Battle of Bull Run Preview

Over the weekend I did a dry run of the Battle of Bull Run game that I’m running this weekend. Below are a couple of images that I took.

Henry House Hill looking North-West. The Henry House is the white building near the center.

Looking South-West

It took me most of the day to get this table setup. I use almost 25 feet of rail fence and I had just enough trees to cover the table. Overall I’m pretty happy with how the table looks. I can’t wait to fight the battle this weekend. More information on this game can be found here: http://saltcitywargamers.wordpress.com/2011/08/11/gaming-event-bull-run-1861/

Keywords: Battle of 1^st Bull Run, Battle of 1^st Manassas, American Civil War 10mm, ACW 10mm

Painted 10mm Civil War Commanders

Today I have some photos of my completed Civil War command stands. These stands consist of miniatures from Perrin, Old Glory, and Pendraken. To my surprise the figures from these three manufactures match up so well that I had no problem mounting them on the same base.

Division/Corps Commanders

For my Division/Corps commanders I mounted two or three figures on 1 ½” round bases that I got from Michel’s craft store. Inspired by a recent post on The Miniatures Page, I decided to add a mounted standard bearer to each command stand. The mounted standard bearer figures are from Perrin’s range.

Confederates

Union

Brigade Generals

My brigade Generals are based on 1” round bases from LITKO.

Confederates

Perrin

Old Glory

Old Glory

Pendraken

Old Glory

Perrin

Figure comparison: From left to right- Perrin, Pendraken, Old Glory."]

Union

Old Glory

Old Glory

Old Glory

Pendraken

Figure comparison: From left to right- Pendraken, Old Glory, Perrin

Key Words: American Civil War, ACW 10mm, Perrin, Old Glory, Pendraken, Division, Brigade Generals, Command Stands, 10mm Civil War Generals.

10mm Terrain (Part 1)

With the painting side of my Civil War (phase 1) project nearly complete, over the past week I’ve begun to shift my focus to building terrain. Below is a quick review of my progress so far.

Rivers:

My rivers are from JR Miniatures. The main reason I decided to use rivers from JR miniatures is because of the variety of pieces and scales they offer. My plan is to use a combination of 6mm and 15mm scales to model different size rivers and streams. The downside to these rivers is I can’t stand how they are painted. To remedy this I decided to repaint them to my liking. Below are some before and after images. Tell me what you think.

Before

After

One down and a lot to go

Trees:

I will need a lot of trees to properly model a 19^th century American battlefield. For that reason I decided to use pre built trees from Woodland Scenics. I feel that pre-built trees are more durable than the ones that you build yourself and besides I hate building trees. Unfortunately, pre-built doesn’t mean war game ready. I still spend quite a bit of time cleaning them up (removing excess foliage and gluing down loose foliage). The trees that I use will range in size from 2” to 5”.

The first 70 trees

Rail Fence

Rail fence is a vital part of the Civil War battlefield. For my refight of Bull Run I will need around 25 feet of fence. That’s a lot of fence! I went with Battlefield Terrain Concepts 15mm snake rail fence kits to meet my fencing needs. I also plan to mix in some rail fence from Musket Miniatures.

Part of the first batch of 15’

Key Words: 10mm terrain, Civil War 10mm, JR Miniatures, 6mm Rivers, Woodland Scenics, Battlefield Terrain Concepts, 10mm Snake Rail Fence

Battle of 1st Bull Run 150th Reenactment Photos

Over the weekend I traveled down to Prince William County, Virginia for the 150^th Battle of 1^st Bull Run reenactment. Let me start off by saying it was HOT! On Friday I visited the battlefield and the temperature was 106 with a heat index of 120 degrees.  Needless to say I did not spend much time on the battlefield.

On Saturday I attended the reenactment. Before the reenactment started I visited the Union camp and I was able to meet up with the reenactors who were portraying the 1^st Minnesota Volunteers. This was my Great-Great-Great Grandfathers regiment and I’ve wanted to meet up with them for a while now. I had a nice conversation with a sergeant from company D (The Lincoln Guards). I look forward to meeting up with them again at future events (maybe Ball’s Bluff in the fall).

Some of the 1st Minnesota Volunteers drill before the battle.

The reenactment began at 9:30 and ended around 12:00. Overall I thought that the chorography was very similar to 145^th reenactment that was held at Cedar Creek Battlefield. The thing that set this reenactment apart was the Uniforms. This was not a battle between the blue and gray. Among other things many units were wearing red shirts and/or Haverlocks. It was reported that over 8000 reenactors were on the field of battle and this made for a great spectacle.

I would like to thank Prince William County for putting on a well organized and enjoyable event. I also thank all the reenactors, sutlers, venders, bus driver, police and volunteers.

Now on to the photos. This gallery consists of around 300 photos. I was concerned about load times so I put them onto two pages. The first page is the fight for Matthews Hill and the second is the battle for Henry House Hill. I also took some video that I may post at a latter date.

Enjoy
Bryan

The Battle of 1^st Bull Run Reenactment Gallery

ACW 10mm painted US and CSA Artillery and Limbers

This week I have some photos of my completed artillery and limbers.

Confederate Artillery

First up are some photos of my Confederate artillery. The crews are from Perrine and Old Glory and the guns are from Old Glory. I must say that Perrine’s figures are very nice and they match up well with Old Glory’s figures. I will probably be adding more Perrine figures to my armies in the future. I chose to use Old Glory’s cannons because I feel they scale much better to the crews compared to the guns offered by Pendraken and Perrine. At the bottom of this post I have placed a couple of images that compares the different manufactures cannons.

Confederate Artillery

Confederate Artillery with Perrine Crews

Confederate Artillery

Confederate Artillery (Perrine Crews)

Confederate Artillery (Perrine Crews)"]

Confederate Artillery (Old Glory Crews)

Confederate Artillery (Old Glory Crews)

Confederate Artillery Comparison , Old Glory on the left and Perrine on the right.

Confederate Artillery Comparison, from left to right; Old Glory – Perrine – Old Glory – Perrine

Union Artillery

For this batch of Union artillery I used Pendraken crews and cannons from Old Glory.

Union Artillery

Union Artillery

Union Artillery

Union Artillery

Union Artillery

Limbers

For limber I used a mix of Old Glory and Pendraken. Once again Old Glory’s limbers and horses seem to have the best proportions compared to the infantry. Note: I plan to add limber riders latter on.

Artillery limbers (Old Glory)

Artillery limbers (Old Glory)

Artillery limbers (Old Glory)

Artillery limbers (Pendraken)

Artillery limbers Comparison, (Old Glory on left) (Pendraken on right) Old Glory’s horses and limbers are slightly larger than Pendrakens . Also, pendrakens rider seems a little too large for the horse that he’s riding.

Artillery Comparison

When I was building my artillery units I noticed that there were large discrepancies in the sizes of cannons between different manufactures. The images below are some examples.

Artillery Comparison #1 (Right-Old Glory) (Left-Perrine). Do I need to say more? Old Glory’s artillery towers over Perrine’s. At the time I took these photos I didn’t have any Pendraken cannons on hand to compare. Over all Pendraken cannons are comparable in size to Perrine. (I will update the photo to include a Pendraken cannon in the future.)

Artillery Comparison #2 (Right-Old Glory) (Left-Perrine). The infantryman pictured is from Pendraken. As you can see from the photo Old Glory’s cannon seem to have the best proportions compared to the infantryman

Key Words: Civil War 10mm, Civil War Artillery 10mm, Old Glory Artillery 10mm, Perrine Artillery 10mm, ACW 10mm