Beneath the Lily Banners 2 - A test game.....at last!!

La Couronne

 As some of you may know I've been painting up an Allied army for a Nine Years War game, while my pal Richard has been painting up the French. We finally had enough troops to play  what we thought was small test game a couple of evenings ago. It was great to finally get a game under our belts and to test the rules out. Richard set his force up and I mirrored his deployment, we kept the scenery to a minimum just for ease. Rich has had a few small test games on his own and made up a deployment and movement sheet instead of using the movement markers as per the rules, this worked quite well as you didn't know what your opponent was up to.

 William's centre and left

 The extreme French right, with the elite class Picardie regt on the far left.

The French deployment - Richard had 2 brigade of infantry with three regts in each, and 2 brigades of horse with four squadrons in each. We picked 1 infantry and 1 horse (both squadrons) to be an elite regt, he chose inf regt Picardie on the extreme left of the pic and the Mounted Grenadiers of the Guard, (i think I got the name right), which is at the back on the far right. We also had to pick 1 regt to be raw, I never found out his raw regiment!!

End of turn 1. My elite regts were the 1st Guards, which are in the front line third up from the bottom and the Dutch Guard te Paard were my elite horse, don't strain your eyes but they're  the two squadrons in blue in front of the mysterious green mountain, otherwise known as a tape measure.

In the initial setup we both threw for our commander ability, Richard was Skilful while I was Competent, I did originally throw a Plodder, but we changed it so we could have a reasonably balanced game. 

The Allies advance to the farm, while the French hide behind the hedge (and Fran was nowhere to be seen, sorry an in-group joke!!)

Richard's lovely painted horse advancing. 

Princess Anne's Horse, the Guard te Paard and in the background
Waldeck's  Horse all advance

Another shot of the French Horse.

I threw well here and could move all my troops, so boldly charged two squadrons onto the French Horse, who I believe were the Musketeers of the Guard Royal Eccosse. (Rich has painted a lot of guard!!)

French Infantry Second  battalion  - One of these must be the raw unit??

After my perhaps over confident charge, Rich moved a Horse unit ready to move in to attack if his
Scots  Horse survived the Guards charge.

And here's a close up.

Another close up, as above only I smashed Richard's horse,  he countercharged both his units but  this one failed to move the 3 inches needed to gain the charge bonus, (he he!) So I wiped his unit out to the man and captured his colours. I took 2 casualties. We were a little unsure what my regt would do now?? Having destroyed the unit, I was now in a strange position, after consulting the rules we were still unsure, so we decided that my unit would pursue forward in a straight line rather than stand or take the ground, I'll have to email Barry Hilton, for his views on the situation.

The French did move over the 3 inches in the other melee above and kicked my butt bigtime
and this was the result, Previously the 2nd Princess Ann'e Squadron was forced back after taking
casualties from artillery fire, it was then joined by the 1st squadron, who lost the melee.

An overall pic of the battlefield.

My left of the battle field. Richard threw well in the movement...I didn't!! Mt raw unit can be seen
at the bottom of the photo -The Scots Fuzillers.

The middle and right of the above pic, I've manoeuvred inf regt Prince George of Heesen-Darmstadt, to get a fire on the  Royal Eccosse Horse who are in forced pursuit.

The right of the field, the second Guard te Paard and the 2nd Royal Eccosse have charged
 each other, the +6 dice for the French Horse is a real killer!!!

An overall pic at the end of the game

Light faded and the enemy broke of for tea and crumpets.

We both really enjoyed the game, hopefully very soon we'll have another bash!! We both realised that the what we thought was a small game wasn't. The first 3 turns wizzes along, but once melee ensued it slowed down quite a bit. There were several things (like I already mentioned) that we were unclear of, Richard wrote some questions down to send to the League of Augsberg Fighting Talk forum, unfortunately, I left them at Richards, he said he'll join up the forum and put the questions to Barry and the other guys from the site. So hopefully we'll clear them things up before the next game.
Cheers
Ray 

Recently Painted No 35 Russian Litovski Lifeguard 1812

 "The French blasted canister at us and then their cuirassiers charged. Our battalions were formed in squares, and they surrounded us on all sides. We allowed them to come closer and then fired at 50 paces, killing and wounding many of them. We shouted Urrahhh! and charged the cavalry with bayonets. The [French] cuirassiers fled." (- an officer of Lithuanian Lifeguard Regiment) 

The 1st, 2nd and 3rd Battalions

Trying to find info about the three battalions of The Litovski (Lithuanian) Lifeguard proved to be damned difficult I can tell you. So I'll firstly explain the figures are from Essex and are part of Posties fine collection painted by myself a couple of months back. 

