The Collection of Eric Knowles....Part 4

You may recall at the end of last year the UK lost one of its unsung wargaming pioneers in the shape of Eric Knowles. There were many blog posts about Eric by both Bob Cordery and I who had the honour and privilege of wargaming with him during the legendary Madasahatta campaign at the end of the 1970s and into the early 1980s. At the time of writing I am helping, when I can, Eric’s son Bill to organise his father’s extensive collection prior to disposal.

Eric’s collection was huge. When I say huge I mean as in filling up a double garage, a loft, a downstairs reception room and a horsebox huge. Bill was tasked with the Herculean labour of sorting out the whole and arranging for its disposal. I offered to assist him with this and trust me, it is a gargantuan undertaking. The main bulk of the collection is painted 25mm 18^th century armies and an awful lot of WW2 in 20mm. There is also a prodigious quantity of unpainted metal organised into armies that Eric had not gotten around to. Bill has made some inroads into the collection and has sorted out some dozen or so plastic storage boxes full of the unpainted metal – at least that which he has found so far. At this stage I have no idea about what the unpainted 18^th century figures consist of only that is covers the 1680 to 1740 period and is divided up into complete armies. That is complete armies – cavalry, infantry, artillery, the whole nine yards. Unpainted. The collection also includes an extensive library and a lot of 1:1200^th scale ships – both plastic and metal.

In many ways the unpainted material is the easiest part of the collection to sort out as for the most part the figures can be bagged and stored quite unceremoniously in bags and boxes. The painted part will be rather more challenging as care will be needed in storing the figures.  Eric has units in boxes with labels but time has not been kind on the boxes and so a new storage system will be needed. The average size for each army is around a dozen or so infantry regiments usually of anything from 24 to 36 figures, half a dozen or so cavalry units of up to 20 figures and artillery like you would not believe. Eric was fond of artillery as well as the whole siege and baggage train thing, not to mention command and staff and sundry non-combatant hangers on so there is plenty of peripheral material.

One of the largest armies in his collection was his Ottoman Turkish force. This is enormous and also has rather a lot of unpainted metal to go with it. Eric really went to town with this army and the end result was simply outrageous in respect of its size. As I recall much of it was 25mm Minifigs but lord alone knows what else is in it and waiting for Bill to unearth. I remember facing this army in its full glory when we refought the siege of Vienna 1683. When is was deployed on the table it took the combined efforts of several collections to field the required scale of opposition.

I say unearth intentionally as Bill does not have a clue what is where until he actually opens the boxes. Any order these may have been in disappeared when Eric’s bungalow was cleared and the contents stacked, box upon box, in Bill’s horsebox for the first of a number of trips to various destinations. By degrees the remaining parts of Eric’s collection is converging on Bill’s house which is fortunately large enough to store it. I have this image of him in full on Indiana Jones mode brushing off the dust of ages by the light of a guttering torch….

Anyway, to the point of the post.

Bill is of the opinion that Eric’s collection as far as possible should go to those that would appreciate it for what it is. There is a tangible value to much of it but money is not the sole motivator for his decision and he is to be applauded for this. The 18^th century painted collection alone is probably quite valuable and when you factor in the books and ships etc there is some significant financial return to be made in due course. We were discussing this very point when Bill casually slipped into the conversation that the Ottoman Turks and the Madasahatta stuff he was giving to me.

That’s right, Eric’s Ottoman Turkish army and all of the Madasahatta kit is coming to me.

Gobsmacked, awe-struck and most certainly moved. Eric and Ivy, his wife, were an important part of my life when I first moved away from home to London as a mere boy of 17 and as Eric was responsible for my lifelong interest in the Sublime Porte (not to mention WW1 Colonial-style campaigns) this bequest is a marvellous way to remember them.

Bill pointed out that as yet both collections needed to be found and reorganised – the only part I saw when I visited him was the Sultan’s camp complete with scimitar wielding eunuchs and a harem for the Turks as well as British artillery from the Madasahatta set up, together with some unpainted African tribesman. The condition of both collections is yet to be ascertained but suspect that some running repairs will inevitably be needed. This is of little import in the overall scheme of things though.

Being the steward of two such significant collections is a singular honour and I am truly at a loss for words at this incredible gesture. I hope that my gaming efforts using these armies in due course will be worthy of the memory of both Eric and Ivy.

Turkish Armed Forces 1925 to 1945 Part 1....Turkish Armour

Czech built Praga TH

I had a little trawl across the net and found a few things out about the Turkish armed forces from the 1920s to the end of WW2, mainly concerned with the vehicles used by the army. The first tanks used by the Turks was the famous Renault FT17 during the late 1920s. They later made use of the French R35 in 1940 but between times gained numbers of Vickers Light Tank Vlb and the Russian T26. The Russian also supplied some BT2, T27, T28 (only two of these) and some armoured cars - BA3s and BA6s.

The T26s were taken out of service in 1942 and were replaced in 1943 with 56 German 50mm L60 armed Panzer lll at Hitler's request. They then received some Panzer lV as well - the idea being that Hitler was trying to convince Turkey that attacking the Russians would be a good idea.

From a transport perspective I assume that an assortment of lorries from various sources would be used but also the Turks made much use of a rather interesting Czech built vehicle - the CKD Praga TH. Turkey also made use of the Praga TH6 and 7 (in fact they acquired the entire production run of these two vehicles - just over a 100 of them) and the Praga T9 (also used by the Germans).

