The Polish Connection

Newark, the home of the Irregulars and the Partizan shows, has a long and much treasured connection with Poland. This began in the Second World War when hundreds of Polish airmen flew from many of the airfields around Newark, and the 1st Polish Independent Parachute Brigade was based a little to the south around Stamford. 

Sadly, many of these men did not survive the war and Newark became home to the largest Polish War cemetery in Britain. Over 400 Polish servicemen were laid to rest in the cemetery and are still remembered in services every November 2nd - All Souls Day - both by the large ex-patriot Polish community in Newark and by their many non-Polish friends and neighbours. 

Most notably, General Władysław Sikorski, the Polish Prime Minister in Exile and Commander of the Polish Armed Forces, was buried at Newark after he died in a plane crash in 1943. Sikorski had always made clear his desire not to return to Poland until it was a free country and, as a result, he was laid to rest in Newark. His body was only returned to his native land after the restoration of Poland as a free and independent nation following the end of Soviet control in 1990. 

The repatriation of Sikorski's remains in 1993 was a major event, attended by Prince Philip along with senior political figures from both the UK and Poland. In addition, last November, three further Polish Presidents who had served their country in exile during the war and subsequent communist era who had been buried in Newark were returned with honours to their homeland. 

The large Polish community and the close links between Newark and Poland meant that it seemed natural that the town should also honour another notable Polish figure from the Second World War. This time it was not a military figure, but a nurse - Irena Sendlerowa - who was responsible for saving hundreds of Jewish children by smuggling them out of the Warsaw ghetto during the Nazi occupation. Captured and tortured by the Gestapo, she nevertheless refused to reveal the location of any of the children she had saved, and was eventually able to escape and survive the war. She finally passed away in 2008. Amongst the many honours bestowed upon her over the decades was a statue of that was unveiled in Newark in 2021.

If you have the time whilst visiting Newark, either for the show or for any other reason, then perhaps you might consider visiting the cemetery on London Road and the nearby statue of Irena Sendlerowa to pay your respects to two important but largely forgotten figures of the war.  

In honour of the Polish connection with Newark, this year's Partizan figures, created for us as always by Martin Baker, will be representations of General Władysław Sikorski and Irena Sendlerowa.

 

  

In Memory of John Dowman

 

Friday 17th February was the 3rd anniversary of the death of one of our dearest friends, the renowned wargamer and long time Newark Irregular, John Dowman. John passing away just before the start of lockdown meant we were unable to attend his funeral, to mourn and to celebrate his life and it was because of this that his wife Michelle arranged for a memorial service last Friday. Along with Rob Rowell, his old partner in crime from the Guild, the Society of Twentieth Century Wargamers and the Wargamer’s Forum, I had the honour of delivering a short eulogy for John. Given this was for his friends and family, most of whom had little idea of wargames, it was perhaps a little light on detail and I have expanded it somewhat since Friday and present it here now as a tribute to our much loved and much missed friend. 

                                                               -----------------

When talking with Laurence Baldwin this morning, we realised that neither of us could remember when we first met John. He was there, with his brother Dave, from the earliest days of the Irregulars when we used to meet upstairs at the Grove Pub in Newark, chatting, playing games and trying to convert us all to the dark side of tanks and guns and of course to ‘God’s own scale’ of 20mm. He was one of the most approachable people I ever met and even though, over the years, like us all he had his ups and downs, he would always make time for others. Whether they were his oldest friends or someone he just met around a table at the local show he was always happy to see them and made sure they knew it.  

John had auspicious beginnings in wargames. At school in Lincoln his gaming group included Rick Priestly and Richard Halliwell, both of whom would of course go on to make their names with Games Workshop. Another of his old school friends remembered evenings spent watching the three of them devising wargames rules and kit-bashing Airfix models. As Rob remembered, John was a fearsome rules tinkerer, always with the aim of making rules both more playable and more realistic for the period. Something I am sure you will agree takes knowledge, skill and no small amount of the dark arts. 

He was an obsessive model maker all his life. Again, Rob noted that he would regularly aim to build at least 100 kits a year. More than most of us build in our lifetime. After a career change in his early 50s he started working as a dive support technician in the North Sea and he would take a pile of models with him off on the boat and that would be him set for a month or two.      

    

He was so long a fixture of the club, of the wider hobby, that it just seemed like we had known him all our lives. He was the voice of reason during arguments and disagreements and worked hard to make sure that everyone was included, no matter how frustrated he might have got with us all at times. And rest assured we could get VERY frustrating if we put our minds to it.  Of course if things got too fractious he could always retreat to the ubiquitous Shed, to build and paint models and to game with a select few who became known as the Shedheads. As the years passed, members moved away or found other pursuits, and the Irregulars drifted into obscurity, John was still there, a constant light drawing people to him. He had long made friends and influenced people far beyond just Newark and his local club. Under the name of Mausman he was, for many years, a massive presence in the Guild and the Society of Twentieth Century Wargamers and made friends all over Britain and Europe – indeed all around the world. We started in wargaming at a time when the internet didn’t even exist but John embraced this way of making new friends and bringing people together like no one I know. He was one of the founders of the Wargamer’s Forum and it is a sign of the great affection in which he was held that, the year after his death, the members arranged a memorial model build in his honour with nearly 30 members putting in many hours of work to create models in his memory. As much as the models themselves and the work they represented, what was so telling were all the comments from people about how much John had influenced them and how welcoming he had been to them when they got into the hobby. The most common word used to describe him, after he passed away, in that rather retrained manner of people not used to showing their emotions, was ‘Gent’. I think that summed him up perfectly.  

