So where did this all begin ?
Well the journey to here has been a long and fragmented one spanning the past 50 years.
As a child Soldier’s soon became the main focus of attention as i could make the “rat a tat tat” sound of a machine gun or the boom of a bomb as i rolled a marble into them skittling them across the floor, but I needed more so the progression was to by boxes of 54mm ready assembled Airfix figures , now we were talking as i had whole armies to knock over.
The intention was to paint them but in practice it never happened as i wanted to spend my time playing with them so to this day they still are stacked unpainted in their Tupperware boxes in the loft.
The younger readers will be wondering what the hell i’m going on about but sorry this was games before video games and computer animated characters in fact it was even before computers and video players.
Anyway this collecting and holiday trips to visit my Great Uncle (a retired Major in the Royal Engineers whose man role throughout the war was commanding a company of Indian Sappers building Bailey Bridges throughout Burma and eventually taking the Japanese’s sword of surrender.) who was now an avid Military Modeller in 54mm scale really kick started me.
The collecting of finished models continued and i now don’t have enough cabinets to show them all but sadly the modelling never really took off i was too impatient and also enjoyed too many sporting pastimes, coupled with young love and subsequent children, Gran Children and work so something had to give.
The passion for history and especially military history has always been there from watching a good film or reading a book and then wanting to know more and delve into the facts.
A few years ago i learnt by chance that a rep that called on me at work (Don McHugh a British Champion) was into this thing called Table Top Wargaming and we got talking. I the only thing i knew or thought i knew that it was like Dungeons and Dragons or Warhammer neither of which ever floated my boat as fantasy is just not my thing. He invited me down to a show being held at the local tank museum in Bovington a place i have visited many times and my eyes were opened as infront of me there were demo games from all walks of history in all scales and a myriad of sellers and stalls. A set of “Rapid Fire” rules and books was purchased and the research initiated taking me on a long overdue visit to Normandy to visit my Uncles Grave at Bayeux and the museums (you can read more about my uncle in the blog )but again i really didn’t have the spare time due to setting up a new work venture
But then along came COVID and loads of spare time!!!! i needed to fill it so a long overdue project of building a Man Cave on the back of the garage begun . I soon had time and space so it was now or never, but where to start ?
What Scale ?… What Set of Rules?… What Period ?…. and What theatre of War ?…
The Period had to be Napoleonic or WWII my two favourite eras.
WWII it was as i thought the models would be easier to assemble and paint and i just liked the detail in 28mm.
The sector was then easy as i wanted a subject that meant something to me. So Normandy it was .
You tube to the rescue and in particular a guy called Mel Bose “The Terrain Tutor” i found a D Day board series that he had constructed giving lots of tips etc , so in i jumped. Mel i can’t thank you enough you are a true inspiration and got me hooked. (A few pictures of my first ever board are on the Blog and Terrain Section).
Bolt Action was mentioned in the videos so i took a look again You Tube to the rescue, followed by Google and Facebook. It Seemed a good a set of rules as any so books purchased, more research and lets start to build my first army. (I should point out i do have a couple of other armies but these were purchases on ebay and not my own work)
My main inspiration for building my own army has to go to Andy Lilof (www.able65.co.uk) who just happened to be building the same force as myself and is a prominent poster on facebook. And so you have it . I’m hooked and looking forward to many happy years building, collecting and perhaps one day even playing.
