"Firing into the Brown" #84 - 3D, Orleans and stuff..

"So Carnehan weeds out the pick of his men, and sets the two of the Army to show them drill and at the end of two weeks the men can manoeuvre about as well as Volunteers. So he marches with the Chief to a great big plain on the top of a mountain, and the Chiefs men rushes into a village and takes it; we three Martinis firing into the brown of the enemy".

Kipling "The Man Who Would Be King"

Time for another update..  

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By way of a wrap up, and also because this is an amazing 3D mapping project by a very talented lady that (although a trifle "niche" 😁) needs to be seen by more people - the following puts the "Gates" mini project into an overall context.. 

Note the following we have visited on the blog (click for the post .. if you haven't had enough already 😏):

• King James (or Point) Gate at 0.15 sec and 2.50 sec
• Camber Bastion at 0.37 sec and 2.41 sec
• Kings Bastion and the Spur Redoubt 0.54 sec
• King William Gate 1.10 sec
• Landport Gate 1.40 sec
• Beestons Bastion 2.16 sec
• King George (or Quay) Gate 2.37 sec

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Regimental Standard - Copyright: Kronoskaf

Another in the occasional "regiments of renown" series featuring the histories of various regiments painted in haste at the beginning of a project but which were not documented here for posterity.. so we come to French cavalry regiment "Orleans", part of my War of the Spanish Succession collection - this one was quite possibly the first French cavalry unit I painted for the project...

There is a very (very) good potted history of this regiment on the Kronoskaf WSS site (link below) so there's little point in me repeating the (huge amount of) good work completed there, but by way of a framework to hang some 'rabbit holes' on (and I do love a rabbit hole😏) the regiment was first raised in Piedmont (Italy) in 1630 by the Commander de Souvré. The regiment transferred into the French service in May 1635. 

The regiment was serving in Flanders at the start of the War of the Spanish Succession (1701-13) and had three squadrons.

As is usually the case the regiment was named after their Colonel, the Duc d’Orléans , but in the field were commanded by these august gentlemen.. unusually (as I've found to now) there seems to be little or no information on these guys other than the tried and trusted information..  

Duc de Orleans - Portrait by
Jean-Baptiste Santerre

• from 1 May 1693: Jacques-Joseph Vipart, Marquis de Silly (a Knight of the Order of the Holy Spirit no less) - 
• Silly commanded a brigade of cavalry at Blenheim, comprising his own regiment, plus the Regiment de Montreval, the Regiment de St. Pouanges and the Regiment de Ligonday - about 500 men in all, in 9 squadrons..
• from what little I have managed to find out about him "..he is said to have been of a haughty and arrogant disposition and after attaining the rank of Lieutenant Général des Armées du Roi he put an end to his life by throwing himself out of a window in a paroxysm of mortified ambition" (from the forward to the "Memoirs of Madame de Staal de Launay" a lady who had fancied him but not had her feelings returned, but despite that cast him in a more pleasant light than most seemed to.. 😏)
• he was wounded, and taken prisoner at Blenheim and the regiment was then given to ..
• from 25 December 1704 to 6 March 1719: Nicolas-Louis Grostête* de Jouy
• apparently an outside choice for the command of the regiment, and someone who the Duc de Orleans had gone outside of the box to choose. From what I can tell the concerns were mainly due to Nicolas's lack of influence or seniority in terms of aristocracy.. 
• he was clearly able as he commanded the brigade after Silly's absence and on at least two occasions was trusted to take them on missions away from the army 

*Grostête doesn't that translate as fat-head?? 😐

War service by year:

• 1701 in Flanders
• 1702 combat of Nijmegen
• 1703 siege and capture of Alt-Breisach; Siege of Landau; Combat of Speyerbach
• 1704 Battle of Blenheim
• 1705 in Alsace being brought back up to strength
• 1706 operations on the Rhine.
• 1707 transferred to Flanders
• 1708 Battle of Oudenarde
• 1709 Battle of Malplaquet
• 1711 Combat of Arleux
• 1712 Battle of Denain; siege and recapture of Douai; Siege and recapture of Le Quesnoy; Siege and recapture of Bouchain.
• 1713 transferred to the Rhine; capture of Landau and Freiburg.