Of course, although our initial friendship started over a wargames table, it developed far beyond that. A few of us; myself, Duncan Macfarlane and John Laing, had long had a habit of meeting up when we could for drinks at one of the pubs in Newark. And whilst the pubs changed, the ritual was always the same. Over a pint of beer or, in John’s case, more usually a glass of wine or a brandy, we would talk, putting the world to rights, chatting about the latest hobby gossip but, mostly, discussing history and of course particularly military history. In the company of Duncan and John Laing, for whom military history and wargaming was pretty much a career rather than just a hobby, John shone with his depth of knowledge. His work in the North Sea meant that he couldn’t always be around for these meetings and we were the worse for it. I was in the same situation as we shared an industry but I kind of doubt my absence was missed as much as John’s. As in all things, the world, whether online or in person, was an immeasurably better place when John was in it.         

Always playing the game for its own sake rather than to win, getting as much enjoyment out of a well played close defeat as from an overwhelming victory, content as much to just sit and chat as to actually roll any dice, John was a lesson to us all – it is the journey that matters, not the destination. I am immensely grateful that I was able to share a small part of that journey with John. 

I will close with a comment from the Wargamer’s Forum which I think sums up John        

“I remember John as everlasting positive, encouraging and passionate. He was always welcoming, kind, polite, and supporting to others and one of those who by these fine qualities made our small community yet so great. John was also inspirational as a modeler, relentlessly working and completing new subjects and as such one could not help but being impressed by how productive he was. Still, he was equally inspirational in how marvellously skilled he was with his air brush and paint brush. John was an artist. I will miss him very much.”

Our great and noble hobby

 

Sunday was a difficult day for the Partizan crew. Whilst the show was, by all accounts, a great success and we could be satisfied in a job well done there was a huge gap left by the passing, since the last Partizan show in August 2019, of four great friends; Klug, Hengist, John Dowman and, of course, Duncan Macfarlane. This was our first show without them and it was felt deeply by all of us, and I think also by many other regular Partizan attendees who were half-waiting for these familiar faces to appear. 

There were times throughout the day that I found this particularly hard and one of the reasons for this brief entry is to pay thanks to so many people at the show who realised this and who were there for us; big men with big hearts who made it clear we should not be embarrassed to show our grief and that they understood what we were feeling. I will pick out two for special thanks - Henry Hyde and Guy Bowers, two true blessed souls who both seemed to know, even before we did, what it was going to be like and made a point of being there for us when we stumbled. We will be forever thankful for their support and kind words. 

But they are just two out of so many in our hobby who make a point of looking out for each other, treating each other with kindness, respect and understanding, who celebrate other people's victories, share their troubles and mourn their losses. 

It is exemplified by the response to the awards that are made at each show. For many years the Irregulars resisted the idea of rewarding games with 'best of' trophies. We were aware that every single game that appears at Partizan - or at any other show for that matter - is the result of endless hours of hard work and dedication and that without them our shows simply would not exist. It was why we originally started the gamers raffle where every game, large or small, gets an equal chance to win a prize as a small token of our appreciation. I am not sure now why we did eventually decide to start giving 'best of' prizes when we moved to the new venue. I was still more than a little concerned about the reaction from those who had not won each time but, as another example of the great heart of our hobby, I need not have been afraid. At every show, when we make the announcements and give out the trophies, the first people right there to congratulate the winners are the other gamers. They might have hoped their game would be the one to win at this show but you would never have guessed it from their reactions both on the day and on social media afterwards. The genuine warmth of their praises is a credit not just to the individuals but to our whole hobby.

It is one of the reasons why we were so keen to get the shows started again. Yes the hobby has weathered the storm and perhaps even thrived online during lockdown. But nothing can replace that wonderful moment of meeting up with fellow gamers face to face once again, of sharing anecdotes and stories, of comparing notes on purchases, painting tips and the latest project and of just putting the world to rights over a coffee or the shake of a set of dice. We are a hobby filled with the most wonderful individuals, the sorts of men and women who, to use an old quote, you would want right beside you in the trenches. It is for this reason we feel it most keenly when some of them pass away but for every one who falls there is another, five more, who are still here and who we should value just as highly. 

Personally I am very proud of our hobby; of the intelligence, thoughtfulness and humanity that you all display day after day. We may provide the space, but it is you who are the heart of Partizan and of wargaming as a whole. In spite of the moments of sadness it was a delight to meet up with so many of you again on Sunday and I am already looking forward to seeing you all again next May. 

Until then you all have our gratitude and our heartfelt best wishes. Thankyou for making the Partizan shows and wargaming such a worthwhile and enjoyable part of our lives.  

        

  

Duncan Macfarlane 1948 - 2021

 

On Tuesday 1st June, Nick Eyre phoned to give me the news that I never imagined I would ever have to hear. Duncan Macfarlane, former editor of Miniature Wargames and Wargames Illustrated, founder of the Partizan shows and one of the best known figures in British wargaming - but more personally, my great friend of more than 40 years - had died suddenly. In the days that have followed there have been many expressions of regret, condolence and shock. Alongside these have been many fond memories and stories of Duncan's warm kindness and the enormous impact he has had on our hobby over the last half century. 

Some might wonder why we were so shocked at the news; he was, after all, 73 which, whilst no great age these days, is never the less more than the three score and ten we are vouchsafed (Duncan would love me slipping a suitably obscure word into his obituary). And yet Duncan was one of the certainties in life, one of the anchors around which our hobby has been developed and thrived. He was always there, seemingly never aging - he had looked middle aged since his early 20s - rarely if ever ill, always just a phone call or a quick trip to Nottingham away.   

