"Osprey Australian Bushrangers 1788 - 1880 Review" Topic

I finally got hold of a copy of this book, by the renowned English Zulu War expert and wargamer Ian Knight, and have read through it once.

It's only let down by a few peculiarities and errors that wouldn't have occurred had the writing been assigned to an Australian author. For instance, there's an annoying tendency to use inappropriate American terms such as ranch (station/run) and rustler/rustling (duffer/duffing).

Despite a few references in the narrative to the local police establishments that preceded the centralisation process of the 1860s, such as the convict constables of the early settlement period, Knight doesn't elaborate upon them specifically in the text, and other police organisations, such as the Road Police and the Border Police, are similarly neglected (for a full description see the two-volume history of Australian mounted police forces by John O'Sullivan).

Also, it's wrongly asserted that Military Mounted Police personnel were former soldiers, when a reading of any basic, readily accessible source (such as O'Sullivan's books) will tell you that they were serving infantrymen seconded from the garrison regiment, and subject to military discipline.

The book is certainly well written in Knight's usual relaxed, competent and confident style, and there are enough colourful touches in the text to keep the narrative lively.

The selection of illustrations presents a pleasing mixture of photos and contemporary paintings, the latter mainly of action scenes, and surprisingly, a number of them in colour.

The plates are of a high standard, as anyone who knows the work of the illustrator, Mark Stacey, would expect. As with the text, there could have been a greater focus on police, but it's apparent that the author's knowledge in this area isn't sufficiently complete to warrant detailed treatment.

The limited page space in an MAA title, especially with the change in recent years to the single-column format, with its wide margins and large expanses of white-space, should result in as economical as possible a use of words, but the main text contains a number of descriptions of costume which are repeated in the plate explanations at the end of the book.

On the whole, with the above caveats, this book is an adequate and appealing introduction to the subject that will hopefully propel a figure manufacturer or two into some antipodean action.

An excellent review.

thanks

I'm a bit confused about the title and your review. It sounds like an introductory history which might have been better released under their Histories banner rather than a Men-at-arms release?
Given the roughly 100 year period, the number of bushranger 'campaigns' and the evolution of policing across different colonies do you think this is a one-off publication and if so, is it too broad to be useful to a wargamer?
I'd have thought you could dedicate a whole volume to a single colonial police force or police service (gold fields etc).

In the usual MAA pattern it tries to do a bit of everything, UG, so there are brief bios of some of the best-known bushrangers incorporating accounts of their criminal 'careers' (inevitably Ned and the boys dominate, with six pages devoted to them), sections on some of the forces of law and order, and descriptions of costume, weapons and so on, all arranged in a loose chronological progression that merely focuses on the busier segments of that 100 years or so. In other words, it's a minimalist approach that allows Osprey to tick the 'done' box for bushrangers.

For someone with no knowledge whatsoever of the subject I think the book serves as a useful introduction, and if its widespread availability introduces many hobbyists previously totally ignorant of the history of bushranging in colonial Australia to its attractions as a potential tabletop game setting I think it will have served its purpose admirably.

It's a pity there's no bibliography (it does contain an index!), but in this day and age tracking down further reading shouldn't prove too challenging for those so inclined.

I do agree that in an ideal publishing world a two-volume treatment (one on bushrangers; the other on their opponents) would have been a better option. Then there would at least have been enough page space to account for all the forces of law and order.

Wargamers are visual creatures who need to have an image in their minds of the combatants in any particular conflict before they can make the imaginative leap to envisioning gaming it. This being the first time that Australian bushrangers and their nemeses have been presented together in a single source-book in high quality colour illustrations, it represents an unprecedented shift towards the possibility of bushranger skirmish games gaining acceptance and a foothold in the hobby. All that's necessary to complete the process is a range of high quality figures.

Just to elaborate on my point about accessibility, we shouldn't overlook the fact that this book will be sitting on Osprey stands in hobby and book shops throughout the world. Previously, only in Australian bookshops would you have been likely to randomly encounter books on bushranging while browsing the shelves. Otherwise, if you had an interest in the subject you'd have to seek out books yourself. For many non-Aussies it will be their first exposure to the subject, and for that reason alone it has a value beyond its contents, whatever their quality.

All very good observations HM. I suppose it's no different to their original Pirates volume and no less worthwhile.

I started to develop a rule set and an introductory scenario for just such a skirmish game centered around Mad Dog Morgan and an encounter with Police Magistrate Bayliss in the Riverina.

I since cooled off – so many other larger wargaming projects and interests. It will have to wait until I retire.

I'm sure you would have slipped into it more readily UG if you hadn't needed to convert figures to make it happen.