A wargamer and author from that classic era of wargaming who perhaps has not always been recognised as much as the more well known ones (i.e. Donald Featherstone, Charles Grant, Tony Bath, Brigadier Peter Young, Terry Wise and then later George Gush, Stuart Asquith, etc) is Charlie Wesencraft. While many will know him and he probably is better known than Joseph Morschauser and David Nash (see my Wargaming Tomes Collection: Part One post) I for one did not see his books early on in my wargaming career (possibly due to being in New Zealand – although other local gamers here have said they saw them in libraries and such in the 1980’s or very late ’70s). I was interested to recently read an interview with Charlie Wesencraft that reinforces my view that he seems to have contributed more than just his 2 books in the early 1970’s to the classic wargaming era.
For those not aware Charlie published two very good wargaming books in the 1970’s:
- Practical Wargaming (1974)
- With Pike and Musket (1975)
Over at the The Independent Wargames Group blog there is an interview that was conducted with Charlie (I am unsure of exact date but it is pre-2014 I believe) and as the interview was not used as originally intended it was posted on the IWG blog in 2015:
It is very interesting and well worth reading. Also in the interview there is a reference to a third wargaming book Charlie wrote but never published, Seven Steps to Freedom, that has now been published by John Curry as part of his History of Wargaming Project. You can get the book here: Charlie Wesencraft’s “Seven Steps to Freedom: Wargaming the French and Indian War and the American War of Independence” (2014). It is perhaps a pity this was not published when originally written in the late 1970’s or 1980’s.
For other related news on Charlie Wesencraft (and a short video) from 2014 and 2015 see:
