Tonkin and Maximilian Reinforcements

It has been a long time coming but I got off my butt and painted several units for both my Tonkin and Maximilian projects. NOTE: click on photos for larger images.

First up are my last two Zouave battalions needed for my French Maximilian army, which is now completed!! I don't get to say that very often!

Here are the two battalions of Zouaves (Thanks Hal Thinglum for the units) which I touched up, rebased, and added flags. They appear to be enjoying R&R at Vera Cruz. I can now rest with regards to my French Army in Mexico!

Here is a link to my French Army from a prior post.

French Tonkin Reinforcements

I managed to finally find enough French Frontier figures to finish my French collection for Tonkin. I painted up the following over the last couple weeks. My two arthritic thumbs make this a choir rather than enjoyable.

Two Line battalions, both in summer white trousers, but different pith helmet colors. Here they are clearing out a native village. Where are those Black Flag rebels?!

Two French Foreign Legion battalions (4 stands each) in dyed pith helmets and red trousers. Love how these units turned out.

One additional Marine (Colonial infantry, they are not really marines in the traditional sense). Who doesn't like how these soldiers look?!

One Turcos (not sure I like the Santa Clause look, but they will do)

My French Tonkin force needs more artillery and commanders. Anybody know where I can find French artillery crew in Pith helmets? Maybe I just use British instead?

Cheers!

Eric

Tonkin Wars - Resources - Help I don't speak French

Greetings Colonial Wargamers!

Part of the challenge of doing a colonial war is finding good resources, especially in English, when the combatants are not English!!

I have listed nearly all the resources I can think of for the Tonkin Wars below. This includes histories, wikipedia, uniform information, etc.

Osprey's new French Naval & Colonial Troops 1872 - 1914: Great for uniforms and some history. 

Foundry Books, which may no longer be in print. This is the Indo-China and Burma one:

War and Peace in Hanoi and Tonkin - By: Hocquard, Edouard from White Lotus Press

Wikipedia French version translated. This has more information than the English version when I last checked. Online translation is available. This is great for French Orders of battle. 

The Tonkin Campaign of 1884 by James G. Scott (Nafzinger collection)

Nafzinger also has unit histories you can download for all the French Colonial troops. 

Sino-French Naval War 1884-1885

EBooks

There are plenty of ebooks in English and French in archive.org. You may also have to weed out the US Gulf of Tonkin titles.

Search

Photos, Drawings, and Sketches

Searching the web can yield some tremendous finds, but you should use both French and English spellings of the locations and units to get the images. Here are a couple I found.

Well, I hope you find this useful for your new Colonial Wargame project!!

Eric

Tonkin Wars 1883 - 1885

 Long time no posts!

I've moved from my long-time home of Charlotte, NC to my future retirement location of Southport, NC. Life is great but losing your wargame buddies of 30+ years is hard!!!!

I have found a couple wargamers here, but they are scattered and hard to coordinate a time to play. Sigh.

Good news is that I have found many gamers for Euro Style games that my family loves to play, so I'm gaming once a week in that area.

Here is a couple photos of the new place and views. All photos are clickable for larger resolution.

Being on a wargaming hiatus has given me time to focus on painting miniatures, which I have done in months if not years! I do have a new "war room" above the garage, but roughly half the storage of my old massive house. I may have to start selling off collections\games.

Tonkin Wars

I have a lot of Boxer Rebellion miniatures and some can be used as double-duty in the jungles\rice fields of Tonkin during the late 1800s. 

French Army

Most, if not all, of the miniatures are rare 15mm Frontier figures. I have put together this small force, which can represent about 6000 to 8000 troops. This was the size of most French columns in the war. I have plenty of Chinese from my Boxer Rebellion collection, but I do have to paint some Black Flag units (I have the figures, just need the time). My French army is comprised of the following units:

2 x Line Infantry battalions

2 x French Foreign Legion

2 x Fusilier Marin

2 x Turcos

1 x Zouaves

1 x Annamite Riflemen (Tirailleur) - Could be used as Tonkinese.

1 x Tonkinese Riflemen - Could be used as Annamites

1 x Chinese Riflemen

2 x Sailors

1 x Gun (Sailors)

I have to make a couple more command stands and artillery units. Gunboats would be used from my Boxer range. French used the Hotchkiss gun\cannon from their gunboats to great effect.

Some photos of the army (only about half showing):

Missing Legion, Line, and another Turco battalion. 

Link to some gunboat photos from my Boxer collection.

Some sketches of the combat in the war:

NOTE: I have PDF on the conflict that I have cobbled together, so if you would like a copy just email at my new email: ericbu2025 AT gmail DOT com.

NOTE 2: if you happen to have extra Frontier miniatures from the Boxer rebellion range let me know and I may purchase them from you. I'm mainly looking from French Marines, which I can paint as line or legion.

Game on!

Eric

Boxer Rebellion - Two Battles - Rescue the Mission

Sorry for the long delay in posting this. I'm not sure I will remember all the details, but we had two very enjoyable games of Din of Battle 2nd Edition, featuring my 15mm Boxer Rebellion collection. Most buildings were made by Mal Wright. I made the Mud Fort (still need to finish it up). Temple is an aquarium piece.

There were two distinct battles going on in the scenario.

Americans and French attacking a Imperial Chinese held mud fort, while Russians and Italians tried to save the local Christian Mission from being overrun. The International forces already tried to evacuate the Mission with Royal Marines, Russian sailors, Italian Sailors but a large Boxer for appeared out of no where and they were trapped!

There were four commands, each with their own sequence deck:

• Americans\French 
• Mission Force - Italians, Russians, and sailors.
• Imperial Chinese
• Boxers

We fought this scenario twice over a two week period. I'm only posting photos of the first battle as the 2nd battle was relatively the same, but the Boxers didn't win the second battle.

FIRST BATTLE

Here is the International Mission with Black Banner Boxers and Yellow Banner Boxers prepared to launch another attack.

Russians and Italians ready to advance and relieve the Mission from the nasty Boxers.

The Chinese mud fort guarding the busy harbor while US forces on land and French Marines on paddle wheeler troop transports prepare for an amphibious assault.

Junks and sampans everywhere!

Imperial guard wondering the streets.

Busy dockyard

And the Boxers launch their first assault, with casualties everywhere. There were Russia sailors, British Royal Marine Light Infantry, French sailors, and Italian Navali Regina in the Mission.

Here you can also see that there is a RED Banner force of boxers heading for the mission.

Can the Russians and Italians get there in time?

International force holding so far.

Men are tested to their breaking point!

US Infantry and Marines start their attack on the mud fort.

French landing force arrives, but is too far from shore to support.

There is a Russian gunboat also shelling the fort. It is barely visible in photo at the bottom right.

Boxers breach the walls where the French sailors are defending with armed civilians.

Boxer casualties are high

Italian Bersaglia tear into the Red Banner boxers.

RMLI pushed back by Yellow Banners. Italian Regina Navali take over for the French and rout the Black Banners.

Massed Boxer reserve appears as the Russians arrive.

More hand to hand fighting outside the mission.

Massive attack by the Yellow Banner boxers (Each banner was reconstituted once to give the Boxers a better chance). The RMLI is driven from the wall and you can see all the yellow banners in the Mission.

It is over, the Boxers have driven the French, RMLI, and Italian sailors from the walls on three sides, while the Russian and Italian reinforcements are too little too late.

Phil, the Boxer Commander, wins a metal (Boxer Rebellion medal I purchased) and will be rewarded by the Emporer for his glory of destroying the mission!

Truly fun game! The Americans were defeated by being over-zealous on their assault on the mud fort so this was a total Chinese victory.