Wayne pulled a grenade pin with his teeth, Dad would yell, “You cain’t do thet!” (He was right. Grenade pins were bent to keep them from accidentally slipping out when carrying them.) Every time a grenade actually exploded and on target, he would growl an expletive, usually in two syllables, because as a rural Tennessean he could not say one syllable words. I remember one time while we were watching “Combat,” starring Vic Morrow, Cage, the BAR man (Browning Automatic Rifleman), charged a German machine gun emplacement while firing the weapon from his hip. “You cain’t run an’ fire thet gun like thet! Lie down!” (The recoil from a BAR could knock the shooter down if it was not properly braced.)

            His running commentaries inadvertently taught me that details are important. Accurate portrayals are important. Writing about a Civil War battle on the ground level that I do requires me to read the drill manuals and to know the weapons and how they operated.

            One thing that has always puzzled me could soldiers fire three aimed shots a minute and, could they really load while running at the “double quick.” I shoot black powder rifles and sidearms. Using a patch and ball and starting loading, I can get off two rounds in a minute and a half. When using an Enfield with a greased minie ball which was not in a cartridge I averaged about the same. Considering that I am no means an expert, and that no one was firing back at me, I do not consider that bad timing.

            So how could a man get off three aimed rounds a minute as prescribed in some of the manuals during a drill where no one was under fire? I think I found the answer. The types of cartridges used determined the rate of fire. During the Civil War the armies used a variety of packaged ammunition such as round ball, minie balls, Enfield cartridges, and patent cartridges. In the movies the infantrymen tear cartridges with their teeth and load by putting the entire round down the bore, which they could do if armed with a smoothbore musket and not the rifled musket.

            The smoothbore paper cartridge was greased. The shooter did not have to unwrap the ball to load it because with the cartridge paper still around it, it could fit down the bore. A musket (shot gun) had no lands and grooves in it to grip the round. Theoretically, a person could get three to four rounds off a minute, as long as the weapon did not foul from the coarse powder. Once the weapon was loaded the soldier had to cap it, which could be done while moving, but probably not at a run.

It could also be loaded while marching at the common time (90 steps per minute), quick time (110 steps per minutes) and possibly at the double quick at (120 steps per minute) because the soldier could charge the cartridge without and ram it home without having to unwrap the bullet. The Prussian army, I believe under Frederick the Great, actually drilled in loading while advancing. The men were armed with muskets.

The conical minie ball used in rifles muskets (rifles) came in a self contained cartridge with two paper wrappings. The powder was in one wrapper and the greased minie ball sat on top of that wrapper with the cone (tip) of the round pointed upward. A separate paper went around that and the wrapped powder charge. In theory the grease from the round would not affect the powder and the extra wrap made the cartridge stronger. However in practice, it slowed the rate of fire and made it virtually impossible to load while at a steady walk. The shooter could charge the powder while walking but then had to halt to unwrap the minie and thumb it into the bore before drawing the rammer to push the ball home. Unwrapping the ball under fire consumed time particularly when a fellow was under fire. While writing this, it occurred to me that this is why so many “dropped” bullets have been found on battlefields,

The British Enfield conical round was a bit smaller than the .58 caliber minie- .577 as a rule. It was placed on the powder point down then lubed on the outside of the cartridge. The rifleman tore open the cartridge and charged the powder, then inverted it and placed the round with the ball in the muzzle.   The wrapped bullet was small enough to fit in the bore without unwrapping it. The man then tore off the empty paper, threw it aside and rammed the cartridge home. This increased the loading and firing time and theoretically could be done while moving. 

The patent cartridge consisted of a combustible cartridge with the minie ball inserted base down but without a separate wrapper. The round was small enough that men said they could load at least the first round by inserting the entire thing in the muzzle and thumping the rifle butt on the ground. It loaded the fastest of any of the pervious ammunition types which I described. Of the four, a soldier could load and fire a patent cartridge faster than the minie or the Enfield round and could conceivably load it on the double quick.