Duncan was a studiously private man. An obituary would normally have some general details of his life but to be honest even after many decades, few of us really knew that much about him. I mentioned earlier that he was 73. The question of his age was one of the great secrets of his whole life and formed a regular topic of conversation amongst his friends with everyone making their own calculations of how old they thought he was. In the end he was older than any of the guesses but it is terribly sad that it took his passing to finally resolve that question. He hailed from Driffield in the East Riding of Yorkshire and studied at the University of Leeds, graduating in 1969 and securing a job as Librarian at Sir Leo Schultz High School in Hull. Looking through the memories of some of the students from those days, it is clear that Duncan was a popular member of staff and was already pursuing the interests with which he would become synonymous in later life - teaching wargames to the students, organising board games events and holding scrabble competitions. He was remembered as a 'breath of fresh air' at the school. 

It was whilst working in Hull that Duncan first met Peter Gilder, a meeting he recalled in Peter's own obituary that Duncan penned in Wargames Illustrated in 1991. Duncan had gone to Ron Jewitt's model shop in Hull looking for an elephant for his Achaemenid army and Peter happened to be in the shop and took Duncan to his house to present him with a gift of said elephant. They became firm friends, entering competitions together and, even though Duncan left Hull in 1981 to move to Newark to begin work at Citadel Miniatures, they still gamed regularly together and, in the early days of Peter's Wargames Holiday Centre, Duncan would be called upon to make up the numbers if paying guests were a little light on the ground. 

Peter Gilder had always been very keen on expanding the appeal of wargaming to the wider public. In 1978 he worked as advisor and provided all the terrain and figures for the first television programme dedicated to the hobby - Tyne Tees' Battleground, fronted by Edward Woodward. Duncan, along with John Tilson, was chosen as one of the opposing generals for the first programme and, even at a distance of more than 40 years, is instantly recognisable in both voice and mannerisms, hunched over the table refighting the Battle of Edgehill. When, in 1983, Peter Gilder and the businessman Stanley Gee decided to produce a Wargames Magazine for the mainstream market, it was Duncan who was chosen as its first Editor. He would always jokingly claim that this was because he was the only wargamer that Peter knew who, having worked as a librarian, knew anything about 'literature'. Whatever the reason, it was a perfect pairing. Duncan very much shared Peter's vision of a high quality glossy magazine with top notch articles and particularly with the very best colour photography that would serve to inspire budding wargamers, and hence Miniature Wargames was born. 

From the very start it was a great success. Duncan was not only editor but also photographer, travelling to the Wargames Holiday Centre to photograph the huge collection figures, exquisitely painted by such notables as John Blanche, Phil Robinson, Dave Thomas and Mark Allen, that would grace the pages of the magazine. Later he would invite gamers to bring their collections to be photographed in his wargames room at his house in Newark or would travel around the country to clubs and wargamer's houses, carrying with him his lighting rig and 5x4 plate camera. He was meticulous in getting the right picture and showing the figures in their very best light, set in superb hand crafted terrain and insisting on each stand being carefully 'flocked in' to hide the bases and make the scene look more natural. He put the same effort into editing and proof reading and the result was a representation of our hobby that looked as professional - often more so - as any other magazine on the shelves. 

It has to be said that Duncan was a terrible businessman and his organisational skills were, to put it bluntly, shocking. After a few years he lost control of Miniature Wargames but then decided to do something unheard of. He turned around and founded another wargames magazine based on exactly the same ethos as Miniature Wargames. Launched in 1987, Wargames Illustrated quickly became the world's premier tabletop gaming magazine. From the start it signalled its intent with the symbol of the phoenix rising from the ashes and, with the same attention to detail and quality in both photographs and articles, it continued the aspirations of Miniature Wargames to inform and inspire in equal measure. When he sold the magazine to Battlefront Miniatures in 2009 Duncan continued to work on the publication alongside its new editor Dan Faulconbridge, photographing and proof reading in much the same way as he had as owner. This remained the case after Dan took over ownership in 2015 and it was a relationship that continued up to Duncan's passing. 

Whilst the magazine was Duncan's main focus of attention, he also produced a series of 28mm miniature ranges - most notably an extensive War of Spanish Succession range under the Stratagem imprint and, more recently the Trent Miniatures Late French Revolutionary range. 

Of course the business side was by no means Duncan's only contribution to our hobby. In 1983 Laurence Baldwin, recently moved to Newark, contacted Duncan to ask if there was a wargames club in Newark. Duncan's response was "No. Why don't you start one?". Thus the Newark Irregulars were born. In 1986 Duncan suggested that the Irregulars should host the East Midlands Regional finals of the Nationals and, with a couple of demonstration games along side the competition tables and three traders, the first Partizan show was held at the Grove School sports hall.               

Duncan continued to organise the show alongside Laurence, John Laing and myself into the mid 1990s when he started to take a less prominent role, concentrating more on photographing the amazing games that were bought to the Kelham Hall venue. It is undoubtedly the case that the success of Partizan as a showcase for the hobby rests largely on the fact that those bringing games had a good chance of seeing their hard work rewarded by being published in Wargames Illustrated. But even though he took a less active role in running the show, Duncan never the less continued to influence its development and direction for many more years.            

