Wednesday Wargaming: Thanksgiving Week

Needful diversions of wealth and strength from the fields of peaceful industry to the national defense have not arrested the plow, the shuttle, or the ship; the ax has enlarged the borders of our settlements, and the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. Population has steadily increased, notwithstanding the waste that has been made in the camp, the siege, and the battle-field, and the country, rejoicing in the consciousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to expect continuance of years with large increase of freedom.

No human counsel hath devised, nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy.

- Abraham Lincoln (full text can be found here)

Thanksgiving is a traditional family holiday in the Americas. Wargamers will recall that it was Abraham Lincoln adopted it as a formal holiday during the Civil War, though the tradition extends as far back as the Puritan colonists who first landed here in the 17th Century. So as we celebrate this Thanksgiving holiday and consider the bounties that we enjoy even in these tough economic times, let it not be said that we don’t have some great wargames to be thankful for.

Soldiers have long known that the weather sometimes dictates when battles may take place or if they can take place at all. Terms like “campaign season” are an explicit acknowledgment of that fact. So as I cast about looking for Civil War battles that took place over what we now recognize as the Thanksgiving holidays, the examples are few. As a result, I’ve loosened my criteria for battle selection and instead of focusing on a battle that took place on this particular week in history, I’ll take a look at some battles that took place in November during the Civil War and highlight some games that can help takes us back to that general time and place.
November 23, 1863 – The Chattanooga Campaign. Grant, Sherman, and Hooker lay the smack down on the rebs.



Games to set the mood: HPS's Chicamauga
Avalanche Press's War of the States
XTR Corp's Chattanooga
SPI's Chattanooga




By: GladiusMagnus