These are Dixon's and painted and based by me some time pre-2006, and as I say probably one of the first regiments I painted - I have a curious antipathy towards flags for my cavalry units - so there isn't one.. 😏

Further Reading:

• Orléans Cavalerie - Project WSS (Kronoskaf)

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Laters, as the young people are want to say...

"Firing into the Brown" #83 - last of the gates and stuff..

"So Carnehan weeds out the pick of his men, and sets the two of the Army to show them drill and at the end of two weeks the men can manoeuvre about as well as Volunteers. So he marches with the Chief to a great big plain on the top of a mountain, and the Chiefs men rushes into a village and takes it; we three Martinis firing into the brown of the enemy".

Kipling "The Man Who Would Be King"

Time for another update..  too damn hot in the loft so time to get out on Gertrude

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...and so we come to the very last of the four gates that allowed access to the old/original Portsmouth, and also, alas, to the end of this most enjoyable little mini local history project..  it's been great fun..  be quite sad to see the end of it, but I don't doubt the odd rabbit hole will present itself going forward..  😏

So the last gate, the King William's Gate, is also the last in other ways actually - as it was the last of the four gates to be built, not being completed until 1834 - and having built it, it was demolished with the rest of the fortifications only 40 years later (1876'ish)

Starting with a map to orientate ourselves:

The gate is ringed - you'll note that it was protected by it's own ravelin (long long gone and no signs of it now) and was in the southern quarter of the old town - adjacent to Kings Bastion (which we have been to already [clicky]). Note also the Guard House just inside the gate..

Some period pictures and photo's..  no date on the following, but it shows the outer face of what was clearly quite a utilitarian gate, no monographs, balls, crowns, entablature (still like that word!) or globes, and not a bit of gilding to be seen. A veritable "Tesco Blue stripe" kind of a gate... 😏

..the one following shows the view into the town, I suspect not long after the gate was demolished - it's not clear but that looks like rubble on the slope just in front of the guard house (left centre - two chimney pots) previously mentioned, which is also now visible..

There's a tiny picture in the "further reading" link, but I thought this painting of the inner side of the gate was good..  I suspect it is of the time, but unfortunately there is no dating information..  again - note the guardhouse, but also note the railings..   😁

...and here's the gatehouse (following) as of yesterday.. the actual gate and wall would be left of picture..  note also the fences which may be original - it's a school playing field now but it's also the grounds for the Royal Garrison Church..

...the line of the old fortifications..  this footpath runs directly to Kings Bastion and would have followed the line..

..following - the bit on the side is clearly newer..  I think the inside of the wall and gate would have butted up to the wall the alarm is on..

..following - the other end of the footpath, wonder whether some of those stones have been re-used from the demolition of the original walls? The plaque by the way, is a remembrance of a previous noteworthy's favourite horse... 

...and last of all a view to what would have been the inside of the gate 150 odd years ago...

Last of all though I'll leaved you with this one, which is a cracker... click to embigen..   we've visited the volunteer reviews before [clicky]

"The Volunteer Review at Portsmouth: The Defending Force Concentrating at King William's Gate UK 1869" - Illustrated London News

Further reading and stuff:

• Memorials and Monuments in Old Portsmouth (King Williams Gate)

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 Laters, as the young people are want to say...

"Firing into the Brown" #82 - Forsyth, the dark side of the shed(s) and stuff...

"So Carnehan weeds out the pick of his men, and sets the two of the Army to show them drill and at the end of two weeks the men can manoeuvre about as well as Volunteers. So he marches with the Chief to a great big plain on the top of a mountain, and the Chiefs men rushes into a village and takes it; we three Martinis firing into the brown of the enemy".

Kipling "The Man Who Would Be King"

Time for another update..

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It would ill behove me not to mention the recent passing (reported this week) of that monumental story teller Frederick Forsyth..

Steve the Wargamer has been reading Forsyth repeatedly (since all books should be considered as friends and revisited frequently, and preferably also taken to the pub 😏) since his early years and for the huge amount of enjoyment Mr Forsyth has given me I'd just like to say "thank you"..

The 'triumvirate' of Dogs of War, Odessa File but most of all Day of the Jackal are for me in the top 10 thrillers of all time, Jackal would be in my top 3, and his other later books were no slouches either (Fourth Protocol  especially).. with those three books, written in the early 70's, he undoubtedly influenced generations of future authors to adopt that same procedural, detail driven genre of  thriller..  

I'll be raising a glass to him later..  thanks, sir.

Further reading:

• Frederick Forsyth, Day of the Jackal author and former MI6 agent, dies aged 86 | Frederick Forsyth | The Guardian
• Frederick Forsyth (Fantastic Fiction book list)

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So you may remember a while back I discovered a delightful rabbit hole (yeah, yet another!😏) to dive down while I was doing the mini project on the "Hilsea Lines". 

I'd read about how they'd dammed and dredged Portsea Creek (which is the body of water - still there - that makes Portsmouth an island) at both ends, in order to maintain enough water level at low tide for the operation of gunboats as part of the overall defence strategy. The rabbit hole was that the Navy had then needed a maintenance facility for the large numbers of gunboats deployed at that time [clicky] - not just for those used in the defence of the Lines, but also the large numbers of other gunboats used at the time (and the Navy had over a 100 of them at one time).

I'd managed to get some photos of these sheds (which still exist) from across the harbour, but one of my disappointments was that I had not been able to get up close, because they were on secure property (it's a Joint Services Sailing Centre I think).

Well ... disappointed I am no longer (as Yoda would say), as when I was walking to the pub following a visit to the Submarine Museum in Gosport last weekend I happened to notice that the facility seemed to be open (I only noticed because a lady had just walked out with her dog! 😏) and the security guys hut was shut and empty..

Not wanting to waste the opportunity I walked through, past the old perimeter defence walls and there were the sheds - behind barbed wire so I didn't get to do a close up exploration - but blimey they are big. Remember this is not all of them, originally there would have been enough capacity to maintain 50 gunboats at a time if required (at one per shed!)..

I wonder if this office type building following is original? During the war this was HMS Hornet (an MTB/MGB base for the Royal Navy with boats operating in the Channel) and I wonder if the Admiralty made use of the space?

Note the rails that are still in place...

Those complex roof supports are amazing..  like an iron spiders web...

3 pairs of rails per shed... 🤔

Regrettably the mechanism for pulling the gunboats from the water and then shifting them sideways one way or the other to go into the sheds is long gone

Fantastic to finally get up close to see them almost in the flesh...

Lots more fascinating meat on the bones in this document [clicky] and it confirms my guess about that office building and war time use..

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 Laters, as the young people are want to say...

"Firing into the Brown" #81 - Camber Bastion, Orkney's and stuff...

"So Carnehan weeds out the pick of his men, and sets the two of the Army to show them drill and at the end of two weeks the men can manoeuvre about as well as Volunteers. So he marches with the Chief to a great big plain on the top of a mountain, and the Chiefs men rushes into a village and takes it; we three Martinis firing into the brown of the enemy".

Kipling "The Man Who Would Be King"

Time for another update..

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Whilst getting the pictures for the post on the King George (or Quay) Gate the other week I happened to notice this on the side of a very new shed like building on the estate between where the Quay and King James Gates would have been..

...and then I noticed this on the side ..

..by way of orientation - the bastion would have been here - the year dates it to the de Gomme fortifications..  the positions of the two gates are highlighted..

..this picture following is from that post on the King George/Quay Gate..  the bastion would have been just out of picture on the left..

The Inner Camber - the King James Gate location is off to the left behind the row of houses/flats in the distance - best guess the two pointy roofed one's.. the front face of the King George or Quay Gate would have been behind me..

...and then I found this in the British Museum Online Gallery

"A VIEW of the NEW MAGAZINE on ye CAMBER at PORTSMOUTH as taken from ye POINT GATE Ano 1716"

Two things about that picture... first, the "Point" gate they refer to in the inscription would have been the King James Gate, the engraving pre-dates the King George (or Quay) Gate by about 18 years, but the Elizabethan sally port/arch would have been up there near the fences top left (behind the boat), and second, the monogram that kicked off this little rabbit hole can be seen next to the square opening in the camber outer face.. 😊

So..  built in 1687, it was basically a triangular limestone gun platform which projected into the Camber - by the early 1700s the garrison magazine was built in to the landward end of the bastion (I think that's the large square building in the engraving) but that became redundant by the middle of the 1700s when it was relocated further out of the city (I suspect the citizens of Pompey would have been quite happy about that - it would have made a big bang if it had gone off! 😁).

By 1865 the bastion was in use as the garrisons out-pensioners* establishment (which would have saved it from the general demolishment of the walls going on at the time) but was then redeveloped as a military hospital which remained in use until the early 1900s. The bastion was eventually demolished in about 1935 which may explain why we still have those monograms..

History's all around us.. 😀

* now here's a thing I didn't know.. historically, all British Army pensions were administered by the Royal Hospital Chelsea, any veterans in receipt of this payment were known as Out-Pensioners but those accepted for admission to the actual Royal Hospital surrendered this payment and were known as In-Pensioners.

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George Hamilton, 1st Earl of Orkney - Colonel
of the regiment from 1692 to 1737!

Another in the occasional "regiments of renown" series featuring the histories of various regiments painted in haste at the beginning of a project but which were not documented here for posterity.. so we come to British infantry regiment "Lord Orkney’s Regiment of Foot", part of my War of the Spanish Succession collection

There is a very (very) good potted history of this regiment on the Kronoskaf WSS site (link below) so there's little point in me repeating the (huge amount of) good work completed there (and there really is, it's one of the most comprehensive regimental histories I've seen on this excellent site), but by way of a framework to hang some 'rabbit holes' on (and I do love a rabbit hole😏) the regiment was first raised for French service*  by a Royal Warrant dated March 1633 awarded to Sir John Hepburn, who was their first colonel. They were known in French as “Regiment d’Hebron” and at one time numbered almost 8,000 men!

*(Charles had married Henrietta Maria, a princess of the French Royal family, in 1625, and the marriage treaty that was signed with it meant a fair few British military resources were then loaned to the French King to be used in his wars against the Spanish)

The formation date certainly makes this one of, if not the, oldest regiments of the line in the British Army. It then existed in its own right (as the 1st Foot after the organisation of 1751) right up until 2006, when it amalgamated with a number of other Scottish regiments to form the Royal Regiment of Scotland - which may explain why their nickname in the British Army is "Pontius Pilates Guard" 😁

Seniority is more complicated (as you'd expect it's a fairly touchy subject!) but I think they would be ranked as the most senior of the foot regiments of the British army, just behind the Guard regiments who differentiate, and are senior, by the fact they are.. errr.. Guards.. 😏

Cutting to the chase... during the War of the Spanish Succession it's fair to say they had a busy war, not the least, serving in all four of the major engagements..

Sir John Hepburn

• 1701, one  of the first thirteen British battalions (or rather in there case two, as uniquely the regiment sent both battalions to the war - most regiments would have kept one back as a training cadre and source for reinforcements) William III sends to assist the Dutch Republic in support of the Treaty of The Hague
• 1702
• siege of Kaiserwerth and then the regiment along with the Foot Guards and other British units formed the rear guard during a French relief attempt
• siege of Venlo
• one battalion of the regiment was detached for the siege of Stevensweert
• siege of Liège
• 1703
• first battalion of the regiment brigaded with the Foot Guards and the regiments of Stewart, Howe, Ingoldsby, and Marlborough, under Brigadier -General Withers 
• second battalion and the regiments of North and Grey, Derby, Row, and Ferguson, under Brigadier-General the Earl of Derby. 
• 1704
• part of Marlborough's march to the Danube,
• Battle of the Schellenberg where they charged three times before storming the Bavarian entrenchments.
• siege of Ingoldstadt
• Battle of Blenheim
• siege of Landau. 
• 1705
• recruits from Scotland
• first battalion siege of Huy
• part of the force to attack the fortified lines of the French
• 1706
• Battle of Ramillies where it was initially deployed near the right of the first line, on the heights of Foulz
• sieges and captures of Dendermonde, Ostend and Menin. 
• one battalion of the regiment was detached for the siege of Ath