It might seem that Duncan's whole life revolved around wargames but nothing could be further from the truth. He was, in his younger days, an avid cyclist. When working as a librarian in Hull he still lived in Driffield and would cycle to and from school each day - a round trip of 50 miles. In the late 80s and 90s he would think nothing of jumping on his bike and riding the 65 miles from Newark to Beverly on a Friday evening to visit his father. He loved jazz music, good coffee, real ale and fine port. He was a life long scrabble fanatic and competed both at a national level and in regular sessions with other Irregulars at their houses around Newark. He also loved all manner of other board games, was an accomplished Go player and could lose himself in cryptic crosswords. He counted himself an expert on Tolkien in all its forms and  when, last Christmas, I texted him a quick seasons greetings on Christmas day the response - typically Duncan - was a curt "SSSH! THE LORD OF THE RINGS IS STARTING!". 

All this gives some indication of what Duncan did and perhaps a little of who he was. But it is not in the bare recounting of his life that we get a measure of the man but in the words of those who knew him and who have been expressing their feelings about him after his death. Uncle Duncan, as he was known to many, was widely respected and regarded not so much because of his achievements with magazines and shows but because of how he treated those he came across in his travels. People have reflected on how they approached him as a stranger at a show or competition event and found a man happy to talk, advise and listen. Someone who would become a friend. He did have a wicked, ironic sense of humour and a fine line in subtle put downs but these were always reserved for those who knew him well and who he knew would take them the right way. He was a generous opponent in competitions and always an approachable and knowledgeable expert on all matters relating to our diverse hobby. More than that, he was committed to helping others achieve their potential, encouraging writers, figure painters and designers and always ready to give a helping hand if he could. Though, like us all, he undoubtedly had flaws, some of which caused him much grief in his life, his character and good intent always shone through. He has left us with many happy memories and our hobby, though undoubtedly much changed from the one he joined over 50 years ago, still thriving throughout all the recent adversity.      

In his closing paragraph of his obituary of Pete Gilder in 1991 Duncan wrote "It is unlikely that our hobby will produce another Peter Gilder. His contribution has been tremendous. He will be missed."

I would like to suggest that our hobby did indeed produce another whose contribution was equally tremendous, who will be greatly missed, and his name was Duncan Macfarlane. 

Goodnight old friend.  

Partizan in the Cloud - past show archives

So, Partizan in the Cloud is tomorrow!! Hope you are all looking forward to it.

To add a bit of structure to the day, we have been working hard organising all the hundreds (actually thousands) of photos from previous shows. These have been arranged by show and tomorrow starting at 10.15am we will release a show at half hourly intervals. These will not be in order, there will be old shows and new shows, the gloom of Kelham Hall and the bright lights of the Newark Showground. But hopefully they will give you something to enjoy in place of seeing the games for real.

Spread the news. Lots of lovely game piccies will be flooding t'interweb thingy tomorrow starting at 10.15am.

Partizan in the Cloud

We thought it would be a shame not to mark the date when Partizan 2020 should have been taking place, so we are proposing a very modest little celebration of wargaming stuff to be held via our Facebook page and other online outlets on the day (17^th May!)



As you know, when we were transported into a tent for one year we called that event ‘Partizan in the Park’, so we thought it appropriate to echo that and call this one ‘Partizan in the Cloud.’



We know some traders like to mark events they cannot attend with special offers anyway, so this is a formalisation and expansion on that idea, and to that end we’d like to invite both traders and gamers (and societies who were attending) to join in, and we will highlight and link to items through our Facebook on the day, with a Facebook Live opening of the event, and hopefully new stuff going up through the day, depending entirely on what you can help us with!



So you might want to consider any of the following, or come up with some better ideas yourself:



VIDEOS – we thought no longer than 5 mins each – these can be tour of your game, or narrations of an After Action report of the game as played out on a club run through. For traders you might want to show things you are planning to release in time for the next Partizan, or are releasing during purdah, or things you are working on at the moment. You might want to just connect with your customers with a short message saying how much you are missing them etc… Videos might be uploaded to Youtube or Vimeo for us to link to them (try and include ‘Partizan in the Cloud’ in the title if you do this!) Or you might want to do a short video clip that we can embed in the site – simple programmes like Adobe Spark Video are relatively easy to master!



BLOG SPECIALS – if you are more literary in your expressive style then maybe a special blog to mark the day? Links to these we can put up and create a bit of feedback as to how people are reacting on the day. Again, include ‘Partizan in the Cloud’ in your blog entry title if you can to help pull it all together.



PICTURE GALLERY specials – if you have a collection of pictures stored that you can allow access to on Flickr or similar, or if you’ve created some cool graphics using Comica app or something similar we can link to them during the day too. We have an Instagram account too, so we can link through that for the more visual stuff.



SPECIAL OFFERS – if traders want to do a special offer on the day, as some of you did for Not Salute Day we are happy to link to these and direct your customers to you and remind you of why they really needed more stuff!



LIVE EVENTS – Annie always does a Bad Squiddo coffee morning on Sundays, and I’ve seen some live painting sessions going on – we’re happy to incorporate these int the day, although we might need to plan timings so we don’t have you competing with each other for viewers! I’ve even seen people doing Facetime gaming in isolation, not sure if these are broadcast-able to a wider audience?



ANYTHING ELSE CREATIVE that you can think of, even Tik-Toks, though I’m not sure videos of wargamers dancing and singing is necessarily a good thing! We’re trying to keep this simple, and don’t want to pressure people to learn too many new skills (or stretch our own technical skills!), and we certainly don’t want to think you have to participate. We just want to do what we try to do on the day of a Partizan show, create a bit of a buzz, inspire people to think of new ideas, and build their enthusiasm for the hobby!

We already have offers of assistance from both Wargames Illustrated and Wargames Soldiers and Strategy to help make the event something special.



Henry Hyde will be doing a Patreon recording with me (Laurence) on Monday, and we’ll release that to the public in the build up to the online event.



Technically it’s better if you send links etc to Laurence (at Laurence.baldwin@ntlworld.com) – that way we can add it to the main page of the Facebook Partizan page. We’ll aim to release stuff regularly during the day, but as you may know Facebook allows you to schedule posts, so send me stuff ahead of time for release on the day so we get maximum impact and the feel for an ‘on-the-day’ event.


We hope you are able to participate and make this an isolation-busting wargames event!



Cheers,



Laurence, Tricks and Steve

Cancellation of Partizan 2020

Evening folks


In my last update on the show I said that we would wait until April 2^nd before deciding on whether or not to cancel this year’s May Partizan. I did this on the basis that, by then, we would have a clearer picture of the situation regarding the Corona virus outbreak and the Government’s reaction to it. I think it is now obvious to everyone that things have progressed faster than I expected and that, even if things have started to improve by May and some of the restrictions have eased, it would be irresponsible to try and hold a major event under the current circumstances.


We are therefore cancelling Partizan 2020 which was due to be held at the Newark Showground on May 17^th.


Although nothing is certain we are hopeful that the situation will have improved sufficiently that we feel we are able to hold The Other Partizan on 11^th October. Of course this will depend entirely on factors outside our control but, if it is possible, then our plan is to transplant the May show wholesale to October. This means that if you have accepted an invite to the show in May then you are automatically rebooked for October. I will of course be back in touch with all traders, gamers and societies individually nearer the time to confirm you are still willing and able to attend but the important point is that no one who was booked in for May will miss out on a spot in October if they wish to take it. This does also mean that, unfortunately, anyone who was not able to make the May show will be unlikely to get an invite to October unless we have drop outs.


The other issue of course is money. Whilst Partizan is going to take a hit on the venue costs, as I mentioned previously, we are able to cope with this and do not see it as a threat to the show. Importantly, we know this will be a difficult time for traders given the current restrictions, the uncertainty for so many people regarding incomes and the loss of revenue not just from Partizan but from many other shows. So the choice is easy. If you have already paid for your stand for the May show we can offer a full refund. Alternatively if you wish to use the May payment as payment for October then we can do that instead. The choice is entirely yours.


We will continue to monitor the situation through the year and make regular updates as we get a clearer picture of the prospects for October.


Thankyou for your continued support and we hope to see you back at the show, fit and well, in happier times.


Best wishes


Richard, Laurence and Steve

The status of the May Partizan show

Hi folks

Apologies for a long and detailed post but I think this needs to be set out logically so everyone can understand our position.

As everyone is aware we are in the midst of an escalating issue with the Covid-19 Coronavirus. One of the questions that is rightly being asked is whether or not events like Partizan can or should take place under the current circumstances. We realise that the show is still over 2 months away but we thought it would be helpful to everyone to set out our current position and what this means for the show on May 17^th.

There are basically three possible scenarios as we see it at the moment. I am listing these in order of likelihood with, unfortunately, the least likely first.

1. The crisis passes well before the show and we can continue as planned. Given the current scientific and  medical advice and the way the epidemic is developing this seems to be the least likely scenario. It is of course the one we would prefer but we have to be realistic and say there is not much chance of this being the situation by mid-May. 

2. The situation worsens considerably and the Government, under advice from the experts decide to ban gatherings over a certain size or advise against large meetings like Partizan. This is what has happened in France and some other affected countries so we have to consider this a realistic option. 

3. The situation continues to worsen but slowly so there is no recommendation to avoid large gatherings. Under these circumstances I would expect that many people would still choose not to attend. We have to be honest and admit that our demographic – primarily middle aged and older men is one of those that the experts say is mostly likely to be hit badly by the virus and I would certainly not ask anyone to put themselves at risk for the sake of a wargames show. Under these circumstances we would be faced with hosting a show  where we would see a very much lower attendance which would then put traders in a difficult position financially. We would also be asking those putting the games on to put themselves at possible risk which we would not be willing to do.

So where does this leave the show? First of all a couple of reassurances.

If we do not go ahead with the show for any reason then traders will not lose their fees. We will give them the choice of either getting a full refund or deferring the payment to the next show in October (assuming things are back to normal by then). This would be entirely up to the individual traders.

If we do not hold the show in May and have to still pay the venue and other costs we will not go bust. Partizan is run by a few people for the show with no monies taken out for clubs or individuals. This has meant that, apart from having to keep the taxman happy, we have been able to plough profits back into the shows and also have made sure we have a contingency fund for exactly these sorts of occasions.  We do have insurance but are unsure if this will be covered, particularly if there is not an outright ban by the Government. But this does mean we are in a position where we can cancel the show in May without putting the future of Partizan at risk.

So what are we going to do?

The immediate answer is nothing. Obviously we cannot wait until the very last minute as clearly people have to make plans and many traders and visitors book hotels and hire vans for the shows. But we do intend to wait until the beginning of April before making a final decision. But we will not wait later than that. If by April 2^nd (I will avoid April 1^st  for obvious reasons as a bad day to make announcements) we are not seeing clear signs of an improvement then we will cancel the show in May and defer all plans to October, even if there has been no official ban. So I would urge people not to book hotels or vehicles until after that date.

