Battle Report - 16-Feb-2015 - Black Powder 1815 Campaign

The first set of orders in the club generated a battle between French forces under Napoleon himself (Grahame, assisted by Dan, RichN and AndyM2 ) and a Prussian force under von Zeiten (Carl, assisted by AndyM, Ash and Pippa). Battle (on a fairly densely populated 8' x 6' table) commenced (at around 3pm, 15th June, 1815) .... The Prussian brief - to give Napoleon a bloody nose, delay him and then fall back.

The French left (top right corner, nearest camera) charged and drove off a bunch of Uhlans, then advanced a brigade against the Landwehr in the village (bottom right). And were repulsed - no casualties on either side, but the defence factor of the village outdid their supports, and AndyM2 rolled dreadfully for the unit doing the attacking... and for their supports. (They were my temporary command, so I was somewhat proud of the Landwehr.)

Meanwhile over on the French left/Prussian right, the Polish Lancers and another infantry brigade got well stuck in, and started slowly forcing units back/off table.

In response on the right, I threatened the remaining French infantry that were attacking the village with my heavy dragoons, and in the best tradition of Napoleonic combined arms, swung the cavalry away and had a lot of infantry unload on them. Rubbish dice, unfortunately - they didn't break.

On the Prussian left, the Lancers kept up the pressure, aided and abetted by yet more cavalry. Back over on our right, the French made yet another attempt to take the vlllage, this time by offloading the fire of most of an infantry brigade and some horse artillery on it, coupled with a cavalry charge on the centre right. Once again, the brave Landwehr... ok, let's be fair, hid behind every available bit of timber and masonry and emerged unscathed. The French cavalry charge was met with a countercharge, which drove off the French, but sadly left my heavy Dragoons shaken, spoiling my cunning plan to force the French infantry advancing on the Prussian centre into square.

About here, Napoleon was buttonholed by his subcommanders, who apparently had a better plan than the one which had one battalion of Landwehr holding up his entire left flank (I shouldn't rub it in, but they were amazing - two entire brigades broke against the Prussian extreme right!). Sadly for us, and for his reputation, they were right. Two whole brigades of infantry smacked into the Prussian centre, and while we managed to survive for the most part, it was clear that now was the time for the Prussians to fall back.

We'll move on next month (it's a third Monday campaign).

But in the meantime, if you'll excuse me, I have the Duchess of Richmond's ball to attend.