• 1707 
• first battalion was brigaded with the Foot Guards, Godfrey's Foot and Sabine's Foot under Brigadier-General Meredith
• second battalion was brigaded with Webb's Foot, Ingoldsby's Foot, Tatton's Foot and Temple's Foot under the command of Brigadier-General Sir Richard Temple.
• 1708
• following the threat of a possible French invasion of Britain the regiment with several others was ordered to return to England. Following the failed invasion attempt the regiment was sent back to Flanders.
• Battle of Oudenarde, where it formed part of the division commanded by the Duke of Argyle.
• siege of Lille
• part of the force which advanced to relieve the French siege of Bruxelles
• siege of Ghent where a detachment of the regiment formed part of the forlorn-hope

• 1709
• more recruits from Scotland
• siege of Tournai
• battle of Malplaquet, in the division commanded by General Count Lottum, engaged in the assault of the entrenchments in the wood of Taisnière.
• siege and capture of Mons
• 1710,
• siege Douai
• siege of Béthune
• siege of Aire
• 1711 
• siege of Bouchain
• 1712 
• siege of Quesnoy
• preparatory to a general treaty of peace, the agreed to deliver the city of Dunkerque into the hands of the British as a pledge of his sincerity The regiment was part of the garrison and remained in the city nearly two years.

• 1713, a treaty of peace having been concluded at Utrecht, the British troops were ordered to return from Flanders.
• 1714 went into garrison at Portsmouth (I'm guessing Gosport? No evidence to suggest it was actually in Portsmouth itself) and Plymouth.

These are Dixon's and painted and based by me some time pre-2006, probably one of the first regiments I painted - the flag is new as of this post [clicky - thanks again for your work David!] as the old one was decidedly battle damaged.. 😏

I chose to depict them with blue facings (which I think they were got at the end of the 17th C) but most pictures/references for the period still show them in the older grey/white facings..

R.J. Marrion’s illustration of a man of Orkney’s Regiment of Foot (from the Charles Grant book cover).

Further Sources:

• Royal Foot - Project WSS
• George Hamilton, 1st Earl of Orkney - Wikipedia

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"Laters", as the young people are want to say...

Shootout at the Sierra Corral - Preamble, Setup and Game

Time for another update..  a game report for a change..

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Preamble..

As the sun rose over a sleepy Cedar Gulch and gradually lit the Sierra Corral and its sales office, the inhabitants of the (normally) sleepy town little knew what a rude awakening they were about to experience..

Wes Alsop, the owner of the Sierra (which was situated just outside the town), had taken delivery the day before of some new horses for the local ranch, the "Lazy C". Chaz Bishop, senior hand on the ranch, had taken the opportunity to ride over to pick the horses up, and at the same time have a coffee and a yarn with his old friend. 

As they sat there in the office, the rich smell of coffee filling the air, neither of them knew that they were to be the cause of their local citizens rude awakening, for unbeknownst to them, the horses had also attracted the attention of some of the local bad men.

'Deadeye' Cooper and Fred Early had been in town the day before drinking in the 'Silver Dollar' ("Whiskey, Beer and Rooms") when someone had happened to mention the arrival of the horses. Looking out the window at their own beaten up old nags, the victims of one too many escapes and hard rides, the looked at each other and words unspoken, lifted their glasses to each other in salute. As the evening went on they got into conversation with Gus Farley, a saddle tramp, who also invited himself in on the "party". One more gun would never go amiss...

Dramatis Personae

The number is the characters toughness rating - the lower the number the tougher the hombre..

Table and Scenario Specific Rules:

• I'm using Ruthless [clicky] again - Ruthless-Fastest-Rules-in-the-West-3.pdf (fireballforward.com) [clicky] ..they're free gratis, but more importantly they drive a fantastic narrative 
• Top of the picture following is North
• Deadeye enters at 2/.
• Fred and Gus at 1/.
• Wes and Chaz are in the front of the office come bunk house at 3/.
• Neither Wes or Chas can react until one movement in view of any of the bad guys, and even then Wes is cursed with a sense of fairness and won't open fire until shot upon
• The horses are unsaddled and in the Corral, and for any of the bad guys to get them away they need to expend 4 actions/two complete turns doing absolutely nothing else - after that they move at foot rate in any direction the bad guys wishes to take them (there are gates in the fence so I'm not going to make it any more difficult for them than it already is 😏)
• Winner is the side that either has the horses in (the good guys) or out (the bad guys) of the Corral
• The "Skeddadle" dice is a D6 rather than a D10 due to the small size of each group 
• Any move that includes shooting will result in the horses moving D6" in a direction decided by a direction dice
• All ground is good going except rocks, hills, fences, scrub/inside building which counts as rough. Scrub/fences count soft cover, building/logs/rocks hard cover. Hills/rocks/building block line of sight

The Game

[Move 1] 

Start of move..

