How To Lose A Battle In One Charge!Haynes Manual Not Included.

Wednesday 18th September.

The field of play.

Donald reminiscing.

                                          This Wednesday's Garvald Film Studio's outside broadcast found us in the sunny climes of Billsquarry,situated in the sunny ville of Bellsquarry tacked onto Livingstone participating in  an American War Of  Independence skirmish straight out of Bill's imagination.It involved a two way struggle for a bridge.Colin and Donald Adamson took charge of the British hoping to impose some order into the local inhabitants who came in the form of Continentals and militia put into the incapable hands of Bill and myself.I hadn't played these rules for a while and it showed right at the start when my lads went charging into an empty field well short of the enemy who used it too their full advantage.

"Here We Go,Here We Go,Here We Go!"

The man on the above picture.

                      After a scrumptious meal provided by Bill’s own capable hands we proceeded into the games room/garage to be confronted by a well set out game with tha Americans all ready to defend their newly stated freedom or something like that.After the sides were divvied up we rolled for initiative and in Donald’s words they “batted first”giving him the opportunity to charge forward and stop before the bridge to which he remained for most of the evening using Colin’s Hessians and Germans to do the dirty work.

My lads lined up.

The enemy -Boo Hiss!

Charging too far!

Correcting my mistake.

Colin takes advantage.

But they were seen off!

As I had said earlier I forgot the vagaries of the rules and had my lads charging in to nowhere due to a low dice roll.This gave the dastardly British the opportunity to snipe at my lads. I did think that it could be a short game but my lads knuckled down to the job in hand hoping to at least give a good account of themselves.The plan at least from my perspective was to have at least possession of one side of the bridge and hold off Donald’s half hearted advances until Bill’ reinforcements arrived to win the day.Luckily Donald’s shooting was on the pitiful side but Colin had brought his super duper purple dice and he was rolling sixes even when they weren’t required.

Bill's forces arrive at last.

And getting stuck in.

Half Time Entertainment.

                   My brigade finally manoeuvred themselves into some sort of fighting order albeit with a few hits and received Colin’s charge with the “protection “ of a wooden picket fence.It must have worked as Colin’s engaging elite Hessians were sent flying.Maybe the worm had turned-fat chance!
             

Chaos abound.

Regrouping!

Trying to hold on-note Donald's shirkers nowhere to be seen.

  My little artillery piece was becoming the target of Donald’s amourous intentions and began to lose casualties.Typical of Donald picking on the wee guy.Bill’s brigade came on at their usual two speeds-slow and very slow but at least he made Donald’s skirmishers retreat.Bill eventually followed up and went head to head with Donald’s regulars and once again it seemed as though we could pull this off.Bill forced a retreat from one of Donald’s regulars,followed them up but Bill’s other units weren’t up for supporting leaving Bill’s victorious unit isolated.

Bill goes a step to far.

And suffers!

Still trying to hold on.

But with little success.

One last push.

                Colin finally had his German’s attacking my militia on the flank having firstly made my gallant skirmishers retreat to the edge of a nearby wood and after making them retreat helped his fellow allies attack across the picket fence and do away with my unit in residence.To compensate for this I had to wheel my last unit around to try and stem the onslaught and get a precarious foothold on the bridge but this just resulted in drawing fire from all sides.It was the beginning of the end for these insurrectionists as this picked on unit decided enough was enough and melted away.This combined with the demise of Bill’s attack meant the bridge would be in the hands of the British at least for this evening.

To no avail.

End in sight,time to advance to the rear.

A score draw I think.

               Once again another great game played in the usual high spirits even when Donald kept on about the eight tape measures he had purloined from the Great Game,and couldn’t find one on the night.It was good to play a non silly game for a change.
                All figs,scenario and scenery provided by mein host Wilhem although I’m sure a few of Donald’s stragglers were around.
          Back to Second World War Hungary next week.See you when I see you!
                            Here's a link to Bill's blog for even more photos of our inadequacies.
                            http://blenheimtoberlin.blogspot.com/2019/09/28mm-black-powder-bendy-creek-1777.html