Bailen, 19 July 1808, refought 25th November 2024

 A last minute trip to Oxford enabled me to visit the OWS club and take part in one of Dr Mark Smith's BBB Peninsular games.  I had played this before, about 4-5 years ago, but Mark had tweaked the scenario and it needed play testing!

The scenario is that the French army, under Dupont, is moving towards supporting forces whilst ensuring that it's baggage train, laden with Spanish treasure, makes it back to the Louvre...

The Spanish are not in favour of this, so have blocked the way forward and are coming up on the French rear as well.  

For the game, Crispin and I were the French, Dave W & Phil were the Spanish.

Here's the map.

The French are heading north, with their 2nd wave coming on in turn 2 and the Spanish followers arriving turn 5 or 6.  In my previous game, I elected for a left hook, got bogged down in the forest and chopped to bits.  This time I decided to just punch through, keeping the baggage as near, but not too near, to the front line as possible.  

Initial deployment - the wagons are on the road, The French are lined up to the right.  The green cube denotes Guard Marines - aggressive, veteran, skirmishers - but only two stands.  The pink cube units are Swiss, having recently swapped from fighting for the Spanish against the French and of doubtful loyalty.  In the real battle they swapped sides again! 

Move 2 - French push North - the baggage train and my advance guard heads north into the Spanish troops defending the valley.  Crispin's rear guard makes it across the bridge and his cavalry + horse artillery are on the French right.

Move 4 - the French advance slows as David and Phil send the Spaniards in to slow the French down.  

Move 6 - the French made progress through the valley (of death) but at the cost of units going fragile.  Meanwhile the southern Spaniards caught up with Crispin and started to erode the rearguard.

Move 6 - other view.  The Spanish are sitting in Bailen, but the French third wave has arrived from the North, so it's not over yet!

Final position - the French did assault Bailen but failed to breakthrough.  The Spaniards caught the baggage train.   Whilst the French had a number of good combats it took too long to break the Spanish and cost too many Frenchmen doing so.  It was, in the end, a draw.

Reflections - once again BBB delivered the HQGE fix we wanted for the evening - all four players were in action most of the time and it was a lot of fun!  

Mark's scenario makes life difficult for both sides - baggage trains to guard, uncertain re-inforcement arrival times, flaky troops that are liable to scarper!

My thanks go to Mark for laying on the game at short notice and to Crispin, Dave W and Phil for being excellent colleagues/opponents!

Battle of Vittoria - 21 June 1813 - refight 17 Feb 2024

 A trip to Oxford in February was the excuse Mark S needed to gather the players for Vittoria, 21st June 1813.  Mark and I took command of the French, Chris and Crispin took the Brits.  

The British objective was to take key villages and the heights of Puebla, several river crossings and stop the French evacuating their baggage.  The French had to hold on long enough for the baggage to get away and generally slow the Brits down.

Here's the map.  

I took the French at the top of the map against Chris' forces, Mark's forces were to take on Crispin's two columns coming from the North.  

This was the battlefield as set up - my job was to hold the heights of Pueblo and the hill top middle.  Mark was in charge of stopping the river crossings and guarding the baggage.

Here's our deployment:

French South - bit of a grainy photo

French South West - French my troops facing Chris's Brits in the foreground 

The French South west looking North - Mark is contemplating Crispin's Brits arrival on the board edge in front of him.

The French defending the North Middle - yup, I can't see them either - must be camouflaged!  Actually, I think that they were held till the approaching British trigger movement.

The French defending the North East

Turns 1 - 4 saw the British, Portuguese & Spaniards deploy more and more troops.  Move 5 pics - Chris (in the foreground) sent his light division (I think I saw Sharpe there) into the woods and started sniping.

Same part of the game, looking at 90 degrees to above pic - Chris pushes onto the hill.

One move later....

Chris forms a formidable line and grinds down my French

The battle on the hill goes slowly for Chris as I stubbornly resist, whilst going slowly backwards....

Crispin's advance goes well, with too few French to defend all the river crossings.  The French column in the foreground rushes to shore up the line.

Turn 7

My French continue to battle for the hill.

In the middle, Chris's Brits, loads of skirmishers and Heavy Cavalry support in attendance, charge me off the objective hill and then repel my attempts to retake it.

In the middle, the Brits cross the river and head for the baggage.

Turn 8

By turn 8 the French baggage train has left at high speed (with the payroll) and the British surge everywhere.

My northern French (or ate least the remnant) are now cut off, but continue to battle on.

As ever it was a great game.  In the end the British destroyed the French, but in game terms did not get enough objectives to win.  The French also managed to rescue the baggage and payroll, so the surviving French will all get a pay-rise.  

My thanks go to Mark for arranging the game and being an excellent comrade in arms, to Chris & Crispin for a fun day's fighting.

BBB, as ever, worked well in that we handled this big battle without too much brain strain!

