Scenario 3: July 24, The Battle of Caspe

 

-Scenario 3: July 24, The Battle of Caspe

In Caspe, a town in the east of Aragon, Captain Negrete of the Guardia Civil joined the rising, arrested the Republican government men, plus leftists and CNTstas, and set up patrols. Negrete went to Zaragoza for weapons and ammo, to arm the 200 right-wing volunteers who joined his 40 civil guards on July 22.

On July 24th, the Durruti Column left the Bruc Barricades, now renamed the Bakunin Barricades, in Pedralbles. Headed by truck through Cervera and Lleida, the excited anarchists forgot many of their supplies, soon arriving in Caspe. There, they found volunteer militia already fighting for the city, though outnumbered. The combined forces of revolution pushed to liberate Caspe. During the battle, Negrete tried to protect himself with women and children as hostages, but died for his efforts.

In this scenario, the Durruti Column, advancing along the highway in trucks and cars, reaches and fights for Caspe. A small group of militia will be present already in the town, fighting against a force of Civil Guard, and Falangist and Carlist militia. Halfway through the game, the anarchists will receive reinforcements of improvised armor and weapon supplies, arriving by highway or railway. At the same time, the nationalists will receive reinforcements consisting of an artillery group. The side that conquers the town wins.

Set up: Clear summer weather, visibility at 40”, 60” with binoculars. Arrange a town centered on a main road, with a church in the center of town surrounded by narrow streets and tightly-packed houses. A train line runs parallel to the road on the northern edge of town, with a station toward the center of the table. Farmlands surround the town.

Unit Sheets: Make unit sheets for the groups. 

Ammunition: Nationalists have 10 ammo each, with an additional 200 rounds in each of the 2 stores in (the church and a farm house.)

CNTstas begin with 8 ammo each, and receive resupply by train or truck halfway through the game,  50 points each. They will receive supplies by train only if they have already secured the rail line up to the train station.

1st Half (Rounds 1 - 10):

Nationalist orders:

Defend the perimeter of town. Capture civilians, hold them at HQ as human shields. Fall back position, the church, location of storage and Negrete’s HQ. Unit orders should be written for each sector of defense.

CNT Orders:

Capture the train station, link up with advanced militia, capture the farm

Nationalist Forces:

Civil Guard: 

-HQ: Captain, runner, priest, 4 guards, 1 75mm cannon and crew, 1 advanced spotter, 2 MG and crew. 

2 trucks.

-1st platoon: 1 officer, 19 men

Falange

-HQ: Sergeant, 4 grenadiers/molotovs

-1st platoon: 1 officer, 19 men

Carlists:

-HQ: Sergeant, armed priest, nuns, 4 grenades/molotov men

-1st platoon: 1 officer, 19 men

Photo above: Sectors of Caspe, with lettered sectors possible starting points for the Caspe militia at the start of Round 1.

Republican Forces

Caspe Militia:

-1 delegate, 19 militia

Durruti Column:

HQ: Durruti, 1 bearer, 1 runner, 2 x 75mm cannon and crew, 2x msg and crew, 5 dynamiters. As many non-armored vehicles as possible. 2 Tiznaos.

1st Centuria: 

-HQ: 1 delegate, 1 bearer, 1 cannon and crew, 1 mg and crew, 

-1st group: 1 delegate, 9 men

-2nd group: 1 delegate, 9 men

-3rd group: 1 delegate, 9 men

-4th group: 1 delegate, 9 men

-5th group: 1 delegate, 9 men

2nd Centuria:  

-HQ: 1 delegate, 1 bearer, 1 cannon and crew, 1 mg and crew

-1st group: 1 delegate, 9 men

-2nd group: 1 delegate, 9 men

-3rd group: 1 delegate, 9 men

-4th group: 1 delegate, 9 men

-5th group: 1 delegate, 9 men

2nd Half (Rounds 11 - 20):

Nationalist orders: 

Await arrival of reinforcements, then push to reclaim lost ground. Use Human Shields. Church is the final fallback, if lost, retreat out of town. 

CNT Orders: 

Resupply forces. Move down the flanks of Caspe to silence artillery. Besiege the church, if possible cut off escape routes. Rescue hostages.

Nationalist reinforcements:

Artillery battery:

-HQ - Captain, staff, 1 advanced spotter.

-Battery of 3 cannon and crew.

Infantry company:

-HQ: Captain, staff, a runner, 1 MG and crew. 2 trucks.

-1st platoon: 1 officer, 19 men

-2nd platoon:  1 officer, 19 men

-3rd platoon:  1 officer, 19 men

CNT reinforcements:

-200 rounds of ammunition

-2 Tiznaos

3rd Centuria:

-HQ: 1 delegate, 1 bearer, 1 cannon and crew, 1 mg and crew, 

-1st group: 1 delegate, 9 men

-2nd group: 1 delegate, 9 men

-3rd group: 1 delegate, 9 men

-4th group: 1 delegate, 9 men

-5th group: 1 delegate, 9 men

4th Centuria:

-HQ: 1 delegate, 1 bearer, 1 cannon and crew, 1 mg and crew, 

-1st group: 1 delegate, 9 men

-2nd group: 1 delegate, 9 men

-3rd group: 1 delegate, 9 men

-4th group: 1 delegate, 9 men

-5th group: 1 delegate, 9 men

5th Centuria:

-HQ: 1 delegate, 1 bearer, 1 cannon and crew, 1 mg and crew, 

-1st group: 1 delegate, 9 men

-2nd group: 1 delegate, 9 men

-3rd group: 1 delegate, 9 men

-4th group: 1 delegate, 9 men

-5th group: 1 delegate, 9 men

The Winner:

The side that controls the town after 20 turns, or who controls more of the town, wins.

