15/18mm American Civil War: Update 5, River and Bridges.

So update 5, more terrain. At the end of the last update I showed the terrain from, amongst others, TimeCast that I had bought, now it was time to get it painted.

Terrain items bought at Hammerhead.

The three bridges, two wooden, one stone, are resin whilst the river sections are latex rubber. The resin items had their bases sanded to level them and then they and the river pieces where washed and left to dry.

The bridges were under-coated grey, areas block painted, washes applied and then dry-brushed. Muddy track parts of the castings were painted to match the felt tracks I had got from Hotz Mats, seen below with Hotz Mats fields and some troops for scale.

Hotz Mats felt tracks and fields.

Bank areas were flocked and finally the water areas were painted, more on the colour later. They were then matt varnished and after drying the water areas were given a coat of Humbrol Clear Gloss varnish.

Finished bridges

Bridges with troop stand for scale.

So now the rivers and what colour to paint them. I knew I didn't want bright blue as these would be used mostly for ACW games with lots of wooded areas nearby in most cases. I tried a sandy colour with a blue wash, didn't look right. A sandy base with a green wash, again wrong. Dark centre with lighter sides? nope. Grey green? no. Finally settled on a single colour, that being Vallejo 887 Brown Violet, the same colour I use for my WWI british aircraft. The only variation was the centre of the ford sections which I painted a sandy colour before washing with a thinned brown violet and adding a few small rocks.

I didn't prime the river sections as the TimeCast website said this was not required. The banks were base-coated the same colour as that used to do the mud track and bank parts of the bridges before getting an Agrax Earthshade wash then dry brush with the base-coat. I then painted in the river itself before applying a couple of coats of brush on acrylic gloss varnish then a coat of Humbrol Clear Gloss (applying the gloss varnish at this point was stupid in hindsight). I then flocked the banks before realising that to seal these with spray matt varnish I was going to have to mask all the gloss water sections or spray the entirety matt and redo the gloss, see previous comment about hindsight!

In the end I sprayed the whole thing and when dried reapplied a coat of Humbrol Clear Gloss to the water areas, plus a little on the crossings of the fords to give a wet effect.

Finished river and ford sections, light gives a helpful reflection.

I'm not entirely happy with how the river came out. My error with the varnishing order has meant there are possibly too many layers of paint/varnish on what are very flexible pieces and some very fine crack lines can been seen in the river surfaces. I may have to strip these back at some point in the future an redo applying the lessons learned. If they had been non flexible river sections or a larger scale I probably would have approached them completely differently and used some form of water effects. Hopefully if I store them correctly they will survive for a while.

One last thing I knocked up quickly were some markers to denote Heavy Casualties for Fire & Fury. As I haven't got any suitable miniatures I decided to use a simple flag on a base indicate this. A bit of research led to discover that both sides utilised a plain yellow flag to identify field hospitals (a green edge was added late in the war by the Union) so this is what I went for.

Heavy casualty markers.

Next, finish those seven bases of infantry before tackling the earthworks and fences.

Tony.

White Plains - Chatterton Hill 1776. Game at NBHW

On Friday night I took part in a American War of Independence game at New Buckenham. The game was played using an in house set of rules and was based on the action around Chatterton Hill in 1776, part of the Battle of White Plains. For information on the battle see Revolutionary War US article.

The initial set up saw Continental regulars and militia defending walled field enclosures across the top of the hill with some rifles forward towards the Bronx river. The initial units of British had just crossed this river at a fortuitously discovered ford and were advancing towards the hill.

Initial set up, Bronx River on the left , Chatterton Hill down the centre.

I will concentrate on my command in this report, for more details on how the whole game played out and a shed load more photographs see the club's Facebook Album

My British command having just crossed the Bronx River.

My command consisted of the leading elements of General Leslie's 2nd Brigade, the 28th and 35th Regiments of Foot together with two 12lbs of the Royal Artillery. I immediately advanced the infantry towards Chatterton Hill with the 35th on the right drifting slightly further right to open up the arcs of fire for the artillery. The Continental rifle men to my front closed up and stood laughing as once again, becoming a bit of a habit when playing these rules, my infantry refused to charge. I blame the artillery fire from the continental 6lbers on the hill.

The rest of the 2nd Brigade arrived and deployed, with the 5th forward, 49th supporting, to my left and started advancing towards the centre of the hill.

5th and 49th advance on my left while General Leslie gives the 28th a bit of a talking to.

The Continentals chose this moment to abandon their defences atop the hill and advance down towards the British, good news for the Royal Artillery who started inflicting casualties as they came.

The 5th and 49th inexplicably stopped their own advance and traded musketry with the 19th Continentals whilst also now becoming the target of the 6lbers.

My 35th advanced to the right to engage the rebel left flank while the 28th dressed to the right of the 49th. The 35th soon found themselves engaged by over five hundred muskets of the 1st New York and Delaware regiments.

The 19th Continentals now charged the softened up 5th Foot who routed and fled back across the Bronx River. The jubilant rebels careered on into the steady lines of the 49th, who under General Leslie's personal command saw them off  before they were hit by artillery fire into their flank as they retired from distant Hessian guns, routing them.

The 3rd New York that had charged down the Hill with the 19th ran into my advancing 28th Foot and were routed in turn, with the 28th continuing their advance behind.

The 35th however decided to give ground and pulled back to enable the Royal Artillery to deal with the 1st New York and Delaware regiments who also started to pull back to their original positions.

Events to the left of the British flank plus the time resulted in the game being called at this point.

In the overall battle the Continentals suffered 243 casualties to the British and Hessian 237. More tellingly the Continental right flank had collapsed, so with the impending loss of Chatterton Hill it was called a British and Hessian victory.

Once again another great, close game with these rules played with some superb figures from other club member's collections.

Tony.