This article comes from two letters that Dave Beatty sent before he shipped back here to the `Great PX in the Sky'. Hey Bill: As I stand my LAST night watch with the great United States Sixth Fleet, I finally have found the time to write a note (almost all the ships are in port for the 4th, most of the sailors are behaving themselves, Albania is quiet, Bosnia is quiet, I don't care about Zaire, the Congo, or the CAR anymore so hey, life is good). Please note my new address above effective 1 August. I am FINALLY back to an Air Force base and will assume new duties at AIRCENT on 25 August. Work phone at Ramstein AB, Germany will be 49-6371-47-8885, home phone TBD. Reading Pete Panzeri's FOG OF WAR letter in the June issue reminds me of several techniques we used in the distant past. With the old Waterloo and Gettysburg board games (can I say that here?), we assigned each corps commander a matchbox and put his troops inside. When the corps HQ came within 4 hexes of an enemy corps, both sides deployed. Worked okay until we memorized what each corps consisted of... Another (and easier) technique was to prohibit looking through opposing stacks of units until figuring up combat odds. Made for some interesting surprises. We fiddled with this, allowing recce flights to look through stacks overflown, dummy counters, random stack searches simulating intel intercepts, etc. In college, a bunch of us got together and talked a like minded instructor into refighting Waterloo with different individuals serving as corps and army commanders. We co-opted a bunch of classrooms, put each commander in his own classroom with a staff of 'runners' and an umpire in his own room with the 'big picture'. The army commander would send an order (oral or written) via runner to the umpire and thence to the appropriate corps commander. The umpire would include the locations of friendly troops on either flank and any enemy troops visible/known. The corps commander would then execute the order with combat resolved by the umpire. Great fun! We even lost Grouchy... We did this with the old Avalon Hill board game but it would work with miniatures as well. Something we are experimenting with now in miniature gaming is using slips of paper or counters to represent units until within reasonable visual acquisition range then plopping the unit out on the table. Another is unknown terrain effects: place a playing card under each terrain feature. When a unit enters the terrain, that player can look at the card and compare it against a simple table for that terrain type. The result is movement restrictions for the unit/terrain type. Units in home climate/country can look at a limited number of terrain features (based upon his scouting points) prior to STARTEX. Both of these techniques lead to increased emphasis on reconnaissance and the use of light troops to both scout and screen. Article on this in the mill... Rome Naval Museum A quick note on some great military museums in the Med... If you ever get stuck in the Rome airport, there is a nice little Roman naval museum right there. Has a half dozen ancient ships they discovered in the old Roman port of Ostia Antica now half buried under the runway. The naval museum in Venice is 4 floors of great stuff if you are interested in anything having to do with the sea. Banners flown by the Venetian fleet at Lepanto are one example of the stuff they have there. Istanbul and Alexander the Great Istanbul has a super military museum that has arms/armor from the 1200s on. It is just up the hill from the Hilton. Don't miss the Sidon sarcophagus in the Istanbul archeological museum, it is a must for anyone who runs a Greek, Macedonian or Persian army. It probably contained one Abdalonymos who is depicted on the sarcophagus as dressed in Persian garb but hunting along side of Alexander (it would seem Abdalonymos allied himself with Alexander probably after the battle of Issus) and later against other Persian garbed figures (probably at the battle of Gaza circa 310 BC where Abdalonymos was killed). A quick analysis of the armament of the figures on the Sidon sacarphogas yielded the following: Persian infantry: Javelin and hoplon = 1; javelin and 'Thracian' half moon shield = 5; javelin, no shield = 2; two handed axe =4; bow = 3; sword and hoplon = 2 Persian cavalry: sword = 2; javelin = 3 Macedonian/Greek infantry: Long spear and hoplon = 4; sword = 1; sword and hoplon = 2; javelin = 2 Macedonian/Greek cavalry: javelin (or lance - depicted using both over and under handed) = 4; sword = 1. Note that none of the cavalry is depicted with shields. You can still see the colors on the marble: all of the Persians are wearing a pinkish tunic with green cloaks; Alexander has a red tunic and blue cloak; the Companion cavalry has red tunics and purple cloaks; Abdalonymos has an orange tunic and green cloak; the Macedonian infantry has blue tunics and matching blue cloaks. Other items of interest there is a well preserved arch depicting Trajan's victory over the Dacians (circa 100 AD). There is a very well defined Roman shield that looks like this: illustration did not print. Other items of note there is the so called serpentine column that stood in the Hippodrome in Constantinople that was erected in honor of the battle of Platea listing the 31 Greek cities that fought on the allied side (it must have stood at Platea at one point), some Byzantine shield devices, and lots more. I only had time for about an hour in the Istanbul Archaeological Museum but you could spend at least an entire day there. The little military museum in