Our hope of course is that in the next month the position improves but I think we have to be realistic and accept that even if we are allowed to go ahead it may not be advisable from a financial or health point of view to do so. Waiting another few weeks leaves that possibility open but we are prepared to take the decision early enough to make sure people are not out of pocket and can make other arrangements.

As it stands if we do cancel then I will initially say that everyone – games, trade and societies - who has already been invited to the May show will be re-invited automatically to October. My hope is that we can pretty much use October as the postponed May. But I will have more on the logistics of that after May.

Regards

Richard, Laurence and Steve.      

Goodbye old friend

Jeremy Butcher 

"Klug" 

1957 - 2019

Whilst the wargaming world has quite rightly been mourning the loss of Stuart Asquith, for so long one of the leading lights of our hobby, the Partizan family are coming to terms with a far more personal loss.

For those of you who have not already heard - and apologies in that case for this being the way you now get the news - on Wednesday morning our dear old friend Jeremy Butcher, better known to us all as Klug, passed away as a result of lung cancer.

Klug was unique. By turns a bodybuilder, a landscape gardener, an ex-miner, a biker with the most amazing collection of Ducatis and Laverdas, an astronomer, a science fiction buff, a Punk, an anarchist, an anti-nuclear protestor, oft times a loner, a mountain biker, a computer buff renowned for running week long first person shooter games at his house and of course, in the context of this blog, a passionate wargamer. But most of all he was a true and loyal friend. He could be absolutely bloody infuriating at times but whenever you needed him he would be right there by your side.

Klug (right) at one of the Newark Irregulars meetings back in 2002

Klug was a member of the Newark Irregulars from our earliest days. He had grown up scratch building WW2 vehicles from plans in his comprehensive collection of Airfix magazines and each one was a joy to behold. He was always keen to point out that everything was 1/76th scale not 1/72nd which was simply too large for the tabletop battlefield. He developed his own set of very playable WW2 rules called Missing in Action based on the basic principle that any normal soldier, once the officers aren't looking, is going to find the nearest bit of cover and brew up a cuppa. He could drink tea like no one else I ever knew. He seemed to live on the stuff along with the ever present roll up ciggy. When it came to wargaming he was ever ready to have a game at the drop of a hat. When my wife and I got married in 1993 he snuck up beside me at the reception and let me know that he had one of his ready to play wargames complete with blanket terrain in his canvas haversack "just in case things got boring later on".

The long time venue for the Newark Irregulars when we met as a proper club was the next street over from his house at Pooh Corner and he became one of the most regular Irregulars, either running games of MIA or sat chatting with - and, to be fair, often arguing with - many of the other club members. At almost every Partizan show when we were at the old Kelham Hall venue he would be there at the end packing up tables and picking up litter, doing his bit as he saw it to make sure everything was a success. It doesn't matter anyone knowing now but he was also the man to whom we entrusted all the money at the shows. He would be wandering around with all of our cash in his pockets and we were completely certain that no one would suspect and that, if they did, they would definitely come off worse in any attempt to take it from him. Not for nothing did Klug have both the friendship and the respect of the local Hells Angels chapters.

Most of all Klug was a fiercely independent spirit with a strong aversion to any form of injustice or authority. It got him into trouble more times than I care to remember and it meant he never had what most of us would consider a comfortable life. Having spent his whole adult life living on nothing much other than tea, occasional slices of cake and the ever present nicotine he was utterly bemused in his final days that the State was so keen to give him money because he was ill. He would joke that if he had known they were going to be so generous he would have got a terminal disease much sooner.

As I said Klug was unique and I think we believed he would live forever. I think he believed that a little bit as well. He was a true friend: our hobby, and the world, is a far poorer place for him no longer being in it.

I trust that wherever he is now, he is sat there with a hot, sweet cuppa, a ciggy and a book waiting for us to all turn up and join him. And hopefully later, if it gets boring, we can all have a game.

         

And so the end is near...

So the floorplan is done, the confirmations have all been sent out, the programme is off with our good friends at Wargames Illustrated for printing and the very last August Partizan is ready to roll out.

And I shall be very glad to see the back of it. Good riddance.

Don't get me wrong, I love the Partizan shows. I have been helping to run them since the very first one back at the Grove Sports Hall in 1986. I have been doing the invites and floorplans for them since the year I got married in 1993. I know this because the floorplans were based on the brochure my wife-to-be and I were given to plan our wedding at Kelham Hall that year. Like any good wargamer I never let anything go to waste.

At one time Laurence and I were such gluttons for punishment we even agreed when someone had the bright idea of running three Partizans a year, with the February slot reserved for Science fiction and Fantasy gaming. It didn't take us too many years to realise this was not a good plan and 'Fantizan' was consigned to history - at least until it was resurrected the following year by another club as Hammerhead.

So the pattern for the last couple of decades has been for two Partizans a year, one in May and one towards the end of the summer. The timing of the second show has been dictated by the need to maintain a gap between The Other Partizan and the collection of long standing, major shows that made up the autumn season. Three big shows - Colours, Derby and SELWG dominated the autumn months and we had always been aware that it would be both counter productive and unfair to put The Other Partizan too close to any of them. That meant the latest we could really run the second show was the beginning of September.

The problem with this was it left a very limited amount of time between the first and second shows. As soon as the May show was over we needed to get the planning sorted out for The Other Partizan. With traders this was not usually a big problem although we lost a few to summer holidays. With games it was a bigger problem - again because of the holidays but also because putting on two games in quick succession is, for many people, simply too much to ask. These problems were only exacerbated by the move to the Show Ground which necessitated pulling the second show back into mid August as well as finding twice as many games for each show.

