Visit to Soldiers in Silloth

So, she thought she was getting a nice break away in the Lake District, just the two of us and the dog. Doing couple things. So she sends me into the little tourist info place in Pooley Bridge and out I come exitedly waving a leaflet and babbling on to the tune of CANWEGOCANWEGOCANWEGO!!!!!!

I had no idea there was a Toy Soldier museum in the North of England. In fact I had no idea where Silloth was? Turned out to be a town high up on the Solway Coast, not far from the border to Scotland.

So we went!

It's a small museum but packed full of total joy and magic! I met the extremely decent chap whose collection is houses and learnt that it had only been open since 2012. I purchased a few books, a Britains Herald origional ACW figure and made some donations before browsing the delights inside.

Here are a few pics, sorry for the poor quality, took them on my phone.

If you get the chance please do go and support it!

http://www.soldiersinsilloth.co.uk

London Toy Soldier Show 9th Dec 2013

So, this year I fulfilled a long held ambition to attend a London Toy Soldier Show. Met Ken from Scarborough's Maison Millitaire, not seen him in years since the shop closed. Also met up with Tim H. and EB from the Loose Forum. Good catch up and bought some things for the Little Wars game we have coming up at our annual games weekend at Ayton in May next year.



People had come from all over Europe, possibly did the same as me and combined it with a long weekend. I went with friends Kay and Rog and we took in the V&A, Natural History and British Museum as well as a visit to a book shop with the biggest Osprey section I have ever seen!

On the whole the show was a bit of an anti-climax for me, these days I can't afford metal 54mm figures and much of it was over priced. It lacked a lot of what wargames shows have, notably any games! It is purely a collectors fair and didn't have the community spirit you might find at such a show as Smoggycon. Never the less it was worth seeing. The turnover of new releases in the toy soldier scale is so slow, it'll probably be a few years before I feel like going to another one. I think I am more a wargamer and collector of the smaller scales these days.

Here is a pictoral review of a few things that caught my eye.

WWII 20mm Battlegroups

I've been tidying up my wargames room and took pics of my current 20mm vehicles with a view to sorting them out for some future Rapid Fire games. So far ths is what I have unearthed from the rubble.

Pictures of Gettysburg Db/ACW game.

This was a three day wargame of Gettsyburg laid on by Alex in his hotel. The figures are all plastic 1/72 scale and most of the terrain, including the town of Gettysburg itself was scratch built. The rules are an adapted version of Alex's DbN rule set available here: http://www.dbnwargaming.co.uk

Alex gives a briefing.

Opening moves. 

Tiger Zouaves lead the way. These were Norman's units that swept the Union off Culps Hill and held it throughout the battle. 

Custer himself. My cavalry units that were tasked with sweeping down the far side of Culps Hill and tying up as many Rebs as possible and if practicable to retake Culps Hill.

Rebs line the fences in front of the Peach Orchard and the Round Tops. 

Meade's HQ. 

Final stages at the Round Tops, Rebs taking a lot of losses here but in the end not enough. 

In a nutshell, the battle of Gettysburg in this instance took 2 long days of hard fighting. The Confederates slammed into the town of Gettysburg with force early on the first day, capturing it completely by day two and pressing on across Culps Hill. Huge reinforcements from the Confederates swung down the roads behind the Peach Orchard to prepare to take the Round Tops but a strong defence, particularly by the New Yorkers and the Berdan's held them off causing huge losses. Despite this after two days the exhausted Union had to concede and withdraw. The attempts to take back Culps Hill were impossible. The last move of the battle by a young Custer saved the Union pride and the army of the Potomac drew back to fight another day. 

Board games!

I've recently been playing Command & Colours Napoleonics and the odd game of Ancients and Memoir 44, love them so far! Plan on playing these while I plough through the lead/plastic pile.

My 28mm WWII stuff continues to grow too and I now have the Chain of Command Rules. This Firefly was origionally a bodge job but I managed to salvage it. 

Also been painting lots of donated Plastic Soldier Company ex review kits kindly given to us by Henry Hide of Miniature Wargames with Battlegames magazine. I enjoy painting 1/72 tanks but the figures seem more a chore than 28's. Here are some I made earlier, the tranfers of the Allied Stars were from the Pendraken guys (thanks Leon).