As the sun slowly rose over the horizon, and a new day burned its way into the retinas, at the  far end of town Wes and Chaz, breakfast over and coffee in hand, are chatting, laughing and reminiscing about previous misdeeds, narrow escapes, ladies loved and lost, the best brands of sipping whiskey and the favourite horses of their respective youths [their cards are discarded as they require one full move to react to any sighting]. 

Across the way Fred gets the drop on his compadres and runs across the open ground to join up with Deadeye who moves into the cover of the fallen logs closer to the office. Gus, the most trepidous of the three, moves to the cover of bushes north of the corral.

The horses snicker and move nervously [no shooting so no movement].

Skeddadle dice not required (no casualties/unconscious or lily livered...  yet... 😏)

[Move 2]  Wes spots Fred running across the clearing the other side of the Corral and something about his furtive manner makes him drop his coffee cup, pull his iron and drop down to get the full cover of the window shouting a warning to Chaz.

Deadeye, cursing the stupidity of his partner at being seen so soon, sprints to the side of the cabin nearest him coming to a rest next to the window, back to the wall while Fred runs to the fence line, using the horses to cover him from the cabin. Gus, screwing up his courage, runs to the scrub at the north east corner of the Corral.

Chaz is slow but pulls his iron drops down to the other side of the window and snaps off a shot at Gus. [One shot only to allow for the other actions - not aimed - can ignore long range - target in soft cover - but not surprisingly perhaps he misses]

Sitrep End Move 2 before horses move

The horses snicker and move nervously towards the cabin [dice(s) give 3" to the East]

Skeddadle dice again not required (yet.. 😏)

[Move 3]  Gun still in hand, and Gus still visible, Chaz takes advantage aims and squeezes off another shot at him across the way [long range but that be ignored because of his character trait, soft cover but the aimed shot counters that] and is rewarded with the sound of a shout of pain from  Gus - "hit 'im" he grunts to Wes.. better.. he's fairly sure Gus is going nowhere soon [he was right - Gus failed his subsequent morale test and becomes "lily livered"..  'shaken' in other words] but his optimism is rudely rewarded with a couple of shots in return from the wounded Gus, splintering the wood work around the window but doing no other harm..

Across the corral, Fred jumps the fence and moves towards the horses, still keeping them between him and the office. At the side of the office Deadeye turns and jumps to the side window intending to fire off a shot at Wes in the room. out of the corner of his eye Wes sees him and quickly snaps off a shot at him before he can fire. Deadeye grunts in pain and drops out of sight - shot untaken.[Interesting passage of play from a rule perspective and shows their flexibility - so Deadeye had the initiative, but the rules allow a character who is about to be fired at, but who hasn't activated yet this turn, to "get the draw" - overwatch if you like. Wes tested (at -1 as I allowed Deadeye his "stealth" bonus), but won, and managed to get a successful shot off  before Deadeye could shoot - Deadeye then failed his subsequent morale test so I adjudged that the wound - which was serious - plus the failed morale test would have meant him dropping out of sight pronto]

End Turn 3 - just prior to the failed "Skedaddle" test - yellow pins indicate "lily livered"/shaken

Fred shouts "I'm getting out of here!" and runs for cover (and the town), and is swiftly followed by both Deadeye and Gus..  looks like the beaten up old nags are going to have to suffer yet another hard ride.. [with two characters now on failed morale the bad guys needed to get over 2 on a D6 or fail the skedaddle test - needless to say they threw a 2 😏]

Post Match Analysis:

• Short, sharp and sweet - like a good Tequila (or so I understand... 😀) - but another fantastic short story delivered by this set of rules..  you can just smell the heat, the dust, the sweat and the cordite when you play...
• Not a lot of lead thrown, but Wes and Chaz were very accurate, both hitting and hitting hard with their few shots..             

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 "Laters", as the young people are want to say...