Well worth a replay at some point..... 

Corunna - 16 Jan 1809 - refight 29 Nov & 6 Dec

After a long retreat in winter through the mountains of North West Spain, Sir John Moore reaches the port of Corunna and waits for the Royal Navy.  The two day delay allows Marshal Court to catch up with the retreating army and attack.  Moore successfully evacuates his army, but dies in the battle to hold off the French.  So much for history, how did we fare?

Mike chose to field his British army and I elected to give my French another outing.  The scenario is by Matt Bradley and has the British holding a ridge which the French must take for victory.  Here's the map:

I elected to use my main force to attack the objective villages of Piedralonga and Elvina (top two objectives) and pin the British at the bottom objective (on the San Christobal hill).

The start of the game - Elvina to the left and Piedralonga to the right.  Note the use of the hand-towel as the Atlantic - so glad it wasn't pink!

French columns going in - Elvina

Piedralonga

The scenario allowed the use of dragoons, as cavalry:

and dismounted, as infantry. The dismounted dragoons (red token) have really not got their act together, only one unit has charged home and the British infantry are benefitting from a massive injection of tea!

After two successful battles in recent weeks, I have to admit I got a bit cocky.  As ever, the BBB rules brought me back to the reality that the more units needing to co-ordinate, the more likely one or more is to go slow or just stop.  The British moved forward at Piedralonga and got driven back up the hill, but it was more of a planned retreat than the rout I'd been hoping for. 

French disorganised assault - not enough troops charging home.  The British "D" rating for devastating volleys added just enough to their firepower to ensure my charges stopped or took casualties on the way in.

A little later in the game - the French have Elvina, however Piedralonga holds on for the Brits...  just.

Next turn - the Brits have Elvina, but the Brits have pushed back into Piedralonga

Close up of French infantry, mostly warmly dressed in greatcoats to keep out the cold.

French 12pdrs - great until the Brits decided to keep the battle at just beyond long range!

To the left of Elvina - two evenly matched blocks of troops slug it out for this flank.

A little while later...

French final assault on Piedralonga - not starting in a good place, as all the French units are disrupted.

Massed French cavalry, waiting for the British to break...  waiting... waiting...

Not really clear from the photos, but the British lost Elvina and got pushed off that part of the ridge.  They did hang on to Piedralonga and stopped the French left hand move past Elvina.  The French dragoons on the extreme left got wiped out, but the time taken to do this meant these British were unable to rejoin the battle.

As so often happens with BBB, it came down to the last move.  The British retook Elvina and the French ended up at the bottom of the ridge.  So, we ended with a British win, the rest of the army can evacuate and Soult has run out of troops.

A really enjoyable game and a lot of fun to get my troops on the table.  The British held firm and managed to counter-attack in style.  The French just ran out of steam and failed to make their numbers count.  As expected, the Brits held the villages and that "D" rating gave them an edge.  It was nice to see Mike's troops - there was one more battle in 2023 and I think we'll be in Spain for a while yet in the 2024 gaming season. 

Vimiero - August 1808 - refight 8 Nov 2023

 This week saw Mike and I get his Anglo-Portugal army out to take on my French at Vimiero.  

The British have to hold the village of that name and keep the road to it from Port Nova free of French.  Wellesley's task is to cover British troops landing at Port Nova, so has deployed on a ridge from the sea to Vimiero.  The French are deployed on the ridge facing Vimiero, whilst expecting a flank attack on the British left to arrive soon (decided by a couple of dice rolls).

The scenario map below shows the start positions.

Here are the troops at the start of the game.

British holding Vimiero

French holding their ridge.....   waiting for the flank march.  As the flank march did not happen till turn 3, we rattled through the early stages of the battle as neither Mike nor I wanted to move, Mike's forces on the western ridge started moving slowly.  Combat was restricted to some cannon fire to/from Vimiero.

It then gt a bit "fast and furious" once the flank march came on.  I tried a daring cavalry strike for the road whilst massing my troops for the assault on Vimiero itself.  Mike was not rolling as well as he needed to, so the Brits were not holding the French off.

My cavalry strike did not get to the objective in time, but my assault on Vimiero managed to get a toehold in Vimiero on my last turn.  Mike then riposted with an assault to drive me off and win the game.  Sadly he rolled too low in the assault and thus bounced off, leaving me in possession of what was by now a very battered village.

Glorious French artillery, supporting the final French push

The end of the game, French hold Vimiero for a draw.

Wider view - Vimiero in the middle, battered Portuguese troops behind.

All in all it was a great game.  It was really nice to get my French out and very satisfying to do better than history.  

The flank march definitely adds to the excitement of the game, as neither side knows when it will actually turn up.  Of the three infantry units on the march, only two managed to take part in combat.  

We managed to set up, play and pack up in just over 3 hours, probably helped by our decision to not move for the the first 3 turns but trade artillery fire and banter....