All Guns Blazing — December 2011

1 All Guns Blazing! Newsletter of the Naval Wargames Society No. 212 –December 2011 EDITORIAL Gentleman, Season’s Greetings to you all. Not much of an Editorial this month, I’m afraid, as I don’t seem to have time to blow my nose at the moment. (Awkward with the cold I’ve got at present!) One thing that has come to my notice which you may like to add to your Christmas List is that ‘Zvezda’ have produced a 1/350 model of HMS Dreadnought. The atmospheric box-art seems to show a Dreadnought having a far more active and dangerous life than the real one! Should be good though. If anyone has made one, or makes one soon, why note send me a few pics to include in AGB? If they carry on bringing out WWI ships, we may be able to fight Jutland in 1/350 scale. Now there’s a thought… Merry Christmas, everyone, and a festive ‘Up Spirits’! Richard Wimpenny wimpenny@talktalk.net An 80YW Dutch Warship. By Rob Morgan I found this an obviously contemporary illustration used in an old school history text book, uncaptioned and undescribed. The inscription 'Fin de la Guerre' "War's End" does little more to help. This surely is a Dutch warship, being attacked by a small galley and an armed boat. I wondered for several reasons, if this is intended to depict am 'infernal machine', and explosive vessel to be used against a port or a bridge? The craft has an armoured housing, with field guns, carriage

2 mounted within, another field gun at the bow, rather like the much smaller early 'Sea-Beggars' boats in aspect, she has a platform for musketeers and calivermen on top, which is pierced for shooting. There are soldiers in the three fighting tops. At the stern on the quarterdeck, and even with a glass I can't make out a pilot or steersman anywhere, there's a chimney exuding s steam of smoke, and no I don't think it's a galley! Her sails are furled, so I take it she's moving with the current downstream. No sign of oars anywhere and the crew is frankly small in number, perhaps again suggesting a death-or-glory mission. I've not encountered this illustration previously, but there were several such astonishing 'fire-ships' for want of a better term, in use during the 80YW. She'd be easily modelled from one of the 'Tumbling Dice' l/2400th scale models, my own thought would be ASD10 or even ASD 26 in the 'dice' list. Does anyone recognise this man o'war? Galfer Flags. By Rob Morgan Paul Bamford's 'Fighting Ships and Prisons' reviewed elsewhere in AGB, contains several plates, all in black and white unfortunately. The oddest inclusion is shown here. All the author gives in comment, caption or description is 'Eight Mediterranean Flags of the Period', all in use, one assumes aboard galleys. Now my collection of the 'Tumbling Dice' excellent 1/2400 'Spanish Armada' galleys andgaiieases would easily make a few of these nation's fleets and squadrons, but I'm unsure of the colours. Sadly Bamford gives no indication in the text. The flag of Castile and Leon's easy enough, it must be white with the ed an gold arms and a gold crown atop. The flag of the Knights of Malta again well known, but the Papal flag's very interesting. Is this I wondered the Pope's personal standard, carried if he ever went afloat, but unlikely to be flown in battle ? The red with white crescents flag of the Turks presents little problem, but Tripoli? Tunis too, and Algeria, guesses would he green and white stripes for the First and white over red or green for the second. I wondered if, in order to complete this review note as fully as possible, anyone knew the exact colours and designs?

3 Sea Quiz Part Fifteen; the answers 1. Name the only two-deck broadside ironclad rams ever built and who designed them? ‘Magenta’ and ‘Solferino’; designed by Dupuy de Lome. 2. What was the main armament of Captain Cowper Coles’ Lady Nancy? The ‘Lady Nancy’ was an armed raft on the Sea of Azov in 1855. She was armed with a single long 32-pdr gun. She carried 100 rounds and fired 80 at Taganrog. This suggest another question, though: can a raft be a ship…? 3. What replaced a carrier’s attendant destroyer positioned fine on the starboard quarter during flying operations after 1952? The attendant destroyer was of course replaced by a helicopter to pick up any flyer who ditched over the side. The answer given went into some detail technical matters on the point of the avoidance of aircraft in the right hand circuit and clearly the compiler thought that helicopters were a bit on the ‘new-fangled’ side! 4. What did HMS Argyll, Raleigh and Bedford have in common? All three were lost by grounding. 5. List five warships named after actual members of the Royal Family. Royal names as given by the compiler were…HMS ‘King Edward VII’, ‘Prince George’, ‘Victoria’, ‘Alexandra’, ‘Prince Albert’, and ‘KGV’. But now on to Rob’s Festive treat! Rob’s Christmas at Sea Quiz!! For well over a year now, Rob Morgan has been providing us all with a monthly brain teaser, and this month, it being the Festive Season, he has provided a bumper Christmas special. And as thought wasn’t enough, this time Rob has provided a prize! To the lucky member who can provide the most correct answers, there is a paper model of HMS Dreadnought. So if you are feeling knowledgeable, email your answers to me by the twentieth of the month, and I’ll pop your prize in the post. It could give you gentle repose on Boxing Day! Anyway, Rob writes on his Christmas quiz… The long running Sea Quiz page in 'The Navy' seems to have stirred a few souls of the Navy League into comment, criticism and sheer disbelief at the questions asked in some cases; but far more often at the answers given or expected. For example, "Which warship was protected by bales of cotton? " would provide ACW riverine enthusiasts with the opportunity to reel off a list, rather than name just one. While asking 'What is the outstanding profile feature of the Shaw Saville Line merchant ship 'New Australia'?' was to many of the magazine's readers a heresy unlooked for in what was after all a naval publication! The answer to that is that 'the forward funnel abaft the bridge looks like a heavy bipod mast'... and no, I didn't get it either! Now this being the season of goodwill and frequent post-luncheon repose, I've selected ten questions which will aid the little grey cells, and the digestive process. All, I promise are naval, not a single 'trade' question slipped in at all! Remember this is the early 1950s.

