Battle of Bloody Run

Our Muskets and Tomahawk game at HISTORICON was loads of fun. Thanks to Nick and Jeff who helped me set it up and run it. But most importantly we had 6 great players who really made the evening fun. It was great to see the characters of Captain Dalyell, Maj Rogers and Chief Pontiac come to life on the battlefield. All in all it was a draw with Pontiac achieving his SubPlot and preventing the British from achieving their Plot and CPT Dalyell and the Commander of the British Lights both achieving their subplots and avoiding the 50% casualty mark necessary for the Indian victory plot. I apologize for my poor picture quality. My tripod was broken and I need to be schooled on the importance of f ratings.

Captain Dalyell as seen from an Indian sharpshooter.

The Battlefield after set up and before deployment. Indian Village in upper right is the British objective of their raid. The Bloody Run can be seen down the middle of the board with the infamous bridge seen as the river road crosses the run along the Detroit River.

A view of the battlefield from the Detroit River.

Finally the view from the Indian side of the board as we began to set up for deployment.

The British deploy with the regulars marching down the river road. Rogers Rangers in scouting to the front of the main column and a bateaux with swivel gun in the bow scouting ahead along the banks of the river. The lights were thrown out to the regulars left in the fields to protect their flank. A perfectly planned British deployment and does not reflect any of arrogance shown by the original Captain Dalyell.

Captain Dalyell beside the boys from the 55th.

The lights in good position to protect the flank. Sio far no Indians in sight......

Suddenly fire rattles out from across the run. Fire appears split between the marching regulars and the bateaux. The regulars form into firing lines.

Suddenly the indians emerge from the forest and the ambush is sprung. Will the line hold....

The melee continue into a third round of hand to hand but the British Regulars hold their position and beat off the initial indian attack.

Pontiac watches from under the famous Pontiac tree as his forces continue to spring the ambush now on the flanks of the column.

The lights advance into the woods to try and clear out the ambushers.

The highwater mark of the British advance. The Bateux was able to fire several swivel gun shots into the Indian attackers along the North side of the road, but suffered heavy casualties from Indian marksmen. They ended up drifting down the river at the end of the battle.

Final shot of the battlefield at the end of it all.

Nick (in the hat) and I pose in front of our signs.

British Regulars are done. Here they are on parade and drills outside Fort Detroit.

MAKE READY!

LEFT TURN! MARCH!

Members of the light company practicing their art.

Terrain for the Battle of Bloody Run

Spent my Sunday finishing up the terrain in preparation for our Muskets and Tomahawk game at HISTORICON. This year we are recreating the Battle of Bloody run since it is almost exactly 250 years since that fateful early morning on July 31, 1763 when Captain Dalyell sallied from the besieged Fort Detroit to punish the insolence of the Native Americans. Here are some shots of my home made terrain. Happy to answer questions about how I made it. Not really hard at all. First we need about 20 feet of field dividers/hedges or fencing. I was a little short so made about 40 of these 5" beauties to be able to make enough to recreate the battlefield.

The before shot. Used large popsicle sticks, fishtank stones and good ol' Elmers glue. Cut the round ends off the sticks using some large wire cutters. Mixed up a paste of stones and glue in a cup. Do not try and do more than 5 or 6 at a time. The glue drys and the mess gets way to sticky. Better to work in small batches. The paste must not be watery. use only a little glue so that the paste is....well....pasty. If the mixture is watery the stones will simply slide off the stick. Very messy. Take your stick and mound up the stone-glue paste onto the stick and shape with two spare sticks by squeezing the mound between the two to shape so that your stack of stones is thinner on top than on bottom. Set aside to dry over night.

The during shot. Here you see the walls after they dry over night. I added some larger stone in here. On some of the others I glued nails to the stick before I stacked the paste. The nails will become small trees later. You will see.

