It was a fortunate coincidence that a passion for wargames was shared by a number of authors around the turn of the-century. Of course if none of them had seen fit to write about the subject we may still have been none the wiser. "Little Wars" set the clock right. "Little Wars" is the culmination of the efforts of that early school of literary wargamers who helped establish lasting rapport between the child's game of tin soldiers and the dull and aptly named Rigid Kreigsspeil of the professional tactician. The result of that unlikely union was, in the words of H.G.Wells, it's chronicler, suitable for "boys from twelve years of age to a hundred and fifty, and for the more intelligent sort of girl." It seemed that on the nursery floor, things were never to be the same again. H. G. Wells, playing scientific soldiers. As a fertile training area for the young professional soldier, the nursery floor had already proved to be a rival to the renowned Playing Fields of Eton. According to legend, the wargame proficiency of Sir Winston Churchill was first discovered in his playroom. If legend is correct, Churchill's father, Lord Randolph, did a disservice to a later generation of wargamers by sweeping young Winston away from his toy fort and into a real one. His action prematurely robbed wargaming of a most distinguished patron the man most fitted to write that 'large thick book' of wargaming promised by Wells, but which, sadly never appeared. Along with Wells, various other eminent authors such as G.K.Chesterton and Jerome K. Jerome wore out the knees of their trousers as avid nursery floor tacticians, but Wells remains sole candidate fo the role of literary Founding Father of wargaming simply because his 'Little Wars' was the first book to be entirely devoted to its mysteries. He is careful to stress however that his game was "no new thing, no crude novelty". It is possible that his inspiration stemmed from an article published in Scribners Magazine, December 1898, by Lloyd Osbourne, stepson of Robert Louis Stevenson. Until then the public had been unaware of Stevenson's prolific contribution to wargaming and may well have remained so if it were no for Osbourne's brief nostalgic record of a childhood memory. Fortunately for wargaming posterity, Osbourne's article together with Stevenson's "War Correspondence" is included in most collections of Stevenson's works. Entitled "Stevenson at Play", it is a rare gem of early wargaming literature which in spite of its brevity, matches "Little Wars" for charm. Its readers will soon discover that Wells' patriotic 'Cannonade of Sandgatel; the shot that echo round the world, was in fact fired thirty years earlier in the Swiss alpine resort of Davos; not by a spring breech-loader but by Stevenson's 'deadly marble'. Between 18th October 1881 and 20th May 1882, Stevenson, a chronic consumptive, was convalescing in a rented chalet at Davos together with his wife and stepson. During those intervening seven months of time when, appropriately enough, a part-time British officer, Spencer Wilkinson, was planning to revitalise the world of professional Kreigsspeil, - amateur wargaming was spawned. Stevenson shared with Wells that combination of boyish vitality, adult intellect and novelists imagination, which were superb qualities for a wargaming pioneer. Lloyd Osbourne, then twelve.years old, naturally hero worshipped him, and in his prefatory note to Stevensonts whimsical campaign narrative, told in the form of a string of newspaper reports, he tells how Stevenson's wargame was born. In the beginning, the power of life and death were exerted by Osbourne's marksmanship - he was always the better shot whether with marble, sleeve-link, button or pop-gun. For a while Stevenson tolerated the constant deflowering of his best laid plans with mild resentment before finally negating Osbourne's 'unfair' advantage by a diplomatic rearrangement of their forces. For instance, by appropriating a horde of chubby cavalrymen, who through their low centres of gravity could bear the fiercest fire and remain unscathed, he forced upon Osbourne a unit of flimsy Swiss who were "so weak on their legs that the merest breath would mow them down in columns." Campaigns grew in length and complexity until they began to resemble true Kreigsspeil. Osbourne describes them as having "rules innumerable, prolonged arithmetical calculations, constant measuring with foot rules and the throwing of dice". Oddly enough, Stevenson appears to have halted before the Rubicon: dice were never used for fire effect. Quite possibly he may have considered this a retrograde step, for when compared to the contemporary professional game his method scored highly - it was