Valetta has some interesting items from WW2 including one of the old Fairey Battles used early on in the defense of Malta. If you ever get to Odessa, the little central park has a great market - the first time we went there, you could get good quality painted tin soldiers for about a quarter apiece (suitable for use by your 6 year old to knock around); when we were there last August, there were some superbly painted Cossacks that I coveted but did not have enough bucks with me. When I returned later with enough money ($60 American for a set of 12 35mm) I discovered that one of my intrepid shipmates scarfed them up in my absence! Oh well, a beer on the Potemkin steps almost made up for the loss... Dear Major Bill: Great to hear you beat the rap at Ft Benning. Those Army guys just have no sense of humor these days... Below are some tidbits from recent gallivanting around the world: Notes from the University of Philadelphia Museum (at least I think I recall that to be the name)... While awaiting transportation back to Italy at Philly a while back, I took the opportunity to visit an archaeology museum in town and made the following notes on the back of my airline ticket: On display were several Chinese artifacts: two bronze trident standards circa 475-221 BC, 4 feet tall by 3 feet wide, socketed for carriage on a pole: These were dug up from some dead guy's tomb in China and were apparently used to mark the CINC's location on some nameless battlefield. Reminded me hugely of the ceremonial giant bronze battle axes on display in the museum in Copenhagen -- they were always found in matching sets apparently thrown (ritually?) into bogs in Denmark. Also on display in Philly were Qin dynasty (circa 221-206 BC) bronze plaques depicting crossbows, metal (apparently) plate armor (the earliest plate armor I have ever seen, with the possible exception of the weird Mycenean wrapping bronze armor I saw in Greece), 14 and 12 spoked wheeled chariots (with crew-apparently a general or senior officer- carrying an axe), and heavy cavalry with a lance carried in the left hand and an unidentified object carried in the right hand (NO stirrups). Also displayed was a model of a Tang dynasty (618-907 AD) riderless horse with NO stirrups. During a recent TDY to northern Italy, we took the scenic route from Vicenza to Aviano and stopped in at Bassano del Grappo. If you ever get up there, visit the Taverna della Ponte at the west end of the old wooden bridge. It claims to be one of Hemingway's hangouts when he was an ambulance driver for the Italians in WWI. In the basement of this fine establishment is an outstanding museum honoring the Italian Alpine troops in WWI and WWII. There are many original photos of Italian troops in the Alps in WWI and in Russia in WWII. Just ask the tavern owner if it is okay to go downstairs and show yourself around the museum! I was in Slovenia last month and stopped in at the little castle overlooking Lake Bled. It has a super little museum housing about 500 years of miscellaneous weapons, maps and drawings. Worth the trip. We also made a high speed pass through Venice - if you get there make sure and stop in at the Naval Museum out near the Arsenale. There are four floors of naval history stored there. While TDY to Ft Monroe, I was able to sneak off to the Casemate Museum there - interesting little set up, stop in and see it. A good selection of artillery pieces. Fort Boykin Historic Park I also wandered over to old Fort Boykin Historic Park, which looks to be a relatively new Isle of Wight County Park. It is located off the route 10 bypass on the James River (follow the signs). The first fort was built on the site in 1623 following the Indian uprising in 1621. Originally called 'The Castle' by it's builder, Captain Roger Smyth, its purpose was to protect the colonists against 'Spaniards by sea and Indians by land.' It was originally a triangular shaped star fort disturbingly reminiscent of an SF fort in the Central Highlands of Vietnam (but I digress). The 1623 fort looked like this: Most of the east and west walls are still visible; the north wall has been eroded by the James River. The fort apparently fell into disuse sometime in the 1680s as the Spanish and Indian threats receded. During the Revolutionary war it was refortified and an additional, identical triangle was added to the west. The fort was instrumental in the defense of the James River and legend has it beating off an attack by Tarelton. Fort Boykin was so re-named after Major Francis Boykin, a staff officer on Washington's staff during the Yorktown campaign. Following the Revolutionary War, the fort was expanded into its present shape. During the War of 1812, legend has it that guns from the fort sank two British warships that were attempting to force the river. An attempt to take the fort by amphibious assault was defeated by local militia under the command of Captains David Dick and Charles Wrenn. During the Civil War, the fort was refortified yet again and manned by local Confederate forces. In 1862, Union gun boats attacked the fort and forced its abandonment as the Union forces were able to stand off out of range of the Confederate batteries yet still range the fort. Union forces captured the abandoned fort and blew up two magazines discovered there. The place is worth a trip. That's it from the Med. Dave Beatty Back to Dispatch Oct 98 Table of Contents Back to Dispatch List of Issues Back to MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 1998 by HMGS Mid-South This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com