The after shots. This is only a portion of what I made. Needed about 40 of them for the game. After they dry, I sprayed them with black primer. Let them dry about 20 minutes then hit them with a spray of grey primer. hit them lightly from different angles to sort of highlight the stone on top of the black primer. I had to go back over some of them with a dry brush of Fortress Grey. I then painted the wooden bases brown to match my terrain boards and added Tree foliage to the nails and added foliage to other areas where it seemed natural to have a bush or two. Now onto the Detroit River. I have never had to create such a large terrain feature before. The battle took place along the banks of the Detroit River and the run or stream that the British raiding party had to cross over was a tributary and flowed into the larger River. So below is my version of the banks of the Detroit River.

I made these by spreading an old sheet tightly over my work table and then clamped it down. I drew out the outline of the river using a marker that bled through the sheet. I then used Cedar Tan colored caulking, brand name DAP, that I got at Home Depot. Make sure you buy the type that holds paint. I then squeezed it onto the sheet using my caulking gun and spread it using a paint scraper so that it was about 1/8 of an inch and covering the outline I drew onto the sheet. I made sure the banks of the river were slightly higher than the area I was going to paint blue for the water. I let it dry a few hours and then while it is still sticky and not completely dry I sprinkled some sand onto the area that would be the banks of the river and gently pushed it into the drying caulk so the sand could set with the caulk. Next you let it dry completely and then unclamp the sheet and cut out your terrain piece following the outline that bled through to the back side of the sheet. Then paint the water dark blue, the banks of the river a brown that matches your terrain choice and then highlight both the water and ground. The close up shows the final highlighted version on the left and the partially complete version on the right.

Roads and bridges. I used the same caulking technique and the same color caulk to make my roads. Using an old sheet, spread it tightly over a table and clamp it down. Sketch the outline of the roads. Spread the caulk to about 1/8 of an inch thickness. You may even want to go less on the roads. Let the caulk dry about 6-8 hours. You don't want it to be sticky but soft enough to hold an impression when you push on it. I then took an old cannon wheel from a 28mm model and put a short wooden dowel through the axel of the wheel and ran the wheel up and down the road to make ruts in the road. I also used the dowel to poke "hoof prints" into the road. Don't overdo it but just enough to give the impression this is a road and not a brown stream. Let dry and then cut out with scissors. Painting is even easier. I simply watered down some Umber paint and washed it over the cut out road and let dry. Also In the above picture you can see the bridge. I made this using hobby wood purchased at a craft store. This is an important feature of the battle as the British were crossing the "Bloody" Run using this bridge when Pontic and his allies sprung the ambush. I finished painting the British last night but need to do the bases and then dull coat them. I should have pictures up in a day or two. If you are going to HISTORICON please come by and say hi. The game is Saturday evening. Cheers.

Getting Ready for HISTORICON

I am painting furiously to get ready for HISTORICON in July.  Plan is for Nick Grenier and I to put on a Muskets and Tomahawks game in honor of the Battle of Bloody Run during Pontiac's Rebellion.  Since the actual Roger's Rangers were involved I got the honor of painting them up.  Here are the pictures of the finished product.

 
Major Rogers in the center leads the way as the Rangers emerge from the forest.

I got these figures from Loyalhanna Outpost.  Link in the links page.  Keith is a great guy and loves being the Galloping Major Miniatures US distributor.

The original battle only had about 250 combatants.  Perfect for an M&T game.  Here is the scene setter:

In the pre-dawn hours of July 31, 1763 Captain Dalyell sallied from the besieged Fort Detroit to punish the insolence of the Native Americans by burning their village.  Pontiac, well aware of the British plans, lay in wait for the overconfident attackers, eager to fulfill a prophecy that the British would be driven from America.  Will the nearby stream run with British or Native American blood this day?

The game will host 6 players, with 3 on each side.  Plots and sub-plots will of course be used to get that cinematic feel M&T gamers love.

Now that the Rangers are done on to the British Line infantry.  Where is that red paint......

