Convoy PQ-19 - part 1

Back by popular demand!  I ran this Fletcher Pratt game at the Sheffield club on 25 January.  It was played on a cordoned-off area of the floor approximately 15 by 40 feet in size. (For those outside the Commonwealth, and and young people, that's 5x13 metres)
The scenario saw a British convoy bound for northern Russia come under attack from German surface units.  Poor weather had reduced visibility to 60 inches and grounded aircraft. 
The convoy was made up of 6 Merchant ships - all unarmed, escorted by 6 destroyers and 2 cruisers (1 heavy, 1 light). 
Eight players took part, along with a four-strong umpire team and 19 toy ships.  As usual I'll let the pictures tell the story...

The convoy with it's close escort of destroyers.

Laden with goodies for our brave comrades.  All of these are wooden scratchbuilds - mostly bought (really quite cheaply) from a toy dealer while the smaller white decked vessel was found on Ebay.

The destroyers are all Airfix Tribals.

HMS Ajax (left) and the escort commander's flagship, HMS Kent.

The convoy Commodore didn't like the initial setup and decided to spread things out a bit.  It may have had something to do with the repeated mention of torpedoes in the briefing...

Grown men playing with toy boats.  Destroyer Captains Gunter (left) and Bish (right) with Tony, the Commodore.  I still say he looks nothing like Lionel Ritchie...

Tony's freighters plodded along at only 12 kts. 

Frank, the escort commander posing with my rather splendid (Soviet) officer's cap.

 The Brits were given several turns of moving to get the hang of things and sort out their desired formation.

Coming next - the baddies!