Last year I wrote about the signed copy of Donald Featherstone’s Complete Wargaming that I had picked up secondhand, signed or dedicated to Richard Tennant.
Reading through Solo Wargaming, my second favourite Featherstone title, (War Games 1962 first, Airborne Wargaming third, before you ask), I spotted another of Richard Tennant’s beautiful wargames terrain pieces.
Richard (Dick) Tennant sadly passed away in March 2021, aged 77.
There is an obituary piece for him here:
https://miniatureminions.blogspot.com/2021/03/a-tribute-to-passing-of-friend-dick.html
Many of these terrain pieces were made for Richard, something I discovered on Richard’s summary of the Miniature Minions website of David Crenshaw.
David now owns many of these Tennant Napoleonic collection figures. You can glimpse the building again in one of Tennant’s own photographs:
Richard Tennant wrote his own mini biography featured on David Crenshaw’s blog:
https://miniatureminions.blogspot.com/2019/05/the-richard-tennant-collection.html
It looks like one of these Spanish farms by Holmes of Deltorama or Peter Gilder has been photographed for Donald Featherstone’s lovely book, one of only two colour pictures including the cover picture of Airfix Arabs.
Richard Tennant was an early opponent of Donald Featherstone in Southampton in the 1960s and a lifelong friend of his. They both shared an interest in the Napoleonic and Peninsular Wars.
As well as Richard Tennant’s collections being together in the USA in good hands, it is good to know that many of Featherstone’s figures are together in the collection of Daniel Borris in the USA.
Solo Wargaming has been republished in affordable softback by John Curry in the History of Wargaming Project – http://www.wargaming.co/recreation/details/dfsolo.htm
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I also spotted Dick Tennant’s name again in Donald Featherstone’s Wargamers Newsletter of October 1969 (I have fairly randomly the Jan-Dec 1969 issues)
Blog posted by Mark Man of TIN, July 2021
Man of Tin blog 
The terrain pieces are lovely and I do like the old advert for them. There was something about these old hand produced journals. Jan used to work on a parish magazine with me with own artwork and sticking on blocks of text with glue, none of this word processing stuff. She also prepared similar material as part of her job. This would be later in the eighties. We have come a long way since then for hobby and work. It was long ago , it was far away, it was…
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You are right, it does have a Wargames parish magazine or fanzine feel to it. Nice to know that it was a cottage industry with the Featherstone children and family bribed with cash to assemble and mail it.
I also had to do this for my job, typed, hand drawn, cut and paste about 25 years ago (I have now scanned these into the company archive to make them available again), for school as an underground fanzine etc way back when …
Now in the days of instant picture blogs (and colour magazines) it does seem a galaxy far far away …
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These buildings have a quaintness and character missing in modern MDF flatpack ones .
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Yes they are atmospheric pictures. MDF buildings are OK but much better to have them custom made by experts. I will scan a few more of these sketch ads.
I remember similarly marvelling at the Ian Weekly Battlements adverts and articles in early Miniature Wargames.
Oh well, that old Airfix thatched cottage will just have to work a little harder!
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