paints brigs for the British fleet.
Perhaps some among you still remember that, not too long ago, an electronic booklet was released in PDF format, entitled Catalonia Stands Alone - 1713-1714: The Catalans' War (link), which was intended to be the first of a complete series of guides related to the least known armies in the War of Spanish Succession - those of Spain. That first booklet had taken the Two Crowns' 1713-1714 campaign for the subjugation of Catalonia as a pretext to explore a still absolutely unknown army: the one hurriedly raised by the Catalans to face their country's occupation by Philip V's troops.
Encouraged by the warm feedback received, in addition to the support of my own local club-mates and gamers from other parts of Catalonia, I've finally managed to find spare time enough to produce a second booklet on the WSS. This new issue in our Desperta Ferro! wargaming guides series has been given the name of Urna de l'Honor/Urn of Honour (link), in honor of an inscription at the Fossar de les Moreres (Mulberry trees Cemetery, link), 11th September 1714 Memorial, in Barcelona's Old Town.
Following in the footsteps of our first booklet, this one also takes the dramatic aftermath of war in the Spanish Peninsula as a background to open a new window on the armies involved in that obscure theater of war. This time, we take the September 11, 1714, massive assault carried on by over 18,000 Two Crowns' troops on Barcelona after a 13-month-long siege - as well as the chaotic, bloody urban fighting happened in the 20 following hours - as a pretext to compile and review the information we've been able to collect about the French and Spanish infantry, dragoons and artillery battalions directly involved in that out-of-time, Stalingrad-like battle; besides, it also takes into consideration a few Catalan lesser units not studied in our first booklet (either for lack of information enough or physical space).
Following the style initiated with our first booklet, Urna de l'Honor / Urn of Honour is a 49-page electronic booklet in PDF format, fully illustrated with 46 uniform pictures and 53 images of Colonels, Battalions and institutional flags, besides two maps, eight ancient prints, and even some photos - including a few of painted miniature soldiers.
Jointly with the booklet, there is also a second PDF file containing four DIN A4 sheets of two-sided flags to be used in your armies, pre-scaled in three different sizes - that makes a total of seven flag pages!
Due to its close relationship with the September 11th, 1714 Project (link) of our own club, this time our new booklet has been published not in English but in the Catalan language first, in order to satisfy local demand. However, we won't forget to publish it later in English, although it will not happen before St. George's Day - my most sincere apologies for this, believe me that I'm doing all the best I can, but I haven't spare time enough! Anyway, those of you with some knowledge of the Spanish, French or even Italian languages shouldn't have too much trouble in understanding more or less this booklet's contents, and no doubt would take some advantage on a first glance to the work before it is published in English...
In the meanwhile, I've taken advantage to compile a second edition of our first booklet Catalonia Stands Alone, which includes all the news, amendments and remarks patiently collected in the past months. I thought it would be best publishing it alongside with our new booklet, for their topics are strictly complementary - besides, both being needed to fulfill our own September 11th, 1714 Project. In a few words, this second edition means to have supplementary information about several units insufficiently covered before, besides adding a new Line Infantry Regiment plate, a completely new chapter devoted to Catalan high rank commanders, and a number of remarks on the Majorca garrison. In the end, the attached flagsheets have been noticeably improved, so that they are now enclosed in a four-page PDF file, with all the flags pre-scaled to three different sizes.
Both booklets can be downloaded for free either from our club's website (wargames.cat) or from my publishing weblog (desperta-ferro-ed.blogspot.com).