Battle Report: Black Powder - Coa 1810

On the 24 of june 1810 General Crauford got caught with a light division between a river and Marshals Ney's corps, he had to find a way to cross the river before Ney's forces got to him and destroyed his forces.

Crauford had found a old bridge, but would he have time to check the condition of the bridge and get over before the French could destroy all his forces, he needed time to check the bridge, and get his forces over.

I commanded the French forces, and my clubmate would take on the British hat.

The forces this time around was a small light division for the British with 2 line battalions, 2 small battalions of 95th rifles, 2 Concadores, a light dragoon squadron and a horse artillery battery.

The French forces was quite a bit larger consisting of a total of 9 regular line battalions, 1 elite line battalion and 2 light battalions and finally a elite dragoon squadron.

For the scenario the British would have to send the cavalry to the bridge, spend a move there to check the bridge and report back to Crauford before any unit under his command could move from the deployment zone. After this the British would get a point for each unit that left over the bridge, and the French would loose one. The French started the game with 5 points.

The British deployment

The French deployment (half the force is of board)

The first turn saw the first French division line up facing of the British line, firing all that they could to get them to break.

The second division moved up to flank the line.

A hard shoot out in the middle

The britts sends the cavalry to check the bridge as fast as possible

After the first turn

The second turn saw the return of the cavalry to the British lines, and a continued fire fight between the two forces

After this the lines stood still for a few turns, pouring fire into each other, both sides taking some casualties but generally the French started to take the britts down, so Crauford signalled for a general retreat, staying back with the last line battalion to hold the line, but got himself cut down by French bayonets as the line started to charge.

The British line is being beaten back in disorder, but still getting to the bridge

The line battalion along with Crauford is destroyed

In the end enough units from the British side got over to give them a draw, but only the lightest units got over, so the French could claim a minor win.

The game was really close in the end, quite a lot of more or less failed orders got the French second division of to a slow and in the end - bad pursuit, I should have concentrated them to take the bridge and not tried to push them towards it. Also my cavalry didn't do much, they charged in once, got a unit quite beaten up, but as they got into square I could not destroy them and they themselves got quite beaten up by it and stood around doing next to nothing for the rest of the game.

But it was an excellent game, and I really like Black Powder, even though we forget half of the rules ;)