Having decided to try out Mike and Joyce Smith’s Table Top Battles (TTB) – the naval rules, I suppose the question might be why? why now?
The consequence of being taken in by post napoleonics and 19th Century Italian Wars has led me to 1848. In that year there were a series of revolutions across europe. Some, like the First War of Italian Unification involved such unlikely naval opponents as Piedmont and Austria in the Adriatic, while on the Baltic Denmark squared up to an aggressive German Confederacy.
Now I also stumbled across something else.
The Wars of Italian Unification are reckoned to have really got going after Napoleon first defeated Austria in the 1790’s fuelling the peninsula with raw ideas of revolution.
So reading about Napoleonic Italy led me to the US Navy in the mediterranean sea! This is something I have completely missed. Mind you the 1812 Anglo-American War has passed me by as well.
All these steps were made possible by reading books. I love book reading – yes I need access to online material but I love reading a “printed” page.
MacAulay’s Book 1 of his Garibaldi trilogy includes his hero’s failed attempt to join the besieged Venetians. Michael Embree’s Radetzky Marches covers the siege in more detail including some sea action.
General reading about the italian wars of the 19th century introduced the presence of the US fleet in the mediterranean.
The First Schleswig Holstein War of 1848 includes some fascinating sea action – where the shore batteries won!
A book about Barbary pirates fighting the US Navy in the Mediterranean in the early 1800’s actually covers some of the effects of the Anglo-US war of 1812 and the whole issue of the lack of a US fleet that could even put to sea when blockaded in home ports by the dominant British Navy.
And that final book has led me back to the USA and some of its naval experiences during the Napoleonic era. That has somehow triggered in my head the need to test simple naval rules.
I am after small actions and a high level of abstraction.
While abstraction is an essential part of wargaming your mind of course fills in all the gaps to give something like this…………
The Wargaming Erratic 
3 replies on “landlubber sets sail”
Enjoyed reading this! 🙂 Sounds like I must read up on the wars against the Barbary pirates! I’ve found a designer on Shapeways that does loads of later 19th Century 3-D printed warships (https://www.shapeways.com/shops/mglawson)! Hard to resist!
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great stuff I need to look them up in detail. somewhere I have some plastic ships – but I think they are long out of production.
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Hi john those shapeways models look really good. Unfortunately their too late in the century for me.
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