I bought a copy of Michael Barthop's The Frontier Ablaze: The North-West Frontier Rising 1897-98 from Dennis Shorthouse's On Military Matters at Cold Wars. I resisted purchasing this because of its heafty price $50, that is until I looked at it. I wish I had this five years ago when I conducted a three year campaign on the NWF against Russia: 1898.

The text has ten chapters with the first two devoted to the Pathans, British and Indian Army and the background to the rising from the 17th century to 1897. These two chapters are very well done with lots of concise and very useful information in one place about the antagonists. The remaining eight chapters discuss various battles, skirmishes from Waziristan to Malakand to the Khyber, Kohat and Kurram passes to Dargai Heights to Tirah, the rearguards and the end of the rising.

The maps are well done and useful, I would have preferred more than the seven here. The color plates are at least as good as Osprey's, but I think they are much better as they are larger with more detail. The uniform descriptions are useful and informative.

However, on the whole these indians are well crafted, most have great expressions (especially 'Voice-like-Thunder), poses are realistic and (as always) they will be easy to paint, for the details are easy to pick out. One individual firing(?) a bow is a two piece figure so that this indian can be turned in any number of directions to his left. What more can I say, these are great figures and will be a great addition to any Plains Indian Army.

The best part of the illustrations are the photographs and drawings. There is at least one per page, but generally two. Most, I think, have appeared before in various sources, but never in one place. Some I have never seen before. Some of the photographs have portions enlarged to show details and peculiarities of uniforms or such.

One thing I noticed in several photos was that within any one Indian battalion there were more than one martial race. This is particularly evident in the photo on page 89 with the 36th Sikhs. There are four men shown each in a different uniform with different turbans. The footwear, pants and equipment are similar but nothing else. This is not true of all units. The photograph shows them all in the same uniform except for their turbans. Another point from the photograph are the different heights of individuals. The minimum height being 5'4" there are some that are over 6'.

So while mixing 25mm figures from various companies is usually a no no, I would no longer consider it wrong.

By now you should have an idea that I think this is worthwhile especially if you conduct operations on the NWF this is a must have book.

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The Foundry: 25mm Victorian Bystanders, Apache (figures)