This was one of the few games I have played where I tried to represent the opposing armies as closely as possible as they appeared on the day. As there were quite a lot of substitutes on the table it did mean looking frequently at the Order of Battle to remember who was who! However it was worth the effort and, in some respects, it did mirror events that actually took place on 16 June 1815. Anyway here are the last pics from this game.
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| Vintage Hinton Hunt 1st West Prussian Uhlans taking the role of Brunswicks. These were in my painting pile for 24 years believe it or not! The officer is a conversion. They are moving down the allied left flank. |
Brunswick Hussars (Clayton Hintons) and only 23 years on the painting waiting list!! They are also moving down the left flank.  |
| The French realise they risk being out flanked and form square |
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| Kennington 79th Cameron Highlanders move foward on the left. |
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| A Dutch General looks folornly at what is left of his front line troops but they have done their job in slowing the French advance. |
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| Dutch Militia (aka Prussian Landwehr) hold their ground |
RHA start to find their targets (Clayton Hintons)
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| The Brunswicks move further towards the French lines but have taken casualties. |
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| Dutch and Brunswicks surge forward |
Hanoverian Landwehr move up the left behind the cavalry (vintage Hinton Hunt Prussian Jagers deputising)
French Line are holding their position in the middle ground but are increasingly under pressure from Picton's Division. In the distance the Dutch Belgians have continued to hold the higher ground.
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| Vintage Hinton Light Infantry voltigeurs taking the role of 4th Light in Foy's 9th Division (I must give Stryker's HH blog credit for the creation of this unit as I was undecided how to deploy them until I saw his creation of a voltigeur regiment). |
Kennington 3rd Chevau-Leger Lanciers move forward to combat the allied cavalry
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| Vintage Hinton Saxons taking the part of 100th Line. |
And so the battle drew to a steady close with the French prevented from taking the crossroads due to the continual input of allied reinforcements. The Cuirassiers did get very close to the village but were decimated by allied artillery. The French were unable to move significantly into Bossu wood and their centre was pushed back by Picton's Division. It would have been fun to introduce the threat of d'Erlons Corps who famously marched back and forth between Ligny and Quatre Bras without firing a shot but sadly all my French figures were used up! It was a great opportunity also to use all my Dutch Belgians especially having reappraised their much maligned perfomance in 1815 after reading "Wellington's Hidden Heroes" by Veronica Baker-Smith.
What a splendid set of posts this has been. I love the Prussian uhlans!
ReplyDeleteThanks Matthew, I kept putting off painting the Uhlans because they had a lot of flash and seemed to need quite a bit of work on the bottom of their lances (they appeared to have bent and welded themselves to the body of the rider!) It transpired they weren't quite as much a challenge as it first appeared, the lances prised away relatively easily. One with a damaged lance lent itself to an officer conversion with saved flash used for a sabre. Every cloud has a silver lining!!
DeleteMore great photos and I really like the idea of using substitute units for a bigger game. The crop strips work well. Also nice to see your take on the ‘Noddy’ Voltigeurs in busbys such a colourful unit!
ReplyDeleteThanks Ian. I picked up the voltigeurs unpainted second hand in 1997, I think from John Tuckey as I remember him dictating painting instructions over the phone! I added a converted eagle bearer and drummer.
DeleteA cracking game, and with all thse lovely troops a real monster! Have you ever tried breaking battles down into smaller actions? That would help with limited troop numbers or table-size, albeit you seem pretty well endowed in those respects.
ReplyDeleteCheers Rob. As I don't get the table out too often I do tend to go for the bigger actions however Plancenoit, which I did after Quatre Bras was much smaller. I'll post that soon. I've also got a Peninsular War imaginary scenario in mind which might be a smaller affair, at first anyway!
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