I did find out that they were in the,

5th Infantry (Reserve) Corps, commanded by H.M. Grand Duke Constantine

Guard Infantry Division: Major General Ermolov, on 12 July 1812 appointed as Head of Staff of the 1st Western army. He was replaced by General Lieutenant Lavrov

1st Brigade: Major General Baron Rosen

 Preobrazhenski Lifeguard Regiment (3)

Semyenovskyi Lifeguard Regiment (3)

2nd Brigade: Colonel Udom

Ismailov Lifeguard Regiment (3)

Lithuanian Lifeguard Infantry Regiment (3)

3rd Brigade: Colonel Bistrom III

Lifeguard Jager Regiment (3)

Finland Lifeguard Regiment (3)

Guard Artillery Equipage

2 Guard Position Batteries

2 Guard Light Batteries

2 Guard Horse Batteries

The 1st

The 2nd

The 3rd

Lastly a quote from Officer Udom

 “… the Lifeguard Lithuanian Regiment was sent to the Second Western Army of General of Infantry Prince Bagration near the village [of Semeyonovskoie] … On regiment's arrival to this site, the enemy made a strong attack on our battery and, upon being informed by Artillery Colonel Taube, I led the II Battalion of the regiment and drove the enemy back, which, however, was soon reinforced and compelled our entire line to retreat for 50 paces. The enemy showered us with cannonballs and canister and attacked with cavalry. My three battalions were arranged in squares awaiting cavalry and despite being surrounded by a superior enemy, they met him gallantly.
They allowed the French [cavalry] to approach to close range before delivering a battalion volley, and, yelling 'Hurrah!'; they drove the enemy, inflicting heavy losses. Our soldiers were so incensed that no prisoners were taken. We lost no wounded on that occasion. The enemy … made a second attack on the regiment, but was met with equal courage and fled to the right, while the height was occupied by the enemy skirmishers. To counter them, I dispatched … the II Battalion to drive the enemy back and capture the heights. Although this was accomplished with considerable success, the enemy was reinforced with several columns in this direction and supported the skirmishers, which made it impossible for my regiment to capture the heights. … I was wounded in the right hand by a bullet. So the regiment was left in the hands of Lt. Col. Schwartz, … [he] charged with the I Battalion to the mentioned heights and, having sent out skirmishers, he captured it. Both sides suffered heavy casualties ... The enemy, meantime, was reinforced again.
My regiment had lost too many people by now and on the order of General Vasilchikov … the regiment retreated, fighting back, to the woods, where it dispatched skirmishers for cover and then joined a battalion of the Lifeguard Izmailovsk Regiment. … In this battle, the regiment had 143 NCOs, 53 musicians, 1,543 privates, 1 non-combatant. The regiment lost up to 400 killed and about 443 wounded, with 130 missing in action. “

 Udom to Lavrov, 31 August -12 Sept 1812 Borodino

Recently Painted No 34 Arggh!! The Pirates are a comin'

Throughout history, there have been people willing to rob others transporting goods on the water. Thousands of pirates were active from 1650–1720. These years are sometimes known as a 'Golden Age' of piracy. Famous pirates from this period include Blackbeard (Edward Teach), Henry Morgan, William 'Captain' Kidd, 'Calico' Jack Rackham and Bartholomew Roberts.

In the 17th century, buccaneers lived on the Caribbean island of Hispaniola and its tiny turtle-shaped neighbour, Tortuga. At first, they lived as hunters, and shot wild pigs with their long-barrelled muskets. Their name came from the special wooden huts called boucans where they smoked their meat.

