Recent years, I've seen a steadily escalating coverage of the gaps in the major wargaming periods. Napoleonic was perhaps the first wargaming era replete with really excellent and extensive ranges of available figures, uniform books, historical information on strategy and tactics, and intelligently formulated sets of rules for the enthusiast to sift and compare. Soon afterwards, efforts of among others the Research Group and the of Ancients and the manufacturers who supported them brought about a similar situation for the "Ancient" wargamer. More recently still, researchers have extended their interest to the Medieval period, linking up with the newly formed Pike-and-Shot Society, equipped with well conceived rules and figures. Having a special interest in the American War of Independence wargaming I have seen that period recently become well catered for with the appearance of relevant Airfix sets and the Bicentenary. Modern wargamers are n the picture thanks to Micro-tanks, Matchbox and Airfix in 1/72nd, plus other makers and literature. It is quite obvious that most of the traditional war- games period 'barriers' have been well breached figurewise, rulewise and informationwise, to allow reasonably authentic and attractive wargames. Colonial period battles, one of the most fascinating categories of model soldier wargaming, remains relatively unexploited compared to the others. Of course people play Colonial wargames, but without the benefit of the detailed research in uniforms and rules available for most other types of wargame - except in the case of "Skirmish" games. Colonial wargames are a type that need special consideration, simply because opposing sides differ so sharply in characteristics, equipment and methods - this is precisely what makes the Colonial game so interesting. As one moves through military history, morale maintains an undeniable importance as a decisive factor in military encounters, while firepower gradually assumes a general precedence over melees until the present day when melees fade in comparison with such firepower devices as rockets. Colonial warfare between regulars and natives presents one with a rare exception to the general historical pattern, since the natives tended to continue to rely on 'ancient' close contact fighting, while the regulars preferred a more 'modern' reliance on firepower with their more sophisticated weaponry. So, instead of both sides using roughly similar tactics as in our other wargames the Colonial period presents us with opponents attempting to force conflict under widely differing methods. Firepower vs. Spears At this stage, many who have attempted Colonial wargames will postulate that the native swords and spears are so sadly inferior to regular firepower as to make wargames in this period quite impractical unless one has so many more natives that they take hours to move. Omdurman might be quoted as a classic example of the hopelessness of using swords against modern firepower. Certainly Regulars in campaigns such as those against the Sudanese, Zulus and Pathans had 'a vastly superior firepower which must be incorporated into any rules controlling such games. What does not seem to be appreciated is that the natives had significant advantages besides superior numbers, even if they usually failed to use them effectively. For example operating more lightly equipped, and under familiar geographic and climatic conditions, native forces had a mobility and endurance p6tential far superior to most of their Regular opposition - especially the slow moving campaign equipped infantry that formed the bulk of most British columns. A brief look at Victorian appreciations of the Dervishes, Zulus and Pathans proves this conclusively. And on the wargames table a wily player can use this mobility in skilful outflanking and rear hook moves instead of the suicidal frontal charges across open ground so often resorted to by natives in real-life battles (Omdurman was the classic example of this). The second great native advantage generally conceded even by contemporary white opposition, was superior fieldcraft, specifically concealment. The most dramatic example of what could happen when a substantial native force managed to delude the Regular commander as to its whereabouts was probably Isandhlwana, although again, ambushing was a potential advantage native commanders failed to utilise to a sufficient degree in real-life - the luring of the 21st Lancers on to a dead ground position full of Fuzzy-Wuzzies by Jehadia riflemen at Omdurman seems to be one of the few other large scale attempts in the Victorian era. But of course, there is nothing to prevent a wargamer from arranging dozens of fiendish native ambushes against his regular opponent on the table-top, provided effective concealment of irregulars is made a key point in Colonial rules! The practical problem here is to reduce the all- seeing roving eye of one's actual wargames opponent to the insectscale, view of a real-life Victorian commander in alien and badly-mapped territory, beset by thirst and flies, and his view obscured by dust, heat haze, unseen dried watercourses, and mirages! Actually it isn't really so difficult to at least hamper battlefield observation! For a start, an article by Ian Cohen in that stimulating journal "Savage and Soldier" suggests that native units beyond a certain distance from the Regulars be represented not by figures, but only by a paper flag giving little indication of the unit's type or size. As Ian points out, this also speeds movement in the opening phases of the game. Areas of dense bush (represented by lichen or green painted foam rubber) and gullies (represented by long strips of odd shaped brown painted cardboard) should always be part of a Colonial battlefield. Natives in these areas and in reverse slope positions are represented by the paper flag without its pole and base with the paper marker actually concealed under some lichen or the cardboard gulley, making detection at long range at least, as difficult as in real-life. The regular player is not allowed to watch while the native player carries out his moves; and from round-to-round paper markers can creep ever closer to their prey as they move along gullies or through bush! To complete the limiting of a regular all-seeing eye, the "mirage horror" system can be added! By this rule, a native unit which has had its figures revealed but subsequently