Outcome: If the workers are victorious, they may move on to the next scenario, and carry over any remaining ammunition, including the captured ammo dumps of Caspe. Lastly, any and all machine guns and cannons captured in the fighting are added to the equipment list in your general supply. Check the briefing for additional expropriations to the column’s stock.

Painting my cardboard ships

Hello all, I'm writing with more progress on my cardboard ships. Some of the first sloops I put together are finished. I painted them Yellow Ochre, which was a commonly used color on ships. Easy on us color blind guys, because it says it right on the paint tube. 

The ships came out a little crooked... something to work on.

Two of the smaller boats:

Photo with a 1/72 miniature for scale:

And some more photos of the smaller ships and boats I've built and painted so far:

Finally, I've almost completed the paint job on my "snow ship." I need to clean up the blue lines a little and paint the name on the stern.

I imagine it as a French ship, and am still trying to come up with a name. Le Neige? Maybe thats too obvious. A white bird? Le Pigeon? La Grue? Le Cygne? La Cigogne? I have until the paint dries to figure it out.

More to come!

¡Á Zaragoza! Photos of early CNT-FAI workers columns and their equipment

A commenter in my previous post asked for some close-up photos of my miniatures. I thought it would be a fun opportunity to show off my workers militia columns as they prepare to set off for the campaign my friends and I are playing through.

If you have been following this blog, you know that we've been battling out the first few days of the Spanish Civil War in the streets of Barcelona. We just wrapped up the second scenario of the campaign, wherein the workers crushed the mutinous soldiers, defeating the local arm of the nationalist coup and unleashing a social revolution.

Before breaking down the table for the next game, I set up my version of the antifascist columns' parade on their way out of Barcelona and into the Aragon. Check out this historic video of the parade:

And now, photos of my forces departing Barcelona:

The volunteers come down the Ramblas, circle the Ronda Colom, and head west, ¡Á Zaragoza!

At the front of the Column, José Buenaventura Durruti Dumange rides in the Hispano Suiza. 

This model is based on this historic photograph. Durruti also marches beside the car next to the flag bearer.

The column's commander and namesake drives on, followed by cars painted with the letters and slogans of the CNT-FAI. Armed workers fill the streets.

Close behind the cars are a few trucks carrying anarchist militia volunteers.

Behind the truck comes the first of the tiznaos: improvised armored vehicles, created by metal workers welding plates onto expropriated trucks in the collectivized factories. 

This first one is of my own designed, built from leftover truck parts, plastic scrap, and index card.

The remaining tiznaos are historic ones, built from "paper model" schemes with index card. The first and third are Vulcanos, and the one in between is an MTM-1.

  

You can learn more about the improvised armor used by the Durruti Column at this TMP thread.

I have other tiznaos, including a 3D printed version of King Kong which I created, but only a few tiznaos were built in time to accompany the Durruti Column out of the city that day, and I just used the ones I saw in the video above for this display.

Behind the tiznaos are another car and a few more trucks. The trucks are hauling cannons and machine guns captured from the army.

These particular cannons are from HaT's French WWI Artillery set, which is plastic and inexpensive. 75mm French cannons saw a lot of use in the Spanish Civil War, and I have a good deal of them.

Behind the truck hauling artillery comes another full of volunteers, and two more carrying heavy machine guns.

The first truck carries two guns from BUM sets, which I think are supposed to be Hotchkiss M1914s. The second has a Maxim gun.

At the base of the statue, two HMG crews handle their weapons. The crew on the left are from Minairons, and the one on the right are converted BUM plastic miniatures. 

On the other side of the statue, the new column displays piles of ammunition, weapons, food, and other supplies captured from the army.

Taking up the rear are units wearing mostly brown and black with "mountain" hats. These units served during the previous scenario as "delegates" of the workers defense committees. These miniatures are from a different set of Durruti Column forces I've made, representing later Durruti Column members when the organization became more uniformed and better equipped.

Another from the group of later forces shows off a grenade. This piece is from Bandera's "Durruti Column" set.

The figures are quite a mix. Most of them are probably from Barcelona Universal Models (BUM), with a good deal from Bandera, Minairons, and Irregular, all of whom have their own great Spanish Civil War ranges. There are plenty of conversions in there as well from HaT Industrie and Ceasars and others cheaper plastic figures.  I won't bother to separate them out by company, I'm not making any free commercials here, but if you own a line of Spanish Civil War miniatures and would like to send me some I would be happy to paint them up and take some photos for your publicity.

That said, I'll try to do posts like these every so often, showing off different factions and forces.