Later, the governors of Caribbean islands such as Jamaica paid the buccaneers to attack Spanish treasure ships and ports. Some of the largest scale raids were led by the Welsh captain, Sir Henry Morgan. Although raids began in this way, with official backing, the buccaneers gradually became more and more out of control, eventually attacking any ship they thought carried valuable cargo, whether it belonged to an enemy country or not. The buccaneers had become true pirates.

These blagards were paint'd by meself, from Peter Pigs range of minis, I raised the banners from Warflag, choosin a pretty little number for each unit,  they be painted for me hearty Postie, who's got a great looking ship for 'em to sail the seven seas in. But 'es gonna use'um for priviteers to fight the darstadly English for the War of 1812, as e says they did fight at The Battle of New Orleans in 1815, commanded by Jean Lafitte and his older brother Pierre!!! And yes.... I will keep on taking the tablets????

Ray

Jean and Pierre Lafitte

Recently Painted No 33 French Napoleonic Generals

After the horde of Russian infantry I painted up for Postie, he very kindly gave me more Napoleonics to paint up!! This time the figures were French Generals and an assorted bunch of leftover figures that I had to paint up in various French uniforms, basically to use as Aid de Camps. They took ages to paint up, as each figure was a separate unit. However they were fun to paint instead of all that rotten Russian green!!!! Most of the figures are from Essex, with the odd AB or Old Glory (I think).
Also I've just been gluing up some of the 18th century wagons I bought at Salute, Mr Magister Militum has got his own back on me after I nearly tramples him to death on Sunday. One of the wagon packs I bought has the wrong wheels, solid not spoked, its not the end of the world, I'm sure they would still have been found in America during the FIW, but its not what I wanted..............anyway back to the painting!!!!

Ray

SELWG 2011 - The Rejects on tour

 Central London Wargames Group

Three of the Rejects myself, Fran and Postie travelled up the A2 and on into London for their annual visit to SELWG at Crystal Palace on Sunday, there we met another two Rejects Big Lee and Richard with his young lad Thomas in tow. We all spent too much money as per usual!! I needed to restock my paints so spent most of my money on paint, I was a little alarmed as to the price of Vallejo paint nowadays, £1.75 a bottle, I realise companies have over heads and all that, but that's just taking the pi$$. I also had a chat with Simon from Parkfield Miniatures about his up and coming War of the Liberators figures, I must say I'm very tempted they look very, very nice!! I also bought 6 different wagons and baggage from Magister Militum for my 15mm FIW project, and then as we were leaving proceeded to knock the owner over!!! I was carrying a massive box of The Last Valley items, trees and whatnots for the invalid Postie and I just didn't see him crouched down on the floor and walked striaght into him! he was damn lucky I didn't squash him and end up sprawled ontop of him....poor chap!!
There were some awesome looking games on show, Unfortunately some idiot didn't check the batteries on his camera, so he, meaning ME!! only got a few photo's of a few games, luckily BigLee had 2 spare batteries which enabled me to take a few more pics before they ran out as well.
I think the best looking game was from Shepway Wargames - Polska Walczaga (Poland Fights) scenario, unfortunatly my camera was dead by then, but take a look at Lee and Fran's blogs they must have some pics!!

Here's a few photos from the show

Ray

Let me innnnn!!!!

Loughton Strike Force's Magnificent WWII game

The Fight for Henry House Hill by Newbury & Reading Wargames Society

 Apologies but I think this is Central London Wargames Group WWI Dogfight game, the                        planes in the first picture are there's too.

Bloody Lane, the Battle of Antietam, 17th September 1862 by South London Warlords

Mid Anglia Gamers - ACW Naval

"Don't feed the Bears"

BigLee & Fran

 Malbrough s'en va-ta-en Guerre, by Steatham & Tooting Wargamers 

 The GLC Gamers Club - The Battle of Chickamagua

 Kingdom of Heaven, Battles in the Near East, 1183-1187 

 The Tunbridge Wells Wargames Society

Essex Warriors - Yom Kippur War1973