A Napoleonic Wargame

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Introduction

The title of this website is an expression of my ambition which I hope shall unfold for you over the coming months. Although I have had an interest in wargaming for as much as thirty-five years, for most of that time I have been distracted by life, work and family.
It all began in the late 1960s when as a boy I walked into the dining room and saw laid out on the table, a patch of countryside with vehicles and soldiers arranged on the hills and valleys and in the woods.

My father and elder brother had borrowed a book from the library. This was The Wargame, by Donald Featherstone and they were trying out some of the ideas therein, using a blanket covering some books for terrain, with railway scenics and some Airfix models.

My imagination was fired and I began organising my own American Civil War Airfix figures in rank and file.

As the years passed my father indulged me with several games. Initially the result of a battle was usually decided on the basis of "last man standing". But gradually matters became a little more sophisticated. Orders were written and units would no longer fight to the last man but run away when numbers were severely reduced. On one occasion my father wrote orders for his cavalry, in which he muddled the compass directions and they charged directly across the face of my guns!
I thoroughly enjoyed our ACW games, but I really wanted to play Napoleonic Wargames. Early memories of paintings such as the retreat from Quatre Bras had given me an idea of the splendour of the uniforms, and the ideas of line and column and Cuirassiers and Hussars intrigued me.
However, for some reason, my next step was in fact in the direction of the English Civil War. Minifigs had just brought out a new range of 15mm figures and the prospect of getting enough figures ( in metal!!) to recreate some of the suggestions in Donald Featherstone's new books Advanced Wargaming and Wargame Campaigns (especially the fight for Alton Church) was very exciting.
I went on to play a bit of solo WRG Renaissance and have dabbled over the intervening few decades with a bit of WRG Ancient. Most recently I have played some Warhammer 40,000 as my son has grown up, and half a dozen games of DBM at a club. Now however I have sold all my odds and ends of figures, all but the original ECW 15mm figs, and have purchased a copy of a book which was very special to me at one time but which I sold years ago. The book is Napoleonic Wargaming by Charles Grant.

And now I intend to create a Napoleonic Wargame using these rules, a new battlefield, and plastic 1/72nd scale figures.
If you are interested, you are welcome to follow developments, as I shall endeavour to keep a journal of my progress in assembling the armies and the terrain in preparation for that long awaited moment when I might actually play my Napoleonic Wargame.

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	Introduction
	The title of this website is an expression of my ambition which I hope shall unfold for you over the coming months. Although I have had an interest in wargaming for as much as thirty-five years, for most of that time I have been distracted by life, work and family. It all began in the late 1960s when as a boy I walked into the dining room and saw laid out on the table, a patch of countryside with vehicles and soldiers arranged on the hills and valleys and in the woods. My father and elder brother had borrowed a book from the library. This was The Wargame, by Donald Featherstone and they were trying out some of the ideas therein, using a blanket covering some books for terrain, with railway scenics and some Airfix models. My imagination was fired and I began organising my own American Civil War Airfix figures in rank and file.

	As the years passed my father indulged me with several games. Initially the result of a battle was usually decided on the basis of "last man standing". But gradually matters became a little more sophisticated. Orders were written and units would no longer fight to the last man but run away when numbers were severely reduced. On one occasion my father wrote orders for his cavalry, in which he muddled the compass directions and they charged directly across the face of my guns! I thoroughly enjoyed our ACW games, but I really wanted to play Napoleonic Wargames. Early memories of paintings such as the retreat from Quatre Bras had given me an idea of the splendour of the uniforms, and the ideas of line and column and Cuirassiers and Hussars intrigued me. However, for some reason, my next step was in fact in the direction of the English Civil War. Minifigs had just brought out a new range of 15mm figures and the prospect of getting enough figures ( in metal!!) to recreate some of the suggestions in Donald Featherstone's new books Advanced Wargaming and Wargame Campaigns (especially the fight for Alton Church) was very exciting. I went on to play a bit of solo WRG Renaissance and have dabbled over the intervening few decades with a bit of WRG Ancient. Most recently I have played some Warhammer 40,000 as my son has grown up, and half a dozen games of DBM at a club. Now however I have sold all my odds and ends of figures, all but the original ECW 15mm figs, and have purchased a copy of a book which was very special to me at one time but which I sold years ago. The book is Napoleonic Wargaming by Charles Grant.

	And now I intend to create a Napoleonic Wargame using these rules, a new battlefield, and plastic 1/72nd scale figures. If you are interested, you are welcome to follow developments, as I shall endeavour to keep a journal of my progress in assembling the armies and the terrain in preparation for that long awaited moment when I might actually play my Napoleonic Wargame.