Nick Lorance
Honing the Blade, Part 1
I January, 1635 As he did every Sunday, Hartmann went to do some shooting. He opened the door of the gun shop, nodding to Herr Schönebeck. The shop owner grinned. “Greetings sergeant!” “Morning, Franz. I came to use the range again.” “Ah, yes.”...
A Little Help From His Friends
Near Magdeburg November, 1634 “Hey, Linus! Where is the sergeant?” Becker sighed. The party had gone on until around two in the morning, and somewhere in that time, Hartmann had vanished. “Josef, does it look like I have been assigned to keep track of him?” He...
The Long Road Home, Part 2
Hartmann escorted the shaken Kirsten to the MP tents, telling her to wait while he went inside. However, things looked to be getting worse. “Murder?” Hartmann asked in a chilly voice. “Yes.” Captain Hess from the MP Company told him from his seat at his desk. “You...
The Long Road Home, Part 1
The Battle of Ahrensbök Early May, 1634 From where the French command group stood, what had been a glorious struggle became tragedy. With the cavalry along with their commanding general in flight, Charles de la Porte threw his men into the attack hoping they...
It’s the Little Things
Grantville August, 1632 To one of the up-timers, it was just a ten-foot by ten-foot storage shed behind a house on one of the hills that surrounded the town of Grantville. It was now the home of Richard Hartmann, a sergeant in what they called their New United...
Transplanted Seed
November 8, 1620 Bohemia Richard ran back toward the line of tents, holding in his arms a precious treasure—two lengths of sausage and a whole cabbage. It had been hard in the last week; ripped from their home by the advancing army of Count Tilly, mother dying...
Birthday Blues
Magdeburg, 30 October 1634 Hartmann looked at the sign in Fraktur: He had heard of the shop from Linus Becker, his assistant at the training facility. They had come up to Magdeburg from Suhl and opened their shop here less than a mile from the Army base outside...
Sergeant Whatsisname
It was not a Duke nor Earl, nor yet a Viscount— It was not a big brass General that came; But a man in khaki kit who could handle men a bit, With his bedding labelled Sergeant Whatsisname. Magdeburg, May 20, 1631 The lieutenant had decided...
