Throwing Thunderbolts - A Quick Review

Christmas brought me this tome by Garry David Wills, published by Helion.

With a long standing interest in the period, both professionally and as a hobbyist, I was excited to get into this and launched myself at it with some enthusiasm.

The volume is A4 in format and is no light weight with its 301 pages of content.

After the introduction, the book is, broadly speaking, divided into three parts:

1. History and chronology of the war:  2 sections of about 105 pages.  The chronology broken down by year, and then by theatre - north, Rhine, southeast, southwest, internal (revolts such as in the Vendée etc.) and overseas.  This expands and contracts according to events such as specifically Italy in the 1796 part.
2. The Protagonists:  about 60 pages.
3. Wargaming the period:  Just under half the book, divided into 6 sections dealing with collecting armies, rules, scenarios resources and references.

Mr Wills writes that "this is a book for wargamers based on history rather than a history book." His approach to the history and chronology of the war epitomises that aim.  He clearly knows his subject and lays out the events without getting bogged down in the minutiae of the socio-political events of the revolution, yet gives enough to satisfy and introduce the broader context.  In my view, the author strikes the right balance of background versus describing the flow of the conflict. In reading the chronology I constantly found myself thinking about how to get the action onto the table or how to construct a campaign with it.  Certainly ticking the "book for wargamers" side of things for me.

The section about the protagonists gave plenty of information about the armies, organisation, and doctrine. But what impressed was that it went beyond the great powers and included states like the United Provinces, Naples and Saxony.  As you would expect more space was given to the Great Powers.

In dealing with how to game the period, the author has covered the hobby without being drawn down rabbit holes. For example, he discusses collecting and painting armies but is careful to provide the references to do ones own research rather than try to be the reference on every uniform in every army.  In this, and many other respects Mr Wills has really understood the position and purpose of his work to open the world of this fascinating period.

I think the author does a good job in concisely highlighting different rules for different levels of game - company/battalion, division, and army. Again, he does so without being drawn into the pros and cons of each.  He defines the rules scales for the reader/gamer to make their further investigation and choice.

The 10 scenarios range from the large scale battles like Castiglione right down to company level with the "whiff of grapeshot" of the 13th Vendémiaire.  The scenarios also include three naval engagements. Wills is not prescriptive in the rules to use but provides some ruleset specific OOB's. However, it would be easy to convert these to other rulesets.  The scenario details are good, with useful maps for reproducing the tabletop battle.

The scenarios are a good and not necessarily obvious mix, including:

The Battle of Lincelles, 18 August 1793

The Battle of Pirmasens, 14 September 1793

The Assault on Fort Mulgrave at Toulon, 16-17 December 1793

The Battle of Boxtel, 15 September 1794

The 13th Vendémiaire, 5 October 1795

The Battle of Mondovi, 21 April 1796

The Battle of Castiglione, 5 August 1796

A fleet action based on the Glorious First of June 1794

Frigate action off Banda Aceh, Sumatra, 9 September 1796

Les Droits de l'Homme, Audierne Bay, 13-14 January 1797

Another feature I liked was that the author included really useful tables and information, such as one that had possible ratings for generals from all protagonists that could be useful for the wargamer in producing army lists.

My usual issue is that there are never enough maps. There are some, and probably enough. My personal taste would be to want a few more. 

The teacher in me wanted more on the revolution. However, the author was right to resist this temptation and stick to the purpose of this volume.  In fact, there could have been more of a lot of things - history and hobby-wise.  However, that would have made this work too unwieldy and possibly diluted in focus.  That said, the section on painting was, for me, the weakest.  But I am coming from the position of already being a painting and playing wargamer of this period.

What I really like about this book is that it sets up the new gamer to this period (and the seasoned one to!) with the information needed and a really good end section on figure suppliers, online resources, and a good and fulsome bibliography.  This is a real pearl of great price in itself.

I am extremely happy that I found this in my stocking.  I enjoyed reading it through and know that it will be a useful reference in the future.  I am itching to play those scenarios, and to work out games and campaigns.  There you are... job done Mr Wills!

I am no literary critic.  So for what it is worth, well done to Helion on this publication and especially to Mr Wills for a job very well done.