WWII Tank Gunner Describes Fierce
Armored Combat Against Germans
I was so moved by this video that I felt I needed to share it.
Walter Boston Stitt, Jr., is a World War II veteran who served as a corporal in the 33rd Armored Regiment, 3rd Armored Division. Stitt arrived in France one month after the D-Day landings and would find himself serving as both a loader and gunner in the M4 Sherman Tank.
Stitt would fight in both France and Belgium, and participate in helping counter the last great German offensive of the war, The Battle of the Bulge. During his time in combat Stitt would survive the destruction of three Sherman tanks, witness the death of three crew members, and be wounded twice by enemy fire, earning him two Purple Hearts for his service.
This issue is overstuffed, which means I had a great November of gaming a little of everything, and still managed to create and send this out before the Thanksgiving long weekend. Happy Thanksgiving and enjoy!
After Action Report Newsletter — November 2024
French Defense 1940: Command Decision
Fall In 2024: One-Day Dash
Skirmish Action Playtest: WWII Normandy
American Revolution: Sleight of Hand
Amber Light Means Caution: AWI Umpire Report
Spring 1813 Campaign in a Day: The GM Report
HMGS NextGen: Games
Space Base: Terra Proxima Space Base: Across the Galactic Table
NEWS
Dunkirk vs Dieppe: Photo
A Courier Giggle
GHQ Releases: 2024-2025
Goober Calendar Book: 2025
La Bataille de Kulm: Kickstarter
Day Of Battle Upgrade: Version 5
Bagration Supplement: TO&E 1944-1945
New Wargame: Ulithi Atoll, November 1944
New Wargame: Droop Mountain — November 6, 1863
Tazan Rell: The D&D Adventure Continues
Steve’s Annual Game Day: Eurocentric
Books I’ve Read
Winston Churchill in 100 Objects
Gladiators: 1st-5th Centuries AD (Elite 258)
Hitler the Scientist: Pseudo-Science
Besieged Beachhead: Bay of Pigs
Pearl: December 7, 1941
Son Tay 1970 POW Camp: Raid 60 (Vietnam)
Wake Island Wildcat: WWII Marine Pilot
Operation Bagration: An Incomplete Truth
Ground Forces Korean War 1: Men At Arms 560
Fascist Italy at War: 1939-1943
Tanks in the Philippines: 1944-45 (NewV334)
Dying Hard: WWII 9th ID, 39 IR, Co. B
Eight-Wheeled Warriors and Grunts: 2004
We Dared to Fly: Vietnam War Air Recon
Escaping Madness: WWII Eyewitness Accounts
German Motorcycles at War 1939-1945: Images
Normandy Beyond the Beaches: Images of War
Boeing B-52: FlightCraft 31
RAF Fighters vs JU-87 Stuka: Duel 138
Blood River 1838: Campaign 402
Wilde Sau Nightfighters: Combat Aircraft 154
War of Bavarian Succession: Reason to Rev 110
Philippines 1944: USN vs Japan: Air Campgn 50
Battle of Atlantic 1 – 1939-41: Campaign 408
After spending hours of time painting my Medieval and Horse and Musket era miniatures I like to add one or more flags to the unit.
I really feel it makes them pop. This year when I did up my 40mm Middle Earth armies for my “Battle of Five Armies” convention games using Battle Masters rules I added flags to each unit on both sides.
This really helped the armies come alive to me.
Romano -Orcs, great Troll and Orc LeaderScottish Pikemen for Day of Battle 5
Here is a unit of Scottish Pikemen based as a large unit for Day of Battle 5 with a simple flag.
Here are three Flag videos I found helpful on YouTube.
I hope you enjoy them.
All of them use “PVA” white glue in the US. I prefer to use Mod Podge. I works just like the glue but makes for a harder flag and protects it better.
Happy Halloween. It’s scary good to get back to wargaming on a big scale with two multi-player, multi-table games as well as the one-on-one games. And let’s not forget the news section where I further link Taylor Swift to wargaming (sorta). Plus the usual cornucopia of book reviews. Enjoy.
October 2024 AAR
Springtime for Napoleon:
Snappy Nappy SnapCon X: Yorck
Battle of Wittenburg Recap: Eugene
On a Pedestal: Malta Convoy
Umpire’s View Of The Fifth Session
Umpire’s View Of The Sixth Session
Red Devils Ambush: WWII One Hour Wargame
HMGS Next Generation Outreach: Battles
NEWS
Taylor Swift vs Joan of Arc: Followers
Against the Odds Magazine: 100th Game
New Wargame: Britskrieg!
2nd Edition: One Page Bulge
Cadwalader AWI Lecture: Princeton Battlefield
WWII Australian Heavy Mortar: 3D Printed
And Elves, Too: 3D Printed
New Wargame: Langport 1645
Maritime Dominion: Card Game
Mega Multi-Table D&D: Return of the Lich
Books I’ve Read
The Trojan War: As Military History
Storm Clouds Over the Pacific: 1931-1941
Brotherhood of the Flying Coffin: Glider WWII
Robert E. Lee’s Reluctant Warrior: Wickham
Becoming Eisenhower: Between World Wars
Hitler’s Last Chance: 1945 Movie Kolberg
Joan of Arc’s Army: France 1415-53 (MAA 558)
Barbarossa 1941: OKH German Army Atlas
Operation Dragoon: Southern France 1944
Captured at Arnhem: In Their Own Words
The End of August: Novel
Roman Army Units West Provinces 3 (MAA 557)
Warships Komandorski Islands 1943 (NV 333)
The Union Army 1861-65 3 (MAA 559)
Through Hell to Dunkirk: Evacuation
The Rif War: 1921-1926 (Elite 257)
Mers El-Kebir 1940 (Campaign 405)
Lockheed Constellation: Legends of Flight
The CAC Boomerang: Australia’s WWII Fighter
US Air Power 1945-1990 (v1): Technology at War 2
Japanese Combines Fleet 1942-43: Fleet 8
8th Army Soldier versus Italian Soldier 1942
Romania 1944: Campaign 404
Sumatra 1944-45: Air Campaign 49
The Messerschmitt Bf 110 Story
How Hitler Evolved Traditional Army Establishment
The Fighting Fathers: South Vietnam
The House of War: Christendom and Caliphate
Perceptions of Battle: Washington at Monmouth
Yugoslavia and Greece 1940-41: Air Campaign 48
Borneo 1945: Campaign 406
I came across this interesting video on YouTube about how to make spears for your soldiers out of broom straws. Now I have seen this sort of thing before. I personally tried it back in 2010 with mixed results. This video was different because it gives hints into what type of bristles to use AND how to modify them with flat nose pliers to look like spear or pikes.
