Thursday, November 13, 2014

Cowpens 1781

I've been reading Lawrence Babits' book, "A Devil of a Whipping. The Battle of Cowpens" and I'm kind of thinking that this would be a fun battle to play on the tabletop.

Fife & Drum Miniatures has most of the figures that I will need for this battle with the exception of the 71st Highlanders- I will use the Kings Mountain figures for this regiment.

Now I have to work out the order of battle at either a 1:5 or a 1:10 ratio and see where I am with respect to painting needs. More later.

What do you think?

11 comments:

  1. I'm afraid of what will happen if you don't try it!

    Damn the torpedoes. Full speed ahead.

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  2. Cowpens and Guilford Courthouse, two of the most interesting battles of the AWI! Eager to see how things take shape.

    Best Regards,

    Stokes

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  3. Half way through this book myself , finding it very detailed and interesting , Tony

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  4. Hi, Jim. I have the book & must read it to keep track of your new project. i look forward to it. Cheers, Rohan.

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  5. A very interesting battle we fought many times. The balance is hard to keep as the British player knows the battle and will not fall in Morgan's Stratagem so easily.

    Cheers

    Franck

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  6. I really enjoyed that book... my American army is based on that battle in 1:10 (plus some extra models to bring units to standard sizes for other games and a few extra units, but the core started out as Morgan's army).


    Quindia Studios

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  7. Jim,
    Would make a great battle. I happened to tour the battlefield last month - will send you one of the National Park Service brochures from the park. Tom

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  8. Thank you Tom, that is much appreciated. Did you take any photos while you were there? Some of the on line photos that I've seen seem to have a lot of trees, that I expect were not there in 1781.

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  9. Jim,
    Brochure went out in today's mail. Didn't take any pix, but in truth, not much to see. The site is a basically open field with scattered individual trees. flat where Morgan put his second and third lines. where he put his sharpshooters it starts to slope down gradually to where the British emerged from the woods, basically giving them no visibility of what was behind the sharpshooters. Woods to either side of the field is open and passable without difficulty, but you couldn't maintain a cohesive formation in it. Don't know if that's how it was back then. Hope this all helps. Tom

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  10. Tom: brochure received yesterday. Thank you for sending this to me. It will be very helpful in my project.

    Jim

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  11. Also read Babits' Battle of Guilford Courthouse. I went to dinner with him at the CMH annual meeting. Very good guy.
    Our Omaha group have gamed the southern battles several times. We use a modified version of Tricorne. A shortened coat (not a round-a-about) with various head gear is needed for an accurate British or Loyalist figure. Should be in advancing position as most of fighting was in woods. Ken

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