disappears into gully, bush, or behind hill to be represented by a paper marker only (with movements marked also on player's map) leaves its figures where they could last be seen by the regular player as a mere delusory mirage! This also saves the trouble of removing and returning figures to the table as they appear and disappear. Ambush tactics can become really devious and you purposely stand native units still to make your opponent think they have disappeared on your map into nearby gullies when in fact they are merely waiting! The regular player's antidote to sneak and delusion native player tactics is to send out small parties of mounted figures as scouts. Once a scouting party reaches a certain distance from "mirage units" or hitherto concealed paper markers, the umpire or native player must at once place a folded piece of paper with the scouting party stating exactly what they have discovered. This paper can then be greedily perused by the regular player when and if a member of the party subsequently reaches his general figure alive! Naturally the native side goes to great lengths to slaughter scouts in possession of valuable information, so it becomes good regular tactics to scout in strength. To sum up the argument and ideas of the last few paragraphs, adequate rules for native concealment, with their greater mobility, in combination with better terrain and tactics than their reallife counterparts usually made use of, can be used to give really fascinating and skill demanding games without the natives having vast numerical superiority and so taking much longer to move. Nor have we yet exhausted the native advantages which should be utilised to allow more balanced table-top engagements. Especially in the Sudan, the natives showed a daunting skill at melee (even against charging cavalry) and had large numbers of rifle armed troops which again, they often failed to utilise in proper co-ordination with their other troops. The Boers in fact, completely burst the bubble of Regular fire superiority and in the Boer Wars it was often the British wh- attempted more "ancient" close contact tactics while the Boers preferred to keep their distance with smaller numbers and relatively far superior firepower. Because the Boers had also concealment skills to match the natives, they make the most formidable Colonial wargames forces of all. From Rules to Information To move from rules to available information, it is obvious to most of us that a great host of historical works have followed Sir Winston Churchillts early narratives. It is no longer difficult to find English language descriptions on British Colonial Campaigns at any rate. But when one comes to the more specific field of uniforms, one realises that research is still sadly behind in comparison with other periods such as Napoleonic. My own small collection of photo reproductions shows a really fascinating variety in the styles of dress worn by various tribes encountered during the Sudan campaigns - i.e. in the intricate wrappings and hair arrangement of certain Hadendowa tribes, and the widespread use of Saracen and Crusader equipment by others - some of Gordon's lieutenants in the arly 1880's saw whole mounted units in mail. And even the British adopted a considerable variety of dress colours and fashions - to take one example the good old sun helmet appeared in several different styles and could have a cloth over, a puggaree, or a large neck- protecting rear flap, with possibly a coloured sprig, cloth patch, or metal badge for unit identification! Very recently, some first glimmerings of really specific and detailed Colonial uniform studies have appeared in "Soldiers of the Queen" and "Savage and Soldier" as Doug Johnson mentioned in his letter in the January 176 Newsletter. In particular, Doug's own article in "Savage and Soldier" on the Egyptian Army 1880-1900 gave the detailed type of information on uniform variety not available, to my knowledge at any rate, in any other written source at the moment. Doug is a pioneer in more than just his attraction to Nile mosquitoes! Turning to that stormy wargames subject, the figures themselves, after trying larger figures of 30mm, I have realised that smaller figures are far better suited to the sort of rough and ragged encounters occurring in Colonial wargames. Peter Laing's 15mm figures are ideal, being small enough to hide in lichen, although in the Durban Wargames Group we decided on makes compatible with Airfix HO figures - which themselves offer a very wide range of simple conversion possibilities (so we include Scruby, Phoenix and early Minifig 25mm's, and Jacklex and-Hinton Hunt 20mm's). Directly reflecting the lack of detailed uniform information in handy form, nearly all makers are content to offer 2 or 3 standard native figures of a type, often differing only in pose. This when half the interest of native appearance is the very fact that fewer uniform restrictions allowed far greater variety in dress and weaponry. One can only agree wholeheartedly with Doug's earlier plea for more scope and imagination in figure design. I hope that in writing this article I have managed to avoid the pet-subject dangers of sounding over feverish and fanatical, but I hope even more that fellow wargamers will see greater potential in Colonial actions, and bring more ingenuity and scholastic ability to bear on its relatively neglected aspects of rules, uniform information and figures. And to end on a personal note, in moments snatched from legal studies and club activities over the next year, I will be steadily working away on my own Colonial rules and forces, and would be very grateful to hear from other Colonial enthusiasts who know of further sources, or who are interested in further discussion about this most challenging and neglected of wargames periods. Simply write to Noel Zaal, I Baden Road, Westville 3630, Natal, South Africa. (Or call personally?? .... Ah well!) (One of the two remaining volumes of WARGAMES THROUGH THE AGES will exclusively deal with Colonial Warfare. D.F.) Back to Table of Contents -- Wargamer's Newsletter # 174 To Wargamer's Newsletter List of Issues To MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 1976 by Donald Featherstone. This article appears in MagWeb.com (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other articles from military history and related magazines are available at http://www.magweb.com