played for fun. This is not to say that Stevenson did not possess the dedicated wargamers capacity for diligent research to get his facts right. On the contrary, the alpine chalet soon became clutter ed with heaps of military manuals and textbooks, And in order to taste the true flavour of war, Stevenson spent hours conversing with a group of invalids from the military hospital nearby. The main action took place in the attic: "A most chilly and dismal spot, reached by a crazy ladder and unlit save for a single frosted window, so low at the eaves and so dark that we could seldom stand upright nor see without a candle". None of these hazards, it may be assumed, could have improved Stevenson's physical condition. Terrain was chalked in various colours upon the floor; mountains, rivers, towns, bridges and roads of two classes. A 'war' took weeks to run, special campaign rules providing for the destruction of bridges, entrenching of camps, weather conditions and'logistics. Four men formed 'a regiment, and each regiment carried its proporionate amount of ammunition, represented by model carts laden with twenty printers 'ems', (borrowed from Osbourne's toy printing press). One 'em' was paid into base per each shot fired, thus ensuring a constant turnover of supply trains. "As a large army employing thirty regiments could consume a vast amount of ammunition in every engagement, Stevenson had no need to stress to young Osbourne the importance of keeping open his lines of communication. The fog of war was simulated by numbered chance cards which could represent anything from large armies down to solitary horsemen. In addition, some of the cards might contain intelligence reports of hazards, others could be blank. As the only safe way to uncover the purpose of each card was by judicious use of cavalry screens, Osbourne soon began to learn the rudiments of tactics--the hard way. Still uncovered units were permitted to fight, their secrecy maintained by lessening, the rate of fire. Further innovations included a rudimentary morale system using dice, which proved so heartbreaking to the loser, (presumably Osbourne), that the idea was abandoned. Also rejected was the attempt to introduce 'unwholesome zones', where unwary intruders had to be diced for sickness. A horrified Osbourne thus witnessed "death's toll in a new and frightful form", and Stevenson humanely erased that passage hurriedly from his voluminious rule book. The latter part of 'Stevenson at Play' is devoted to Stevenson's 'War Correspondence', (well worth study, incidentally, by present day writers of wargame battle reports). Stevenson, probably influenced by Osbourne's American background, has given his campaign an 'ACW' slant; evidenced not only by his colourful sounding place names - Glendarule, Sandusky, Tahema, and Savannah - but also by the nature of the conflict, in which the opposing armies share the same cultural and residential backcloth. The defiant editorials of the 'Hallobally Record' are a joy to read. This biting attack serve as an example: "......Where were Osbourne's wits? Will it be believed, the column at Lone Bluff is again short of ammunition? This old man of the sea, whom all the world knows to be an ass and whom we can prove to be a coward, is apparently a peculator also. If we were to die tomorrow, the word "0sbourne" would be found engraven backside foremost on our hearts." Strong stuff, and fighting words indeed! It is not surprising that they needled Osbourne to the point where he forced Stevenson as 'proprietor' of that scurrilous scandalsheet to hang its editor. However, as Stevenson went on to win the campaign, the result may have taught young Osbourne yet another truth of war; that civilian repression is no way to win battles. Defeat was acknowledged in the person of one of Osbourne's Staff figures, which was modelled with the features of Napoleon. Apparently that is where the resemblance ended, for upon surrender of his sword, this gaudily painted, eccentric figure was given the full treatment from the battlescarred press: "'General,' said Napoleon to his captor, 'you have today immortalised your name.' 'Sir,' returned Stevenson, whose brutality of manner was already proverbial, 'if you had taken as much trouble to direct your army as your tailor to make your clothes, our positions might have been reversed." Having won by the sword, there is no need to add that Stevenson would have attained victory equally well with the pen!  Back to Table of Contents -- Wargamer's Newsletter # 155 To Wargamer's Newsletter List of Issues To MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 1975 by Donald Featherstone. 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