This Week, I Have Been Mostly Reading...

...Magazines.  Well things are moving again, sort of, in that I've been doing even more reading.  I don't often buy wargame magazines these days (infested as they often are with too many space marines, zombies and in-your-face marketing) but here are the latest ones I've been looking at.  First up is Wargames Illustrated #314 from, what?  Is it really December 2013?  I'm really falling behind...

Anyway, this one featured the War of the Spanish Succession (WSS), which is this decade's new period for me.  Lots of nicely painted figures and an excellent overiew of the war as well as accounts of various WSS battles, including Blenheim (obviously) as well as one that Marlborough wasn't at (Cassano, northern Italy 1705) all very enjoyably written by Simon MacDowall of the Legio Wargames website and blog.  And all this plus an article on Jutland and some ACW stuff and only two pieces relating to Flames of War products, so I think we got off lightly there.

Then there was the impulse buy this weekend.  We had to try out Edinburgh's new tram and so we ended up in the Gyle Shopping Centre and, with nothing much to do whilst my son was engrossed in his Godzilla 'zine, I bought Minature Wargames #374.  The principal motive was that it has an article by Dr Kerry Thomas on mass painting of 15mm horses, which I often find difficult.  And what with quite a few WSS Blue Moon 15mm cavalry to paint (as Danes) I needed some ideas and inspiration.  Job done.

A bit more variety here though, it has to be said, particularly with an article on Chotusitz 1742 (War of the Austrian Succession) which isn't quite WSS but is in the right half of the appropriate century for me these days.  There is also something on the first part of an 18th century campaign system that looks promising (although to get the full flavour it appears that it may be necessary to purchase one or more of the Age of Absolutism books from Caliver).  I will draw a veil over the fantasy/futuristic product reviews and the new boardgaming columnist and all those hexes and dull cardboard counters.

I should add that I have never thrown out a wargame magazine in my life and therefore I was also able this week to pull off the shelf and review this timeless classic, Minature Wargames #1.

Well do I remember as a Glasgow University student walking by a newsagents on Byres Road in 1983 and seeing this and rushing in immediately and buying it (for 75p).  I could not believe that there was an actual real wargame magazine in print!  And it's a classic too, with articles by George Gush, Paddy Griffiths, Phil Barker, Terry Wise, Ian Weekley (always with the qualifier "of Battlements" lest he be confused with any other bearded Ian Weekleys out there) and of course good old Duncan Macfarlane, WI's first editor.

The thing is that I didn't remember that it included a guide to painting 15mm figures and a (free) futuristic space strategy game to be played out on a hex map.  Isn't it funny how some things don't change.

Seven Years War Project No.1

I've been considering this for a long while and I think things are getting closer to fruition, in other words the commencement of a new period.  As usual I do a lot of planning and reading (for years sometimes) before ordering figures and getting started - mainly because I'm not that motivated when it comes to painting.  However, the SYW has been floating around in my mind, particularly since I read (and am currently re-reading) Franz Szabo's The Seven Years War in Europe (published by Longman, 2007).

I'd really recommend this book, well, for a number of reasons, although mainly it's because it's fairly recently published and has drawn on a lot of original sources in German: Szabo being a Canadian of Austrian extraction.  This latter point is of note because he is no apologist for Frederick the 'Great' and in fact sticks the boot in with gusto (occasional comparisons with the approach to foreign policy shared by Prussia and the Third Reich do not seem out of place in fact).

Some critics (for example on the TMP 18th century forums) ascribe this to Szabo's Austrian roots and desire to promote Austrian successes, but the account I think is more accurate and more critical than previous historians and times have allowed, where the supposed greatness of Frederick and his military 'genius' have been exaggerated either for political reasons or simply because a full and objective review of the primary sources was not previously available to scholars.

The Szabo book just covers Europe (as though that's not enough to be getting on with) but I was interested in what was happening elsewhere, so I also got Daniel Baugh's book, The Global Seven Years War (also Longman, 2011).

I've not read it yet although it looks interesting (and we get two extra years thrown in!).  I'm hoping it will cover some of the more interesting actions in the colonies (and not just North America) and I think there'll be a lot on naval engagements too.

Finally, I should add that not content with reading about the Seven Years War, I thought I needed a bit of background reading and in fact today received this nice hard-back copy of Reed Brown's The War of the Austrian Succession (St Martin's Press, 1993), from a second hand bookshop in America (via Abe Books), and hence the prompt to post something about it all.

There are more recent books on the WAS (1740-1748) but Szabo recommends the Reed Brown book in a footnote early on in his tome and then mentions in passing that, oh yes, there's also something in the Longman's Modern Wars in Perspective series by Anderson (damned by faint praise).  So yes, plenty of inches to wade through.