So here is the YouTube link. I hope you enjoy it and please give the author a thumbs up.
Make your own spears for free How to make you own spears – better than the commercially available spears and less than a penny each. Pikes, lances, javelins, bamboo, even how to make a pilum.
Let me begin this post by saying that I do not sell any of these products mentioned in these post here nor do I have any affiliation with any company’s mentioned.
For a few years now I have been using Sharpie pens to help with my painting. Usually their black, and other colors along with gold and silver. They don’t seem to have white or yellow. I particularly wanted white to help me paint white straps on my Horse and Musket troops.
Over the last few weeks I have come across a lot of reviews for the AK Interactive Paint Markers. These appeared to be a game changer for painting. They appear to have 32 colors and they work well on any material you might use in our hobby. The draw back was they were made in Spain. Shipping was out of this world. I did finally find a company here in the US that stocked them (see below). I ordered the primary set which is white, red and yellow to see how they would do. They were amazing. They went right on my primed and unprimed plastic miniatures with ease. The tip is strong and very fine. It hasn’t bent or failed yet. These are exceptionally good for camo work on vehicles and armor.
I will place a few you tube links below as well as a link to the US business I got my order from.
This week I dropped down to the Hobby Bunker in Wakefield Mass to pickup some supplies and Victrix 12mm WWII Soviet Infantry for my Kursk project for D-Day to Berlin. I brought the yellow marker to show the owner Matt. He was very impressed and left me with the impression that he would stop them.
We had such a great response to our birthday sale that we decided to offer a permanent discount. As the banner below says, you will save 25% off your miniatures orders of $30 or more (rules are excluded). Enter the code “armybuilder’ at check out. There will be a reminder on the shop page with the code, enjoy 🙂
> I follow the ‘Blunders on the Danube’ site and all the multi-table game AAR. I am really impressed by all.
Peter, James, Mark, Greg & company do put on a wonderful day of Snappy Nappy gaming called SnapCon. Next one is October 5 (about 10 miles east of Hartford, CT), if you happen to be on this side of the pond. It’s at The Portal, 60 Hilliard St, Manchester, CT 06042.
Peter’s e-mail is in the CC. He runs the blog and the SN ‘SnapCon’ list.
>I write to ask you if the rules have ever been converted to earlier periods (Seven Years War) by anyone?
I recall Chris Parker gave it a whirl years ago. I’ve added his e-mail in the CC in case he can add some more info about his efforts.
There was a Franco-Prussian War variant, but that was lost when the SN group on Yahoo disappeared. And it’s in the wrong time direction.
In theory, mechanics for 7YW should play roughly the same, with a slight tweak for deployment: I’m thinking instead of the second stand being placed wherever the player wants when going from column to line, the stand must be placed to one side to reflect more rigid linear deployments. Not sure about the timing of formation changes, say from line to square, etc. The best Napoleonic units could perform these rapidly. I have to dig out my Christopher Duffy book on the 7YW. I’m not sure about firing distances of musket or cannon — maybe a tweak to ground scale needed to keep things about the same.
We haven’t done a 7YW battle in our group for a while…or maybe I wasn’t at the game that night. I found a write-up of Rossbach from 2018, but it was using modified Shako II rules. I’m attaching the After Action Report (AAR) newsletter I wrote. Dan played in a Command & Colors Kolin game at Fall-In 2022. Here’s a link to the PDF download page:
If you like the AAR, I’ll add you to my AAR list and e-mail the monthly PDF issues to you. If you think it nothing but horrible spam, let me know and I won’t. It’s changed over the years, but I think it’s gotten better. 😀
Or, Chris is nice enough to post the AAR on his website: Here’s the June 2024 issue:
If you have any other questions, SN, AAR, or otherwise, please don’t hesitate to ask…
Thanks,
Russ
On 07/15/2024 6:44 AM EDT JACQUELINE LODGE wrote:
Dear Mr Lockwood,
Please forgive this ‘cold call’ email. I hope you don’t mind me contacting you.
I have recently retired from the British Army and find I have a great deal of time to pursue my long-standing wargame hobby!
Firstly, I am a recent convert to Snappy Nappy and love the rules. I combine them with WoFun 10mm Napoleonic figures, which work brilliantly. I follow the ‘Blunders on the Danube’ site and all the multi-table game AAR. I am really impressed by all.
Sorry to ramble. I write to ask you if the rules have ever been converted to earlier periods ( Seven Years War) by anyone? If so, please would you kindly point me in the right direction to where I might find them. In addition, please could you advise where on the net I might find the best snappy nappy group to join.
Very many thanks. I look forward to hearing from you in due course.
AAR_Wargaming_CD1940_AWI_FallIn_Skirmish_EuroGameDay_SnapNap_DandD_HMGSNG_SBTP_News_BookRev.pdf