Last weekend I had the privilege of playing in a SAGA tournament to raise money for Wounded Warriors.  Besides a portion of the entrance fee going to this worthy cause, during our games we could re-roll any combat die by simply throwing a contribution into the glass jar.   Unfortunately, in the heat of battle, many of us simply did not think to do this during our games.  Most just tossed in a contribution at the end of the tournament.  It came to mind that it might have been a good idea to have a few mercenary units "for hire" to the highest bidder.  We could have bid for the units between rounds with the winner being able to use the mercenary unit in substitution of 1 point in the war band which they brought.  Theses Swords For Hire would have to be different from that in the current rules and somewhat powerful enough to solicit  a desire to hire them.  I know it may mess up play balance, etc.,. but in a friendly game for charity not sure that matters.  As such i developed the following three Sword For Hire units.  Please feel free to critique and/or comment.  I have not play tested them yet but plan to once i get some feedback from the SAGA community.  The three units are:

Ragnar's Sons - Each seeking individual glory and ambition just as Ragnar's Son's were want to do.

Favor Of God - representing the influence of "The Church" on the battle field, pagan or Christian.  Of course you have to pay for it.....

Svipdag's Brothers - Apparently this group of brothers always rode into battle just in the nick-o-time to rescue their brother when he needed it most.

Very busy September.  I have been spending most of my hobby time this month preparing to run a Muskets and Tomahawks game at Fall In.  I am slowly finishing up my French and Pennsylvania Provincials.  Here are a few pictures.

French Artillery

French Artillery

The Game I am running at Fall In represents a French and Indian Raid on one of the many small forts built by the settlers in the Cumberland and Susquehanna Valley.  So of course I need some ragged Pennsylvania Provincials to man the fort.

Fort Bedford Visit

It was a beautiful late Summer day in Western Pennsylvania and I had a few hours to kill so I decided to stop at Fort Bedford in Bedford Pa.  Here are a few pictures for you to enjoy.

  Fort Bedford Location lies East of Fort Necessity and Southeast of Fort Pitt.  In the lower right of this map.

Fort Bedford was a British Stockade built in 1758 as part of the  campaign against the French at Fort Duquesne. After several failed attempts in the early 1750's, the British launched a major offensive against Fort Duquesne in 1758. Facing the formidable task of crossing the Allegheny Mountains and the threat of attack, numerous stockades were built along the trek west. Fort Bedford was constructed as a key fortification along the military path, Forbes Road, and served as the staging area for the successful campaign. After the war, Fort Bedford was used as a British outpost on the frontier as refuge from Indian attack as the exploration westward increased. The stockade stood strong until the 1770's. 

In the Museum I found this model of what they believe the fort looked like

The reproduction on the current location only replicates a small corner of the original layout>  The town of Bedford PA has been built on the location previously occupied by the fort.

Possible location of the Postern Gate Overlooking the river.

The stockade, known as Raystown and later named Fort Bedford, had been built by Forbes' capable deputy, Col. Henry Bouquet. Bouquet constructed one of the best of the frontier forts at Bedford. Embracing an area of 7000 square yards, the fort had five bastions, places for the use of swivel guns, which guarded the corners of the irregularly shaped stockade (see image, below). The main gate was on the south side of the fort parallel to modern-day Pitt Street, a smaller gate faced the west side and a postern gate opened northward.

The Western Side.  

It is interesting to note that several articles I read on the fort indicated that there was no artillery present.  Yet in the Museum they show several shells and from the archaeological finds in the area it appears that they had discovered they believe there had been an "artillery park" at one time where they found a concentration of unused shells and some artillery tools and they found a concentration of obviously spent/used shells about 200 Meters from the proposed "park" .  Target practice or crew drills perhaps being the cause of the spent shells as there is no reported battle at Fort Bedford.

Artillery Shells found near Ford Bedford

Original Bedford Flag in the Fort Bedford Museum

The Fort Bedford Flag was a gift to the British forces at Fort Raystown by the Fourth Duke of Bedford, England. Between November 28th and December 14th, 1758, Fort Raystown was renamed Fort Bedford in honor of the Duke and his honored flag. Known as a "red fly," this type of flag also was used on British ships. While no evidence that the flag ever flew over Fort Bedford exists, the official Fort Bedford Flag was hung in the officer's quarters and only brought out on special occasions. (copied from Fort Bedford website http://www.fortbedfordmuseum.org/flag.html) 

The small city of Bedford is interesting and the surrounding countryside was beautiful.  Nearby there is an "old Bedford Town" which replicates what the town might have looked like in the 18th century.  It is apparently frequently used by reenactors.