In short, it takes twice as much work to organise the second show as it does the first. And I think it is widely recognised that The Other Partizan is generally the poor relation to the original version.

But now two events in quick succession have produced a solution to this problem and marked the end of the late summer Partizan.

The first was the implosion of the Derby Worlds show. I won't go into detail about this, partly because the loss of such a long standing show is not something to celebrate, but mainly because I simply don't know all the details. Needless to say the show, after moving venues over the last few years, is now no more. This opens up a very nice gap in the calendar in early to mid October.

Following quickly on this opportunity came the news that the Showground were very keen for us to move the second Partizan away from the current mid August slot. I believe this is because Newark is due to be overrun with vegans on an annual basis - a sort of reverse zombie apocalypse.

When a number of alternative dates - all still scattered around late summer and none of them really ideal - were offered, Laurence took the opportunity to suggest a more radical move; to the October slot recently vacated by Derby.

This is a much better slot for us all round. It is away from the purse-tightening weeks of 'back to school'. It is away from the summer holidays so the full compliment of traders and game are more likely to be available. It gives the games more time to regroup and prepare after the first show. It ensures that the previously profitable Derby slot is maintained for traders.

And, most importantly of all, it gives me an extra two months to get the show organised.

So personally I will be very glad to see the back of the August Partizan. But I am also very much looking forward to its new incarnation next October.

Awards season

Well it has been just over a week since Partizan 2019 and we are already hard at work preparing for the second show which will be on 18th August. Invites should go out over the next few days and we already have the free figure crafted and cast ready to be revealed in early June.

But before we wrap up the first show we need to do the important business of announcing the lucky winner of the raffle and the winners of the awards for best Participation and Demonstration Games and the Editors' Award for Best in Show.

Without all the hard work and effort that goes into providing the more than 60 games and displays, Partizan simply would not exist. And so we like to say thanks to the gamers by drawing a free raffle at each show. Every game is put into a hat and one lucky winner gets £75 worth of vouchers to be spent with any of the traders at the show.

At Partizan 2019 the lucky winner was Phil Steele from the Northamptonshire Battlefield Society. This was particularly pleasing for us as Phil is one of the hardest working people attending and supporting our show. Not only does he bring excellent medieval games, filled with detailed histories and background information such as the Battle of Edgecote presented this year, but he also organises stands for no less than three societies - The Northamptonshire Battlefield Society, The Society of Ancients and the Nasby Project. A worthy winner indeed.

As at previous shows, for our judging panel we were very fortunate to have the services of a triumvirate of Editors; Dan Faulconbridge  of Wargames Illustrated, Guy Bowers of Wargames Soldiers and Strategy and Henry Hyde of Battlegames. Dan, Guy and Henry spent the day scouring the hall looking at all the games on offer before huddling in a corner to try and come to a joint decision. For anyone who does not know these fine gentlemen I should point out that they could all be described as 'strong willed' characters and this phase of the deliberations is rarely quick or easy. But thankfully after much discussion and no recourse to edged weapons, they arrived at their joint decisions. 

The first award was for best participation game and is named in honour of Pete Gill of the RAF Wargames Association who passed away in 2016. This year we were delighted to welcome Pete's widow Jacqui to the show to present the award to the Peterborough Wargames Club for their "Men Who Would be King" game. 

The Macfarlane Award for the best Demonstration Game went to the Old Pikey's Wargames Club for their superb rendering of the Battle of Oosterbeek during the Arnhem landings. Quite apart from its great visual impact, the game was filled with the many small details that can keep you occupied for hours. Most moving were the small 'Pegasus markers' showing the location of the actions during which some of the 5 Victoria Crosses awarded during the Arnhem operation were won. A truly inspirational game. 

Our final award of Partizan 2019 was The Editor's Award for Best in Show. This is for the most impressive and inspirational game at the show. For the second year running this was won by those incredible chaps from the Earlswood Wargamers Club. In May 2018 they won with their magnificent Stalingrad game and this year they had an equally inspiring World War 1 Offering - 'Angriff Auf Die Abtei'. Once again the overall spectacle was matched by all the amazing little details. A couple of photos are shown below but we will try to put together a larger gallery for a future posting. 

  

One again we would like to thank everyone who brought their wonderful games to the show, not just those who won awards. Without the efforts of all the gamers, there would be no show. 

Thankyou all. 

Just as a post script, big thanks also to Guy Bowers of Wargames, Soldiers and Strategy of sending me his huge collection of photographs from the show. One of the reasons Partizan succeeds is because of the kindness of those in the industry who support us year in, year out in so many different ways. Thanks Guy. 

From Brussels with Love

Over the years we have been fortunate to have a smattering of international visitors to the show - at least those who have made themselves known to us. These have included, unsurprisingly, more than a handful of North Americans of both the loyalist and rebellious variety (only joking guys) as well as visitors from Japan and Australia. This year, as you may have seen on the Facebook page, we have already been contacted by Roly Hermans who is visiting the UK from New Zealand and has managed to arrange things so he can pay a visit to the show whilst he is here. Of course the most oft spotted foreign fellows at Partizan come from our nearby neighbours in Europe and over the last few years we have had visitors from France, Italy, Germany, the Netherlands and Finland.  

This year we have something a little more interesting with (I think) our first game provided from outside these shores. A few weeks ago we were contacted by Jasen Lakic, a games designer from Brussels who runs 3C Boardgames. He asked if he could bring a new block based wargame to demonstrate at the show prior to launching a Kickstarter in May. Of course we are delighted to support new and innovative gaming ideas so leapt at the chance to host the game. 

