The 'Other' Gettysburg Movie.

Gettysburg, The Final Day.

Reports are still filtering in from the Battlefield around Gettysburg but it appears the Confederacy has won a narrow victory based on points, though to be honest, from my position smack dab in the middle with 2nd Corps, it didn't feel that way. I felt my opponernt, Tim, and I had the measure of each other with no decisive winner of the contest when time was called, despite some spirited and courageous assaults by Pickett's Division.

But in the true spirit of wargaming the Union accepts the decision of the umpires with good grace and dignity.

As previously stated a full report of this battle will follow once all the reports have been collated.
To be honest a game of this size gives one a small sense of the fog of war because I found myself so engrossed in my section of the battlefield that I hardly had time to take it all in. Fortunately a good portion of the day was spent behind the camera or camcorder so I can dissect the event in detail with the aid of photographic evidence.

I don't claim to be much cop at movie making but check I am working on video of our refight complete with suitably stirring musical score, juddery motion, blurred images, out of focus shots and waaay too fast zooming and panning.  Special thanks to my darling daughter Courtney, who does all the tricky computer stuff while Dad sits beside her saying do this or that, or,  is it possible to add music...? All I have to do now is figure out how to upload it to my blog, I think it must be way too big because every time I try to upload it things go tits up.

I've attached some pics of the final day for your delectation.

Pickett's Charge

The aftermath

Meade, C in C, Army of the Potomac, outside his Headquarters

The Lads

Gettysburg Refight, Let the battle commence!

At last the great day is upon us.
Months of preparation and frantic painting and modelling have come together on the day to recreatre the epic event in 28mm. See Rodger Woods Blog, 'Harpers Weekly', for an depth narrative of the lead up and preparation of the table.

There is so much to absorb with a table this huge and over 4000 beautifully painted figures plus superb scenery so I will just post the selected highlights of Day Two, we omitted Day One to condense things a bit to ensure the battle could be fought to completion over a weekend.

 Look out for more pics of Day Three's action and a full battle report in the near future.

I cant wait for tomorrow.

Initial deployment

The calm before the storm

Moving up

Cemetery Ridge

Culps Hill

Hoods Texans

Birds Eye view

Hancock the Superb.

Reinforcements in March Column

Hot work at the Cemetery Gates

Fire!

The Butchers Bill

Rebels assault Devil's Den

Limber up

Gorgeous Zouves

Looks like horsemeat for dinner again.

Here they come!

Hancocks 2nd Corps ready for Gettysburg refight at last.

The Southern Strategists are hosting a refight of the 2nd and 3rd day of the Battle of Gettysburg in Christchurch, New Zealand,  this coming weekend, July 6th & 7th. (See Harpers Weekly).

After countless hours of undercoating, painting, washing, highlighting, and basing, my humble contribution to the Union cause, two Divisions of Hancocks's 2nd Corps, are finally ready for next weekend's epic refight. 50 stands in total plus guns, Corps and Divisional stands and markers.

Frankly this has become something of a chore for me as I'm not one for painting large numbers, and with the deadline looming, I was astonished at just how much effort was required to pull it all together. I havent even had time to check my favourite blogs so if anyone's wondering what's happened to me don't despair. 
I now have the utmost sympathy for those poor devils who are compelled to paint complete armies. The worst thing is one has to adopt an assembly line approach to the process and this tends to increase the tedium factor somewhat. The figures are painted to what I would call wargaming standard but probably wouldn't win any prizes in a modelling competition, anyway, enough bleating...here are some pics of 'Hancock's Boys'.

72nd Pennsylvania (Baxters Zouaves)

Corps Command

'Hancock the Superb', 2nd Corps Command stand

Divisional commander

2nd Corps, 1st and 2nd Divisions

Disorder markers

Breakthrough markers (hopefully they'll get plenty of use)

Low on Ammo markers

More Zouaves (You have to love that uniform)

 

 

The figures are mostly Perry and Dixon. I love Perry's Zouaves but am not so enamoured with the basic infanrty plastic set, poor definition and bland poses, the second infantry box are a vast improvement. The do make good rank fillers though and are well priced. The Dixon figures are a bit odd looking close up but are a joy to paint with great definition and creases that make highlighting easy. The Perry metals are all superb.
I took some liberties in naming my Zouaves the 72nd because in actual fact they wore kepis, not fez's at Gettysburg and the uniform differed in a lot of other ways as well but what the hell.  They did put up a good account of themselves however in wargaming terms. We held an ACW game the other night at Waynes place and they not only repulsed a Confederate assualt but launched a breakthrough charge that swept the damned Rebs from the field.