Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

So, at an antique fair, I purchased a small box of (poorly painted) Civil War era ships, figuring I could make some profit off of them on eBay or something. However, I have not been able to figure out where these are from. One of the longer Confederate riverboats Has the name Authenticast on it, but I have not been able to find any pictures of them online beyond the CSS Virginia(?) and a better model of the USS Monitor. The rest of the models have a single number on the bottom.

The only things I have been able to figure out is that these were collected over a long period of time and passed between many people (due to at least three different types of paint used), and that they were used for wargaming in the past (due to some having bits of blue painted plywood attached to them).

What are all of these? Which companies are these from? What wargame would these have been used in?

Possibly NavWar or Davco models. Their ranges were around in the 1980s and are still in production, there not being huge demand for 1/1200 scale ACW naval stuff. The quality is fairly low, but acceptable for the low price, rarity of alternatives, and to some degree reflects the crudity of the real ships which basically were bolted together from sheets of iron.

. I think NavWar absorbed Davco at some point but NavWar is still around.

http://www.navwar.co.uk/nav/default.asp?MMID=80

Sadly no pictures but catalogue numbers are there which might match up to your models. (Though if not, it's possible that NavWar has changed their catalogue over the decades.)

There have been various rulebooks for ACW naval/river warfare published. I cannot at the moment remember the names of ones I played, but the NavWar site lists three books for ACW/Ironclad.

The interesting thing about ACW ships is that you can combine them with 6mm armies to play riverine campaigns.

Heritage USA did some of these in the 70s/80s.

It was a pretty popular period for Steve Miller, one of the early Heritage Sculptors who did primarily straight-line work in those days (or as straight as you could get without proper machining facilities).

The "Authenticast" though comes from the mid-20th century, when a company called "Comet" made a lot of Historical Miniatures (larger, like 1/35th scale, or larger). I would not be surprised if they produced Civil War era gunboats.

MB