The Spanish Civil War lives again

When I graduated from college way back in '78, I was taken with the Spanish Civil War. There was something romantic about a Republic supported by a melange of political leftists bravely opposing a band of fascists, supported by the Nazis. I've learned just enough to know that there were plenty of mass murders, executions and political orthodoxy on both sides. A war which, in reality, had no good guys.

I was always intrigued with the idea of gaming the period, but alas, for the longest time there were no miniatures. Then, at an Enfilade many years ago Lance Runolfson of Bloodaxe Miniatures in Medford Oregon brought his crude but charming SCW figures and sold them to David Sullivan. As is David's habit, he sat on them until I liberated them from him in one of his frequent fits of closet cleaning.

One of my all time favorite set of rules are those written by Dick Larson for this period-he called them Non Pasaran from the famous words by La Passionaria, the poster girl for the Republican side. Dick wrote the rules for his beautiful 20mm Hotspur (now Bandera) figures, and I have wonderful memories of playing the rules in a variety of different venues. Modified from the old GW Space Marines rules, they were easy to play and very fun, though there needed to be some fairly careful game mastering.

Though my homely Bloodaxe figures were no match for Dick's 20's, I was thrilled when Peter Pig came out with a 15mm range at about the time I started painting my figures. There were lots more figure types than my little Bloodaxe lumpen. Eventually I acquired a fair number of figs, way back in 1994. I played with them once, and they've lived in their box ever since. I decided to drag them out for our August 16th game day. Another report will follow up.