4th July AWI Celebration Battle : Chatterton’s Hill

Given the date yesterday it seemed appropriate to dig out the AWI collection. With a slight limit on gaming time I was looking for a smallish battle Chatterton’s Hill is a scenario straight out of the BLack Powder Rebellion book, the battle for the hill was part of the larger White Plains battle. To speed things up  we used V&F for the first time downloading the latest army lists form the Perry Website.

The American ‘Rebels’ are defensively setup on the Hill, they only have two brigades, McDougall with regular continental troops and Douglas with a much less dependable brigade of Militia. These have a low tenacity of 2 compared to the regular British infantry of 4 so they are fragile and could easily flee if the British can get to grips with them ?

The first British brigade arrives under Maitland, they have artillery setup on ‘Wolf Pit Hill’ scary for the Americans but in the end they have little effect on overall battle.

Maitland with his light troops advance on the right, Leslie’s British brigade of regulars can be seen in the distance and beyond them a Hessian brigade under Colonel Rall

As the Allies advance towards the hill the Americans rather than pulling back move up to take advantage of the various stone walls, looking to blunt the advance before the British can fully deploy.

Given the space and the numerical advantage the British really need to get stuck in and not surprisingly they chose to assault the weaker militia units holding the wall either side of the road.

 Not surprisingly the Militia unit taking the brunt of the attack turn and run, but the brigade holds and the second line pours volley fire into the advancing British.

With some pretty lucky dice, the Militia on the right hold and eventually /heroically push back the Hessian Grenadiers

Both sides throw more troops into the hand to hand fighting the militia are on the point of breaking

In the centre Maitland has crossed the river and his light troops are starting to bring fire onto the ridge. The final grenadier brigade has also now arrived and in crossing the river.

The key fight is now very British have been badly mauled with all their units shaken but the militia are thinning out and shaken as well it is only a matter of time before one side breaks !

The British light dragoons charge forward driving the American riflemen away but they come under fire from behind the walls and are shaken

After two further turns of combat the fighting is on the edge, the Militia hold and have to use a fate card to stay in the fight. In the final turn a single volley causing a single wound causes a cascade of failed valour and fortitude tests for the British, this is too much for Leslie’s Brigade which flees the field. Hoorah !

With redcoats fleeing the field and the Hessians beyond now down to a single unit the Americans have held the day. A fun battle with combats and Valour tests right on the edge for several turns. V&F worked well with the recent army lists so we will be using this again in the future. A good way to celebrate the 250 th celebration.

During the week I was also down with George to pick up our 1940 campaign. As always a beautifully setup battle with George’s WW2 collection.

Having won the last two battles this attack by the British was a harder setup (sone might say almost impossible ?)

They gave it a go but the Germans proved too strong. I’m sure George will be posting his thoughts, but fair to say we agreed the scenario wasn’t really balanced, both in terrain and the forces available. That said a fun game.

That’s it for now another battle planned for early next week.

Thanks as always for checking by ❤️

Matt

WW2 Convoy Battle

The worst/best of the heatwave now over we moved into the shed for a much anticipated Cruel Sea battle. Having played a couple of games of Cruel seas and expanding the collection last year I had planned a ‘big’ game which would use the Boats as well as some of my 6mm aircraft collection.

The German navy and aircraft would be attacking an incoming convey, the British navy supported by the RAF would attempt to fend off the assault. I was pretty ambitious with the scale of the game rather than using the aircraft rules attached to cruel seas we would be returning to our homegrown ‘aeronautics’ rules for WW2 combat. This meant we would effectively be playing two games at once but with the chance that the aircraft and ships could interact and I had worked out a way for the rules to cross over. It turned into some madness but a lot of fun.

German E boats with the Luftwaffe approach the convoy using the coast as cover

British MTB’s leave the harbour to cut them off ?

RAF Typhoons fitted with 20mm cannons arrive to take on the E boats form the sky

The convoy arrives at the top of the picture protected by (what turned out to be) a very powerful escort of 2 Fairmile patrol boats. In the foreground the E boats sweep in to launch their torpedoes

Ouch the convoy also has a US destroyer which arrives last. Their powerful 4” guns immediately cause a problem. The Fairmiles are armed with 6 pounder guns which were highly effective, but the E boats manage to lunch off a number of Torpedoes

Madness but a lot of fun , my 13 x6 foot table , ships and planes all over the place !

The MTB’s start to engage the second squad of E boats, the two es are BF 109’s after the typhoons

At this point I should say the dice gods were squarely in the British camp this day, the Germans could hardly hit a thing, the British on the other hand were dishing out the punishment, knock the one E boats rudder out causing it to crash into the friendly boat !

After several turns and a lot of German torpedoes quickly launched in the water the Destroyer and the Fairmiles gradually sink the E boats one by one ! You don’t last long in an e boat when hit by a 4” shell !

But the convoy has been distracted by the Eboats while the JU87’s gradually make their way across

In the final turns of the game their swoop down causing a lot of damage to the convoy

But probably not enough to give the Germans the win so the Royal Navy win the day ably supported by the RAF who did manage to cause some damage to at least one of the E boats

As I said a lot of fun what ever the outcome, my only real mistake was not realising how slowly the convoy would move even at full speed I should have started them in the middle of the table but forced the support to arrive from the edge….but thats for next time.

