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Background

A village on the line of retreat in the North of Spain. A brave rearguard action on the part of a British half division desperately trying to hold up the advance guard of the French Corps in pursuit.

Setup

Strangely enough the British had selected a decent sized ridge to hide behind and deployed accordingly. The French deployed in two waves, with all the artillery forward in a Grand Battery. For the British deployment I think the strangest thing was perhaps the cavalry as a reserve, rather than as an attacking or threatening force. For the French deployment, the only fault (he writes modestly) was perhaps the two waves. Tactical deployment was equally unsurprising, with all the British battalions in line and all the French in column.

The Battle

The battle opened with an hour of heavy preliminary cannonade. The British certainly came off worst (it didn't help that one of their batteries, deployed back from the base line, was out of range). As the smoke and din cleared, Le Marvin's brigade was to be seen advancing briskly towards the British Line, while the British muddled through a series of parade ground like formation changes (the rather eccentric brigadier had drawn a bad order card and in an effort to stop the line marching of in the direction of the French, the formation changes were deemed the best of a bad lot). Meanwhile on the other flank artillery were simply trading shots while the infantry awaited developments. By the end of the second hour Le Marvin had assaulted the British right flank and forced it back a little. There then followed a confused melee and the British cavalry was committed, charging recklessly through their own retreating infantry to get at the French. The British line on the ridge was also threatening an attack and so it was at this point that the French reserves were committed. French infantry advanced to take the ridge with the cavalry scattering one of the British battalions. On the British far left three French battalions massed an attack on the solitary British battalion holding the end of the line. By lunch time, although the line had rallied the British were badly shaken and almost certainly in no state to fight through the hot Spanish afternoon, and a general retreat was called.

Debriefing

A modest French victory! First time out with the rules and so we probably didn't get as many turns in as we could have.

The game played well and the card order system while resulting in the occasional eccentricity did work out, and at one point we managed to do it correctly and set up a proper attack along the line. If Steve did anything wrong it was rolling badly for his brigade commanders right at the beginning (and not holding out for no preliminary cannonade!). If Colin did anything wrong it was attacking in a piecemeal fashion. Sending in Le Marvin's brigade without at least advancing the reserve to a position of support was inexcusable and could have gone badly if the British brigadier on the ridge wasn't cautious (meaning he had difficulties in putting in an attack at the best moment).

All in all a good game with a decent set of rules.

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