What are you currently reading ?

[kipt]

Finished "Decisions Of The Seven Days: the Sixteen Critical Decisions That Defined the Battles" by Matt Spruill.  Interesting in the author's pick of the decisions by the various generals and leaders - Davis, Lee, Jackson, Halleck, Lincoln, McClellan and others.  Maps and quotes form the Official Records.

The author, a retired US Army colonel, has written several other "Decision" books on the ACW.  Recommended if you are interested in the seven Days battles.

[Steve J]

Hail Caesar 2nd Edition. Just a quick flick through so far, but it looks very good and is nicely laid out. So far I spotted that the Break test table for Close Combat is different in the main book compared to the QRS and Run Through section at the end . Other than this minor but annoying issue, very happy with my purchase.

[fred.]

So what does HC2 bring to the table over v1? 

[Steve J]

From what I've gleaned so far Fred is that there has been clarification and simplification on some areas of the rules, the rules for terrain have been expanded, the rules cover up the the War of the Roses rather than stopping c1250AD and sort of siege rlated rules added too.

The army lists have all but gone, bar a good WotR section and a simple Roman and Gaul guide, with the aim being the you buy the relevant supplement. Not a problem for me as I will be doing a sort of ImagiNations appraoch for the time being. No battle reports either but I can't remember if the original rules had them in or not as I sold my copy years ago.

Hope this helps?

[kipt]

Finished "General Sterling Price And The Civil War In The West" by Albert Castel. Price was a charismatic leader in Missouri, but initially did not want to secede.  This earned him the doubts of other Confederate leaders, including Jefferson Davis.

Price's overriding ambition was to free Missouri from the Yankee hordes.  However, he really never got a good chance nor the troops to do so.  In addition he wasn't a very good general, even though his Missouri troops adored him.

After the war he went to Mexico, along with other Confederate leaders and generals.  He returned to Missouri in 1867, but died shortly after his return.

[kipt]

Finished "The Lion of The South: General Thomas C. Hindman" by Diane ward and Thomas W. Kremm.  Hindman, like Price, was a Western (west of the Mississippi) man, from Arkansas.  He was short, but a great orator.  Because of his skills and his almost rabid devotion to the South and its "peculiar" institution, he raised a regiment but was rapidly promoted.

He had an aptitude for war and was aggressive.  He, like others, left the US after the war and went to Mexico, but eventually returned.  He was later assassinated in his living room while reading a newspaper by someone firing through the window.  No one was ever caught but there were suspicions that it had been done by the Republicans, as Hindman constantly opposed their politics and carpet bagging in Arkansas.

More engaging than the book on Price that I reviewed above.

[kipt]

Just reread "The Battle Of New Market: Shenandoah Valley, May 1864: battleground of two great armies - and 258 young V.M.I. cadets" by William C. Davis.  Good book, tactical with OB's and maps.  I reread this because we are setting up the battle this weekend (pictures of the battlefield sometime next week) and fighting the battle on Feb 25 - which will also generate the Batrep and more pictures.

[kipt]

Finished "The Journal of Military History" Vol. 86, No. 3.  Published 4 times a year it includes 5 or 6 main articles and, in this volume, 69 pages of book reviews.

Articles in this volume are:

Celebrating "Bloodless Victories" in the Roman World,
Husbands, Sons, Brothers, and Neighbors: Eighteenth-Century Soldiers Efforts to Maintain Civilian Ties,
The Royal Navy's Psyche on Lake Ontario: A British Experiment with Prefabricated Warships in the War of 1812,

and 3 others.

always interesting articles.

[toxicpixie]

"Tank Men" by Robert Kershaw.

I am enjoying it a lot, and also finding it useful food for thought. It has some issues which I won't go into here – as a summary I tend to agree with most of the 3 & 4 star reviews on Amazon and think the 1 and 2 star reviews are unfair.

2 points in particular stand out:

1) I can't shake the feeling that no set of rules I have seen in the past 40 years capture anything like what I'm reading (although the more abstracted approach in BKC comes closest to some of it). Maybe there is something that could be done to address that... but given my second point maybe that's not a bug but a feature!

2) There is some very grim stuff indeed described – it does give me pause to think about why I have been obsessed with tanks and tank warfare ever since I built my first Airfix kit...

I really enjoyed that - good book, and the heavy focus on the men driving the machine and on "soft stats" is excellent - I think the 1 & 2 star reviews are from Panther apologists unhappy their tank & crews's are assessed fairly

[Steve J]

Redcoat by Richard Holmes. All about the British soldier during the age of Black Powder, but really covering mid 18thC to the Crimea. An excellent read and lots of titbits of info.

[kipt]

Finished "The Journal of Military History" Vol. 86, No. 4.

Articles include;
The "Push of Pike" in Seventeenth-Century English Infantry Combat,
"Measure of Conciliation": Winfield Scott, Henry Halleck, and the Origins of U.S. Army Counterinsurgency Doctrine,
Reevaluating Ghormley and Halsey at Guadalcanal

and others.

In this volume 97 pages of book reviews.

[petedavies]

Oooh, the "Push of Pike" article sounds very interesting! According to the abstract the author "...examines the limitations of previous models used to explain how pikemen actually fought and suggests a new model, based on a close reading of the sources".

Any chance you could give a (very brief) outline of his position?

If not I may have to track this one down :-)

Cheers,
Pete

[kipt]

Here is part of the conclusion. "The examination of contemporary seventeenth-century evidence refutes two commonly held assumptions: first, that pikes had ceased to be and offensive weapon by mid seventeenth century; and second, that the role of pikemen was primarily as a defense against cavalry units...some essential characteristics are observable.  First, in most of the battles examined in this study, the officers were reported to have performed the most active role in hand-to-hand combat.  In many cases, they were engaged in violent action bu often avoided severe injury, indicating they were well-protected by their armor.  Nevertheless, on some occasions, they were killed or wounded...Second, while most f the rank and file seemed to engage less actively, their aggressiveness increased as they gained more combat experience.  Third, in most cases, the majority of pikemen followed their officers' lead and participated in more violent action when the opposing line was visibly shaken, whether physically pr psychologically.  Most casualties occurred from this point onward."

[petedavies]

Thanks very much for that.

I am definitely not a period expert but I have followed the back & forth about exactly what "push of pike" might really mean. I am swayed by the idea that in modern English it is better phrased as "thrust of pike" i.e. visualising a pike-length standoff melee until one side or other cracked, rather than a direct physical collision. Sounds like this author might be (somewhat) in agreement? Anyway, more grist to the mill of argument 

Cheers!

[Raider4]

On a Victoriana/Colonial kick at the moment, so The Defence of Duffer's Drift, followed by The Man Who Would Be King.