More family history - German Parachute mine tragedy.

 As I continue to research and build my family tree one of my favourite parts of this has been discovering where my ancestors lived and finding out what I can about the numerous places in SE London they lived in. Yesterday I discovered that in the 1911 Census my late Nan was living with her parents and siblings in a large block of flats in Southwark called Queens Buildings ( built in the 1880's). I found several old photos but also discovered that in 1940 during the Blitz a German Parachute Mine destroyed a large section of one end of the Estate, killing 41 people, many of whom had taken refuge in the Number 1 Shelter which was collapsed by the bomb damage. Luckily my family had moved away by this period but reading accounts yesterday left me feeling extremely sad all day so I wanted to share it here.

Descriptions from some who had lived there describe them being of just two rooms with toilets  on the balcony, no baths or hot water and families of 4 or 5 sleeping together in the single bedroom even during the 1960's. The entire estate was demolished in 1970 and replaced with more modern social housing blocks of flats.

German Parachute Mines carried up to 2200 lb of explosives and the devastation can be seen from the image below where the blocks in light blue were all destroyed by the one single bomb.. 

This mine was dropped on the Woolwich Arsenal but failed to detonate.

The bomb destroyed the entire near section of the Queens Buildings estate.

Later photo - the entire estate was demolished on 1971.

This illustrates the size.

Putting the game together - 'Ramekin' for the English Civil War!

 Another week on and I'm starting to gather together the components for the C&C variant ECW game. The hex mat has arrived from Rollinmats in Spain and again I'm very pleased with the quality. As usual it arrives in a very sturdy cardboard tube which is handy for storage.

Also arrived is an order from Warbases, 2mm thick hexes, some more 60mm x 25mm bases and a pack of 10mm discs (3mm thick for ease of handling) which will be used for the Activation Chips and hit markers used in the Ramekin C&C variant, suitably coloured.

With another standard Pike & Shot base painted this week - Purple Coats so probably Lord Brooks Regt - I turned my attention to making the first of the planned 'Stand of Pikes' markers for the game. The need to use markers for such formations is dictated by the fact that my units are single bases but I think this will work just fine. A couple of the spare 'pikes forward' individual figures from the sprues does the job when placed in front of a base of foot.

As usual the link to the rules is on Tony's Prometheus in Aspic blog linked at right where you will find the  complete rule booklet, the Command and 'Chaunce' cards and the Stand of Pikes tracker, also if you wish to have a read of the 'Ramekin' variant which uses Activation Chips and dice roll to replace the use of cards and emphasises Command and Control in a most effective way then it's also to be found on the link there.

More cut down Yankees!

That's another 10 ACW Epic strips this week, cut down to 3's, painted and varnished so 1 complete sprue of 100 figures and just 10 individual figures discarded. They work out at just 7.5p per figure and there is still the gun and crew and mounted officer left on the sprue to paint later. The paint job is quite fast but I do take care with detail work and at 13.5mm's I know that Noel is very happy which is what counts to me. Noel is basing them on small 20mm frontage MDF bases for his Original Fire & Fury project.

This coming week is another sprue of Rebs (the blue and grey sprues are of course identical) so a slightly more varied paint job.

More cutting up Epic strips - this time it's ACW's for Noel!

 Alongside the big Wars of The Roses 15mm commission ongoing for Noel I'm also continuing to add to his original Brigade level ACW Fire & Fury project Warlord Epic figures per 20mm frontage base. Just a couple of sprues per month over the last several months. Noel already has an extensive AWC Epic Black Powder collection that I painted for him previously so this is a separate project for the F&F rules. My job is to cut the strips down into 3's (1 wasted figure per strip) then paint and varnish, Noel is doing the basing himself which I'm rather pleased about. Brigades of 10 or 12 such small bases actually look very good together. This month I'm doing 1 Union sprue and 1 Reb sprue.

Cutting the strips - it really is very easy to cut down these strips and I find that the early Epic ACW strips are the easiest to do for some reason as they part very neatly when bent. Always cut through the base first between the feet and then a gentle back and forth bending will cause them to part.  if these is any slight damage along the arms then a quick trim up with a scalpel does the trick nd to be honest once undercoated they look absolutely fine, I have tried to illustrate this in the photos below, before and after painting.

'This War without an Enemy' - Progress report.

 With the newly printed C&C mat now winging it's way from Spain thanks to FedEx and due for delivery on Wednesday I think it's time now to get a couple of small forces together in readiness for a first run through. What you see below is where I am so far and as said previously I'm very pleased how these little bases have turned out as I was never confident that it could be done I have to admit. I'm making labels for the underside of each base with a unit name and starting strength in blocks, type of unit etc. I need to print a nice set of command cards this week and order some plastic sleeves for them from Amazon. 

Terrain - I took the decision some time ago that any terrain must be suitable for the 60mm frontage single bases, so hexes will be ordered from Warbases and I'll be making hills by my usual MDF/5mm Foamboard sandwich method. I'll be using magnetic printing paper to create any roads and rivers to lay directly on the printed mat. Buildings are always an issue with hex terrain, especially where smaller hex grids are in use so I decided to downscale any buildings to 6mm in order to be able to fit them a round the unit bases, well out of scale I know with my 13.5mm figures but with a small 5mm base added at least a height of about 35mm can be achieved with a small footprint that I hope won't look too bad. It's a board game after all and such compromises are not uncommon. Buildings are on order from Steve at Battlescale wonderful English rural range of half timbered buildings. 

So here are the two small armies so far ready to do battle as I continue to add more. Hit markers will be 10mm MDF circles painted green with a small number painted on in white as per my usual method and simply placed on the unit base as required. 

Trying a white basecoat again!

 This week I am painting a unit of 30 x 1/72nd WSS Spanish Pro - Bourbon Infantry (Strelets) for Old John. As they wear long white coats and stockings I decided to begin with an off white undercoat and work them up from there. To be honest I'm rather pleased with both the method and the finish and timings were about the same as using my usual black base. I have another 8 painted yesterday completed (seen in their white undercoats below) and today I'll be painting 6 more including the officers/standard bearers/musician. this will leave just the last 8 to complete the unit by the weekend. Might need to lighten the cuffs a little as I used the superb box art for reference but I think Regimiento Saboya as requested had lighter blue cuffs and breeches, no problem.

Grenadiers in front with red  stockings.

Another WoR Faction has arrived from Noel with additional Mercenary crossbowmen and a few other bits. I also continue to add more ECW units for myself as my printed mat if now on it's way from Spain via FedEx thanks to Rollingmats.

Below: WoR artillery (15mm Peter Pig) heading back to Ireland for Noel along with two completed Factions numbers 4 & 5!

ECW progress video - 14 seconds!