4 1. The 20 Destroyers of the 1912-13 Programme which formed the 'L' Class were originally named after literary characters. What were the original names, and to what were they changed? 2. What were the naval toasts for each night of the week? 3. Which 12 British armoured ships have been named after battles? 4. In one Battleship Division at Jutland each of the 4 ships had different calibre guns. What were the ships and the guns? 5. Name 9 British warships lost in peacetime disasters whose names have never been used again. 6. When was the office of Lord High Admiral last held? By whom? 7. Name the first carrier to be designed as such, and have an island funnel on the starboard side. 8. The last Royal Naval Destroyer to have three funnels? 9. Give 6 names each beginning with 'C , each borne by three or more warships since 1877. 10. Which Royal Navy warship had the battle honours Sabang 1944, Burma 1945 and Korea 1950-52? That's it. Answers next month, and compliments of the hopefully un-sickly season to you all! SIGNAL PAD! A few weeks ago the following email was sent to myself, as editor of AGB, and several other members with this interesting proposal. Quite a few replies wended their way across the ether, and I believe plans are afoot to bring it to fruition. I have to confess that being somewhat busy of late I fell by the wayside as regards keeping up with all the developments. Nevertheless, if you think you can help, contact me, or any of the other committee members. Gentlemen; Due to some recent health issues I have been bed ridden for some time and I have been passing the time re-reading my copies of Battlefleet. Two things jumped out at me when I finished. 1) Like the majority of our members I only have an incomplete set of issues. 2) The 100+ issues already printed make a unique and valuable body of work that it would be a shame to loose through carelessness. I have a proposal for the NWS: The NWS should gather as many unique copies of Battlefleet as possible; scan those copies as cleanly as possible into an easily accessible format (.pdf? .jpeg? forgive my lack of technical knowledge); provide copies of this archive to old and new members, other clubs, and wherever it will do the most good to spread out hobby. Because this will be a time consuming task I would propose a stipend for the member the member who undertakes the job, and that we all do our best to get old issues into their hands.

5 As I now find myself in a position to fund such a project, I am formally asking the board and senior members if they would undertake such a project, and if so I propose a stipend of ₤150 and a further ₤100 for production and postage (although I am sure we can expect great savings through e-mail sending). Sincerely. Jayson Abbott JOINING THE NAVAL WARGAMES SOCIETY If you have been lent this newsletter and would like to join the Naval Wargames Society, please follow this link to join our Society: www.navalwargamessociety.org. NWS Events and Regional Contacts, 2009 NWS Northern Fleet – Falkirk East Central Scotland Kenny Thomson, 1 Excise Lane, Kincardine, Fife, FK10 4LW, Tel: 01259 731091 e-mail: kenny.thomson@homecall.co.uk - Website: http://falkirkwargamesclub.org.uk/ Falkirk Wargames Club meets each Monday night at 7pm with a variety of games running each evening. Naval games are popular with 2 or 3 run each month. Campaign games sometimes feature in our monthly weekend sessions. Games tend to be organised week to week making a 3- month forecast here a waste of time. Please get in touch if you’d like to come along.  Popular periods – Modern (Shipwreck), WW1 and 2 (GQ), WW2 Coastal (Action Stations), and Pre-dreadnought (P Dunn’s rules) NWS North Hants [Every 3rd Sunday] Jeff Crane 31 Park Gardens, Black Dam, Basingstoke, Hants, 01256 427906 e-mail: gf.crane@ntlworld.com NWS Wessex [Bi-Monthly Meetings] The Wessex Group has gone into (hopefully) temporary abeyance for the moment. If anyone living in the Bath / Bristol / Gloucester area (or further afield) would like to take on managing the group please contact myself or any of the other NWS officials.