Earlier in the week I also had another game down with George this time giving his beautiful itlaian wars collection a run out.

Beautiful stuff and a pleasure to play

The Venetians has the numbers if not the quality of troops but they just about held out for a close run win

My commander before the majority of his cavalry was wiped out !

The stars also aligned for a change so I managed to get out in the hills

Striding Edge leading up onto Helvelyn a famous scramble in these parts and a lot of fun

A view from the tops looking north, a hot day and my legs are still feeling it three days later

That’s it for this week and catching up, finally a bit of painting but nothing yet finished to share.

Thanks as always for checking out my blog

Matt ❤️

The Battle for Bridge : Operation Sealion

This week we had planned to play out in the shed but the weather in a crazy twist became too hot ! So we stayed in the dungeon for a return to our Sealion campaign. The Germans are pushing inland on S-Day plus 1, having secured much of the south coast of Kent on S-Day they are driving North towards Canterbury. The direct route along the A2 has a potential pinch point at the Village of Bridge where the  Nail Bourne (river) cuts the road.

The Germans recognising the challenge have sent a small recon force who have successfully captured the bridge. The British have missed the importance of the objective, luckily the retired colonel of the Barham Yeomanry has taking things into his own hands and called all the home guard forces for the area to attempt to take back the bridge. The local population can only hope the regular British army will reach the village to support the battle before the Germans are able to get their support to the village.

Looking North up the A2 towards the Village of Bridge, a German Stuka has been called in to support the small German force.

The German recon force holding both bridges (which are the objective for the day) including motorcycle MG teams rushing up the road.

The first wave of British are the Home guard and local residents, including the mounted Barham Yeomanry. The British also have Bofor Anti-aircraft gun

A view from behind the windmill to the village of Bridge and the objective bridges on the Nail Bourne

The A2 is a very straight Roman road linking the coast to Canterbury. The advanced German infantry cross the bridge and dig in to the small white cottage by the bridge

German armoured cars push forward to hold the advancing Home guard back

The RAF enter the battle

As the battle progresses both sides begin to bring reserves on, the German rush forward in trucks

The RAD 8 takes a hit and bursts into flames blocking the road unless a heavy tank can be brought forward to push it out the way. Home guard can be seen edging along the rear of the houses but they come under fire from German machine guns dug in on the other side of the river.

British regular infantry finally starts to reach the battlefield

The spitfire swoops on the German infantry knocking out one of the trucks luckily the majority of the infantry are able to dismount unharmed

The British bring on a Matilda II whoch drives the German AC back towards the bridge

The Yeomanry gallop forward on their horses catching a German unit in the open behind the white cottage they are nearly wiped out

More German reserves are pushed forward, this Pioneer Hanomag armed with a powerful antitank weapon

The Matilda strikes and another armoured car is burning, but behind that you can see a large crater where sadly the Yeomanry were targeted by the Stuka a direct hit saw them literally wiped out !

British regulars advancing down the A2

Matilda pushes the AC off the road and prepares to rush the smaller of the two bridges, you can really see from the photos the intensity of the battle which focussed around the white cottage the British bringing more and more troops to assault it but them being driven back by the defenders.

The Matilda attempts to smash the German vehicle but fails to destroy it and they become locked on the bridge

The Germans attempt to advance on the right, but a Vickers tank has managed to take the bridge, and only the arrival of German armour will be able to drive this away

The Matilda is hit but rather than destroyed it is driven back off the bridge. The infantry behind assault the German Armoured vehicle but they too are driven back, lucky for them only move back onto the bridge.

In the meantime the spitfire has been chasing the German bomber but has been unable to knock it out. And that without anymore photos was about the end of the battle, both sides had taken massive casualties, the British did manage eventually to retake the white cottage, but with German tanks moving up the road they have limited resources to hold the village. Always fun to renew the Sealion campaign, a tough battle for both sides with a lot of infantry casualties.

Earlier in the week I also played  another  CoC game down with George

The Germans find themselves defending another wood

The British launch a cleverly planned mortar barrage which hits hard

Almost finished, the Germans fight back making it a tense and close battle but eventually the German morale breaks giving the British a fine win 👍

My Partizan loot, not too much just some bits and bobs. What I did buy secondhand was a couple of boxes containing lots of bits for a Star Fort. It was very cheap so I wasn’t too worried whether it was complete or not (I didn’t unpack it at the show) so when I got it all out back at home here is what I found.

A basic triangular shape, 10mm SYW figures shown above

This extended version with my ECW figures

A bigger version with extra bits added including the broken wall sections.

I played around a bit and it does seem to be missing some sections, and the shape seems slightly odd ? It would be easy to make a couple of extra sections, above is how it might look in the corner of the table which I guess is most likely as I wasn’t planning to play any siege battles in the near future. Food for thought anyway depending on when and how I might use it ?

That’s it for now likely more to come soon although very little progress on painting.

Thanks as always for visiting

Matt ❤️