The Napoleonic Wars, Black Powder, 28mm

This Black Powder game was a Peninsular War clash between the Spanish and the French. With a great sense of civitas, the game was selflessly organised and umpired by Bill Gilchrist. Just like the game the previous week, it was played in order to test out a few house tweaks to the basic Black Powder rules. The 8×6 foot table was dominated by a large ridge, held by the Spanish. The French were on the attack, combining a frontal assault with a sneaky flank attack by the bulk of the French cavalry. John Glass, Hugh Wilson and I played the Spanish, while Dougie Trail, Bill Gilchrist and Brian Phillips commanded the French. The hapless Spaniards were rated as “unreliable”, while a Portuguese brigade supporting them and the entire French army were rated normally. The Spanish also suffered from reduced morale and melee values, and poor quality cavalry.The Battle of Gebora was fought out between Marshal Soult’s French Army of the South and a Spanish army commanded by General Mendizabel. The Spanish army deployed on the San Cristobal heights outside Badajoz, and on 18th February Soult drove them from the field by combining a frontal assault with an outflanking manoeuvre by cavalry. It was rather a one-sided battle, as the Spanish were pretty easily rolled up by Soult’s veterans. This refight gave us a chance to change history and to test out the new-look rules, with Bill’s amendments. The French began the battle by launching an all-out assault on the heights, with the right wing leading the assault, followed in echelon by the centre and then the left wing. On the far left the French light cavalry brigade launched an immediate assault against their Spanish counterparts, and within a couple of turns the 2nd Hussars had swept their opponents from the field. This forced the Portuguese brigade propping up the French right onto the defensive. This was just as well, as elsewhere on the field things weren’t going according to the script – the Spanish infantry held their ground, and broke four French assault columns through small arms and artillery fire.This more or less stalled the French assault, and they milled around, reforming and generally licking their wounds. it was almost as if they were waiting for something. Sure enough, that something duly appeared in the shape of a brigade of dragoons. Having marched around the left flank of the Spanish army, they fell on their left rear, charging up the back of the ridge to fall on the Spaniards, who were taken completely by surprise.Within two turns six Spanish battalions had been broken, and the tide of battle turned for the French, who duly renewed their infantry assault to claim the ridge, as what remained of the Spanish army fled the field, covered on their right by the slightly more professional Portuguese.This game though, was fought to test out a few changes to the rules. the consensus was that these improved the basic Black Powder rules, as it made the sequence of play a little more sensible. Before, units could make three march moves across the tabletop, and then fire on the enemy who weren’t able to reply. That problem was neatly solved by putting the firing phase before the movement one. Click here for more details of the amendments.

Tags: Black Powder