Czech built Praga TH6/7 - a poor photo but you can make out a rather fetching camouflage scheme

Czech built Praga TH7/8 - again, a poor photo but you can (just about) make out a rather fetching camouflage scheme

Czech built Praga T9 - the last of the group (and the largest)

I have absolutely no idea if anybody makes these in any scale at all so they would be a challenge and no mistake. Having said that, finding a suitable tracked chassis and adding a truck body should be fairly easy to undertake should I need to.

Not for a while though....;-)

The Berlin to Baghdad Express...and not many people know that...

THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE AND GERMANY'S BID FOR WORLD POWER 1898 - 1918 by Sean McMeekin

I ask you, in all honesty how on earth could I have possibly resisted this title - especially with a £30 Waterstones birthday gift card burning a huge hole in my pocket?

The best description of this title comes from the book cover itself:

'The Berlin-Baghdad Express explores one of the most important but least understood stories of the First World War: the bid by the Germans to destroy the British Empire by harnessing the power of Islam.

The German military authorities had long enjoyed a special relationship with the Ottoman Empire - training its army but also starting to build the great Berlin-to-Baghdad railway, one of the era's most extraordinary engineering projects. The railway, on its completion, would have allowed the Germans to transport many thousands of troops to Asia, invulnerable to British naval power.

Yet as fighting began to stalemate on the Western front, this relationship took on a whole new dimension. With the Ottoman Empire fatefully deciding to join Germany, a hugely ambitious project began - to end Britain's hold on the Suez Canal, to call a jihad against British interests throughout the Muslim world and to bring Afghanistan and Persia into the war as German allies in an attack on British India.'

I am most certainly going to savour this one and no mistake...........

The rather odd title for this post came about as when I visited Waterstones in Leadenhall Market (famed as Diagon Alley in the Harry Potter films) no less a personage than Sir Michael Caine was signing copies of his new autobiography - From the Elephant to Hollywood. The queue was immense for the book and his signature butI managed to catch a glimpse of the man himself on the way out. I was amused though when one of the staff answered a customer when asked about how long Mr Caine would be in attendance for at the shop was promptly told '...until about 3pm, but not a lot of people know that!'

It made me smile.

In Praise of the 'Mehmetcik'

When our friends at Osprey first mentioned that a new Warrior title devoted to the Ottoman Infantryman of 1914 to 1918 I was highly delighted. The title has now been released and the redoubtable Mr.Fox acquired a copy for me at the recent Tonbridge show - Cavalier - on 28th February. Written by the prolific Middle Eastern military historian David Nicolle and illustrated by Christa Hook this book is quite superb. It has the usual Osprey format; lots of black and white photographs and the obligatory colour plates - together with a useful glossary of Turkish military terminology.

I have yet to read this fully but at first glance it reinforces the fact that the Turkish soldier, when properly equipped, supplied and led was a match for any of the empire's enemies and that the main failings existed in the middle command echelon and the appalling logistical handicap they operated under. The army as a whole was not in any sense prepared for a long war - the infrastructure and economy, not to mention the industrial base, was never up to the task of fighting a long and modern war. Having said that, the army, and by extension the empire, outlasted both the Romanovs and the Hapsburgs - by a few years at least which was not bad for the so called 'sick man of Europe'. The raw material of the army was excellent but was poorly served by both faulty leadership and logistics. You could apply the 'Lions led by Donkeys' analogy very easily to the Turkish Army.

I realise I may be biased in favour of anything Turkish related but this book is a welcome reminder of the reasons why the allies held the 'Mehmetcik', the ordinary Asker, in such grudging respect.

I have not checked the Osprey website but I hoping that a Men at Arms title will appear covering the Balkan Wars of 1912 and 1912 for obvious reasons - well, they are sitting on my paint tray as I write!

A Pharoah Way to Go.............

As a result of a number of fortuitous boot sale acquisitions I was able to engineer a trade for a number of titles I was keen to add to the collection. The two titles in the picture are a graphic example of this and very pleased I am to have them. As mentioned previously, I have acquired a Napoleonic era Ottoman Turkish army and given their activity in Napoleon's Egyptian and Holy Land adventures they are very timely additions to the library. Volume 1 covered the french whilst volume 2 covers the Mamelukes and the Turks; together with the British - so the possibilities are many and varied. There are plenty of figures around in 15mm for this (I shall be using Minifigs to go with the Navwar stuff I have) and as the scale of operations is fairly modest the project will not need huge amounts of kit to realise. It would certainly be a colorful undertaking and no mistake!

I would look to tackle the armies on a DBA basis with perhaps no more than 20 or so bases of figures a side for a representational look rather than 'normal' sized units. This will mean that the use of Tabletop Battles as the preferred rule set is a distinct possibility.

So, Mameluke, Turkish, French and British armies to consider - and an active naval scene as well - which again certainly gives plenty of variety!

I will sit down and think about the feasibility of the said armies - I always find this a therapeutic exercise - and calculate costs etc. The Turks I have little problem with although I will need to add some of the Nizam-I-Cedid troops to the existing collection. These were the new army raised by the Sultan using modern methods and training as opposed to the traditional Janissaries (who hated them with a passion!).

Much to ponder methinks!