When loading while at the double quick, as some of the Civil War veterans said they did, they more than likely halted to load then double quicked into combat. Loading while at the double quick probably meant they loaded and charge their in four steps, not nine (depending upon which manual they used) and then marched at the double quick with some of them still having their ramrods in the bores of their weapons. I have communicated with Mr. Joseph Bilby, a nationally recognized expert on Civil War rifles and muskets and Mr. Phil Spaugy, an historian of the 19^th Indiana, and a very active member of the North-South Skirmish Association who also has a tremendous working knowledge of Civil War muskets and rifles and both concur that the men would have had to halt to load the weapons before or after running to their objective.

What I would really like to know if there is anyone who has seen a re-enactment unit load and fire live rounds while at the common time, quick time, or double quick step. I would welcome any additional documents information about loading while on the move in formation. I genuinely want to know “How did they do that?”

A Tribute to Two Very Special Individuals

    

My Father-in-Law, who was my best friend, took a serious medical down turn during the summer of 2015. I took him to his very frequent daily hospital visits and was with him during several hospital stays. He passed away on January 15, 2016 at the age of 89, one day before what would have been my mother’s 91^st birthday. (She died in 1986 of a heart attack, at age 60.)

            Dad was raised in poverty in Paw Paw, West Virginia. During World War II he was exempted from the draft because he was the youngest son at home, his older brothers having all gone into the Army. He quit school in the 3^rd grade to work on the farm, and at the age of 18, he married my Mother –in-law (age 17). She (to me she is Mom) did not graduate from high school. Both of them came from large families by our standards. Dad was the youngest of ten. Mom was one of eventually 20 siblings until after her mother’s death when her father married a woman who had 7 children of her own.

            They are two of the most hard working, down-to-earth people I have ever known and in so many ways they represent the hearty stock of individuals who settled this country’s frontier in the decades preceding them. Dad was not perfect. None of us are. But he loved me, and respected me. He was one of the very few men I have ever trusted and I surely do miss him.

            I am writing about him because he was the kind of quiet man who embodied the virtues of genuine hero. We do not have too many heroes today. They seem to be passé, irrelevant or superficial clichés. Dad was no superman but he was a man in every sense of the word. He taught himself fractions so he could read a ruler. He read blueprints and squared footers – many of which I dug for him by hand. He read the Bible and he believed in its teachings but he was not a “gospel grinder.” He often said, “I might be a dumb bricklayer but there ain’t nothin’ in that book that is not true.”

            His personal beliefs were as simple as he lived. A master stone cutter, bricklayer, and a good contractor to work for, he lived by his word. If he said he would do something for someone, he did it. He took care of his laborers. He expected the work to be done right or it would get torn down and done over. He taught me the value and dignity of hard work. He treated me like his son.

He never held my education against me. He often embarrassed me in front of people he did not know by telling everyone he met that I wrote books and that I traveled to Australia to give talks. Most of all he told me how much he appreciated me doing things for him when he could not. He taught me how to take scraps and make something work and work safely. 

Why am I spending my time writing about him? I love him and I always will. His passing took a toll on me but I am bouncing back. I was never afraid of him. He treated me decently and never hesitated to tell me when I did something wrong. He brought out the best in me and I am indebted to him for all eternity for it. When I had a terrible flashback, he and mom picked me up at the conference I was attending and took me to their place and let me sweat through it on the couch, no questions asked.

History is about men and women like Mom and Dad. It’s the humble, and simple lives of human beings like themselves which illuminate the darkness in this cold, unfeeling world. They embody the morals and decency which so seldom gets the attention they deserve. They remind us that all of the lying, killing, pain, and evil in this society and any society, for that matter, cannot stamp out or destroy the light in the darkness of the countless number of decent individuals, like themselves, who have positively affected everyone they touched.

For me history is not about the big names but those thousands upon thousands of quiet souls who have slipped into anonymity. Their memories and stories, whenever possible, deserve to be resurrected and honored. There would be no great civilizations without them.

Thanks for listening. More blogs will follow periodically about my new project on July 1, 1863 at Gettysburg.