The Men Who Would be Scalped!!!

[skirmisher]

I decided to take my US/Indian figures out of deep-storage and try TmWwBk rules with them. These forces had not seen action for an AWFUL long time.

The Apaches were eager to make up for lost time as their firing was DEVASTATING and quickly pinned and decimated the US patrol. I was solo-playing the "Its awfully quiet out there..." scenario so the Apaches were able to cut-up two of the three U.S. units (routing one of them) and then melt away to claim victory. They suffered no casualties in a very one-sided affair that compared to some of the historical actions in which fire-armed natives successfully ambushed the US Army (e.g. Nez Pierce, Modoc or Apache wars).

The sole redeeming moment for the U.S. 6th Cavalry was when the survivors of the lead unit, a Lieutenant and trooper, rallied and managed to carry off two of their wounded without being pinned, dispite being under fire from 22 braves, who had hitherto hit everything they aimed at.

I modifed the rules slightly for my game (around pinning/firing to make the both less crippling) but was pleased with the overall rules for small skirmish US/Indian War actions.

[Inkpaduta]

I like the name. Would make for a good supplement of the rules.

[SABOT]

Nice one.

[joroas]

Hair today, gone tomorrow!

[FierceKitty]

Decimation isn't that serious on the wargames table. I seldom win without twice those losses at least.

[Sunjester]

A nice looking game.

[FifteensAway]

Like the title, too.  But did Apache scalp their opponents?  Not sure - and if you say yes, please document your source material because I'm not sure they did.  Quick Google search was inconclusive.

For OP, what scale are the figures, please?

[Inkpaduta]

Good question,

My gut response would be no. That was more of a Plains Indian thing dealing with gaining various honors.
The Apaches did not have a system of honors (Like counting coup ect.) so I would say no. But, as you asking
for evidence, that I can not provide. Just my thoughts.

[Clearco]

Chris Peers in "war on the plains" states: "The Apache peoples had to endure such onerous purification ceremonies after even touching a dead enemy that it was not generally worth their while to scalp people, but a single scalp might be brought back to the tribe from a successful fight to prove that enemies had been killed."

So I guess they generally didn´t

[DintheDin]

Very realistic terrain! Must have been a thrilling game!

[skirmisher]

Hi folks, just seen these replies now. Thanks for the feedback. I am afraid the title was just some bad punning on my part.

I think Inkpaduta is right in that scalping was a more feature of Plains Indian warfare. For the Apaches though, I have a recollection they were actually the victims of scalping in their conflicts with the Spanish & Mexican governments, as these in some cases paid bounties for Apache scalps (did a quick google there and confirmed).

FifteensAway, the figures are 90s Freikorps 15mm.

DintheDin, thanks: it was nice to get these figures in action again. For terrain I used a mixture of rocks and cork. You just reminded me I need to go scan my local model shop's website and order more of the latter.