Raid on St. Michel - Game 5 - "Heading Home" - the battle (Part 1)..

I'm way overdue posting this as the game mostly took place the night before Warfare (which is a few weeks ago now). I say mostly because we never managed to finish it on the night and I wanted to do that before I put up the game report...

So to start the set up was described here [clicky] - yikes - that was January!

Suffice to say that this was the forgotten game of the five that make up the mini campaign (see left) and I still have no idea how we managed to do that.. If you select the "St. Michel" label to the left (just under the picture of the Hanomag's), or click here, you'll get taken to the series as whole (in reverse order so start at the bottom) where, if you wish, you can refresh your memory on events leading to this final game... game four was 2 years ago - yee gods where does the time go?!!

Orders of Battle:

My calculations were slightly off in the set up post and I also made some changes to allow the French a slightly better chance at making a good game in the face of what looks like a fairly significant British force, so the orders of battle ended up as follows:

Summary of changes from set up post:

• I added a militia regiment (ie. reduced morale) just to add a little bulk to the French force which was quite small in comparison to the British force
• There was a half squadron of heavy cavalry - I disbanded them and spread the strength points among the other cavalry units to bring them up to full strength... 

Next the British:

Summary of changes from set up post:

• I disbanded Rechteren and Ingoldsby's and distributed the strength points among the other infantry regiments - I took the decision to make two of them 6 strength as that would make them considerably more "sticky" in morale terms - important for assaults which tend to be bloody
• There was a half squadron of heavy cavalry -  I bought them up to full strength on an arbitrary whim as DG was very low on cavalry.. and to be honest still was even after I'd done that!

...and so on to..

The Game

So the objective of the game is for the British to get their loot (carried in 3 carts) over the bridge on the left, and off the table edge...  the French in the meanwhile, heavily outnumbered are going to do their damnedest to stop them - and being in defence have something of an advantage..

As the French I had no plans to assault or go offensive, except to support my primary aim which was a defensive one....  OK.. if I saw a chance to finish off a damaged unit I would attack but otherwise the name of the game was "wait and see"...

Move 1

Start of game (picture above - click any of the pictures for a bigger view) and the French (me) have deployed conservatively - two regiments of foot in camp, with the remaining two in the village...  like bee's to honey the artillery had deployed on the high ground..

I deployed my cavalry on the far right flank as that would be where my cavalry shadowing force would arrive giving them an opportunity to act in unison...  it was also a fairly open terrain, the corn fields block line of sight but there is no terrain/firing modifier. In the far distance behind the yellow tape, the British vanguard has entered...

Also move 1

Same turn but a different view (picture above) - this time from the camp to the right of the river in the first picture - my other artillery piece is limbered far left - both regiments in camp are regulars...  in the village the regiment in the second line are those militia...

Move 5

Move 5 things have started to develop - on the right the first of my cavalry shadowing force have started to arrive - one of my regiments from the camp is crossing the bridge, the second artillery piece is about to deploy on a low hill to help with line of sight - lots of British arrivals in what was to be a bit of a headache for DG; loads of troops and nowhere to deploy them outside of artillery range (which in my case was to about that lone fir tree by the church hill....)

Move 12

Move 12 (note the use of the dice in the picture to tell me the turn number so I don't forget when I'm looking at the pictures after the game! )

The cavalry have deployed and two of the squadrons have advanced across the central corn field, as that regiment to their front has taken some significant damage from my artillery in the centre, and I saw a chance of seeing them off for good...  no such luck - damaged as they were they still saw off both squadrons - an expensive mistake...

In the village - the single base by the house indicates that the house is occupied by the regiment previously seen crossing the bridge - I intend to make it a strong point ......

Move 17

Move 17

At approx 10 minutes real time per game move this is the position roughly 3 hours into the battle,  and we are really going hammer and tongs now....

• My medium cavalry has been roughly handled; centre right you can see two separate squadrons in disaray either because of failed formation change or failed morale. 
• In the centre I have limbered the artillery and am in the process of moving them to the left flank of the infantry manning the hedge to provide some close support for what I know is coming...
• My cuirrasiers can be seen in column heading between house and bridge where they subsequently covered themselves in glory...
• DG's infantry are getting pounded by two sources - the artillery on the left in particular had relocated due to the arrival of  DG's own artillery, but had found itself in an ideal position to pound anything moving down the open side of the corn field  in this case the Scots of Orkney's Regiment. They are also taking damage from the "strong point"....

In the next move Orkney's failed their morale check and routed, but where then charged by those cuirrasiers - in the subsequent test they surrender!

....and there we left it on the night - we're hoping to finish this via Skype if we can get our acts together!