John G Garratt and Charles Sweet

Not strictly wargaming, but interesting nonetheless, an article from the Surrey & Hants News Tuesday August 12th 1980. John G Garratt was the author of Collecting Model Soldiers, Model Soldiers for the Connoisseur, and The World Encyclopaedia of Model Soldiers.


From Model Soldiers for the Connoisseur, below is a further picture of Charles Sweet's American War of Independence gridded set up, shown previously here.
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Charlie Sweet - The Sports Illustrated article

As referred to in previous posts, Charles (Charlie) Sweet was a hugely important figure in giving wargaming a public profile in the United States. Featured in an article in Sports Illustrated and as a bank president he gave the hobby gravitas and credibility, as well as drawing it to many's attention for the first time. He also appeared on television with Mike Wallace and Walter Cronkite. Much better known in the US than in Britain, he died aged 87 in 2001.

Thanks to a regular source (you know who you are) I am now able to post some scans of the original Sports Illustrated article here. If you are interested in finding out more about Charlie Sweet there is an obituary by Bob Beattie here on miniaturewargaming.com.

American Revolutiion: Rules by Charlie and David Sweet

Partly as a late trubute to HG Wells birthday last week, and partly inspired by the pictures of Charlie Sweet's gridded 30mm AWI set up from Bob Bard's Making and Collecting Military Miniatures, posted earlier here, here are Charlie and David Sweets American Revolution rules, published in Wargamers Newsletter no 93, December 1969.

The Wells-like features include the use of a spring loaded cannon firing cotton buds. Other interesting elements are a timed three minute move and the use of Chance Cards.

Enjoy!

Napoleonic rules by Gerard de Gre, modified by Charles and David Sweet, The Courier 1970

Featuring artillery fire using a plastic gun firing Q tips (cotton buds for those of us this side of the Atlantic), and using a home made catapult for howitzer fire, these rules bridge the HG Wells era towards Morschauser and others.

Charles A Sweet: The Early Years

These pictures are from Making and Collecting Military Miniatures, a book by Bob Bard and published in the States in 1957. I am indebted to Doug from Unfashionably Shiny for drawing this book to my attention. One chapter considers wargaming at the time in the United States, including rules, on Wellsian lines.

Here Charles Sweet is using (I believe) 30mm figures on a gridded system. There is a pleasing aesthetic to the pictures. Does anyone want to identify any of the figure used?

Charles A. Sweet, Table Top General from Table Top Talk September 1963

Looking in this picture vaguely like Tony Soprano (or really quite a lot like Assistant Commissioner Rawls from The Wire) Charles A Sweet was one of the early godfathers of wargaming in the United States. This was not least because he featured in an article on the hobby in Sports Illustrated. More of this in the next post, from The War Game Digest, another of Jack Scruby's publications.

Charles Sweet: Confession of a longtime wargamer, War Game Digest Fall 1971