It is called Multiverse War and, according to Jasen's description is 

"an area control/character progression/wargame where players recruit armies, explore the new lands and battle for better strategic positions to secure more space for development. The only way to advance through the eras is by killing enemy units or destroying buildings so players must do their best to outmaneuver their opponents and earn those valuable kills. You gain access to more powerful units and buildings by making kills with those units but do not underestimate Heroes. They are special units with increased Health, Action points and many unique and powerful abilities. Veteran heroes are formidable opponents, a strong hero can easily sway the odds in your favour!"

Not our traditional miniatures wargaming perhaps, but just another facet of our wonderful hobby. We are certainly looking forward welcoming our Belgian friend and seeing Jasen's game in real life at Partizan next month.    

You can find more details of the game development at: 

http://www.3boardgames.com/multiverse/
  

2019 Partizan figures first look

"Freiheit ist immer nur Freiheit des anders Denkenden"

We always try to do something a bit different with the Partizan figures. Over the last few years this has usually involved basing them on historical figures of interest - both military and civilian - particularly if there is an interesting anniversary lurking around a corner. This year is no exception and we have decided to make a temporary swerve to the left to celebrate two notable figures of the socialist movement.

2019 is the centenary of the Spartacist Uprising in Berlin in 1919. In 1915 one of the founders of the Spartakusbund  (Spartacus League) - originally a left wing anti-war movement - was the Polish-German philosopher and activist Rosa Luxemburg. When Germany was defeated in 1918 the league became very active in the post-war chaos of the German Revolution and Luxemburg, along with Karl Leibknecht, co-founded the Red Flag Newspaper and took part in the first congress that founded the German Communist Party.

In January 1919 a wave of violent strikes and uprising swept across Germany with armed bands attempting to seize control in a number of cities. Although Luxemburg apparently considered this a mistake, she did eventual come to support the uprising in Berlin. But it was a short lived revolution and was quickly crushed by the German Freikorps - mostly WW1 veterans - raised in support of the existing government. On 15th January 1919 Luxemburg and Leibknecht were captured by Freikorps troops and executed.

There is no evidence that Rosa Luxemburg physically took up arms during the uprising but we have asked our figure designer Martin Baker to model her with a rifle as if she were standing on the barricades in defence of the revolution. Here is the green ready for mould making.

The figure will be free to everyone trading, putting on a game or running a society stand at the Partizan show on 19th May and will also be free for the first 500 visitors through the door on the day. 

ROBIN 2019 Games Expo and Trade Fair

So I (LB) popped down to the ROBIN show today (Sunday 17th February) to see how it was going to be different from the previous incarnation. For its first two years it was run by Donna Simmerson who put in a lot of energy and experience to pull off a great little show which had a lot of potential. It's always difficult to start something from scratch, but Nottingham, at the centre of the fabled Leadbelt, has struggled to develop its own show, probably because of more established offerings in nearby Newark, Derby and the late lamented Cannon in Retford. The new experience has been relabelled as a Games Expo and Trade Fair so I was expecting an expansion of the card and boardgame part of the hobby, and looking forward to seeing what was on offer, given that Nottingham also has a thriving industry in this sector.

Arriving a few minutes after opening I parked easily, and found that their first innovation as to make the entry through the Tennis Centre, which means no door opening straight to the outside, which was a definite improvement. The weather was much milder this year too, so a much more comfortable temperature in the hall. There were a lot of unfamiliar traders which was refreshing, but meant some of the big names were missing. I think Tactica was on in Germany this weekend, so it looks like Foundry and Wargames Illustrated, for example, were there instead of nearer to home. Surprisingly the fresh faces didn't really represent an expansion into the boardgame and card game sector, but it as good to see some of the smaller names from the wargames field - and it is probably wise at this point for us to apologise again to those of you who are on the Partizan waiting list - we know it is frustrating to have to wait to get into the more established shows, sorry! 

For those of you who like to hear the personal side of things I managed to get two out of three things on my shopping list - a ne can of Strong Tone varnish, and Wayne Bollands new Cold war rules 'The Zone', which look very good, and will persuade me to get out my Sloppy Jalopy vehicles and those old Mongrel figures! I saw Wayne in the distance and s going to get him to sign it for me but he diappeared whilst I was chatting! I was looking for some Vallejo sepia wash, but couldn't find any, but got some decal softener instead! All in all quite restrained I thought.

Of the games again there were  couple of board game and card game offerings, but more traditional wargames. Standout amongst those were the Lenton Gamers Chain of Command game and James Morris'  Red Book of the Elf King games, and the Leicester Phat Cats Blood and Thunder pirate game with some very impressive ship models.

I had been hoping to find time for a quick game of Mortal Gods and/or Cruel Sea, but seemed to spend a lot of time chatting with folks instead. The legend that is Duncan Macfarlane seemed in fine form, and we talked nostalgically with Dave Bickley about the days when painting was done with Humbrol enamels, Plaka paints, or even oils, before I realised that I'm actually not old enough to remember those days...

ROBIN has only been going three years, and this is the first year 'under new management'. I've often said that a show needs to have a reason for being, a niche that makes it stand out and gives people a reason for going. Over the years I hope Partizan has done that, and I had high hopes that the move to expand this show to include more diverse sectors of the gaming world would be the making of it. On the face of it much remains to be done to achieve this goal, but if and when it succeeds then ROBIN will be a great addition to the circuit - and it's also very handy for me, living as I do in Nottingham now..