Tank and Infantry Battle on St James Road, Battleground Show and other stuff

Keeping fairly busy this week and the hobby mojo remains pretty high. As some of you will know I was a child of the ‘Featherstone’ era and his Wargames book has significantly influenced me as a child and ever since. As my 15mm collection has grown I realised I had enough to recreate his Battle on the St James Road from his original book. 

For those not aware this is the opening shot of the battle report, airfix figures and a mix of homemade tanks. I spent many hours looking at these pictures as a child, nice to see WW2 described as modern.

But this is not an exact replay, firstly I have Americans rather than British and our ruleset of choice would be Bolt action. The table is slightly larger and I reduced the forces slightly to ensure the game didn’t last over 4 hours ! However, it is close enough for me and brings me great pleasure.

The Americans dug in on Copse Hill and around red farm.

The Germans arrive across the embankment, past the plantation, but one of their transports are hit immediately causing the occupants to jump out

Panzers advance straight towards red farm, with infantry disembarking at the base of the hill

Long range fire from the rear by the plantation

The Americans lost a Sherman early on to an advancing Panzer behind copse hill

As they break through the barbed wire the tanks duel at close range but ineffectually

American infantry reserves push forward to block the gap ?

Germans transports are hit and burning, but the Americans have been unable to knock out any of the panzers

Eventually the Germans break through to St James Road, two of the American Sherman’s are burning 

…and the infantry on Copse hill have been outflanked. Time for the Americans to pull out and a victory to the Herman Goering Panzer Grenadiers. A really fun battle with a different outcome to the original but that is no bad thing.

On to Battleground Show, busiest that I can remember, so much so that I didn’t get a chance to look at any other games, or visit the bring and buy (probably saved some money then)

The Whitstable Harbour setup in situ at the show. All the games of which I think there were six were very enjoyable creating a good amount of fun and entertainment, everybody seemed to enjoy themselves.

I managed just one close up shot during the day ! The feedback was incredibly positive and I spent a lot of time between games talking to people genuinely interested in the game, the setup and of course the U-boat. Thanks to all those who took the time to play or just catch up.

I did purchase a couple of things, mainly french heavy cavalry. Having collected a couple of free Scottish epic sprues. I pick up another for 50p. Then Leon ran a raffle and I won the pike and shotte epic Scottish Battlion box set, wow from no where I have a Scottish Covenanter army. I’ll paint a block up to see what they are like 😀

When I got home I packed away the game and was looking for a location to store the Kreigsmarine and found a space in the ‘mixed’ German box along side these. Keith I took the photo just for you 👍

A couple of bits of painting, although most of my time has been planning up and coming battles.

Passing through town I popped into the secondhand bookshop and found these two books

Aly you will be proud of me 

That’s it for now couple of games coming up and hopefully a first run out for the peninsular collection 🤞

Thanks as always

Matt 😀