Games Day 10th March

We played a Franco-Prussian War battle using the Fire and Furia Francese amendments for Fire and Fury (produced by the Wyre Forest Wargamers).

It pitted 3 Prussian Corps against the equivalent of two French ones. The battlefield is shown here, with the initial French units deployed. 

The Prussian objectives were to maintain control of the bridges across the river and seize the road junction at the French table edge. The French had a choice either to Attack, in which case the objectives were the bridges, or to Defend, where the objective was to hold the road exit. If the chose the latter then and units from the off-table reserve that was destroyed, would count against their victory point total. After a brief debate, the French commanders decided to defend.

The Germans decided to ignore the defended hill in the middle of the table and instead threw all their strength up the flanks in a pincer attack. On the right the attack followed the course of the road, whilst on the left the commander made a feint up the road whilst the bulk of his units advanced behind the wood.

On the right it was a hard fought struggle, with one French regiment heroically holding back an entire Prussian division for a time. A French counter attack broke the first line of Prussians and temporarily held them back, but numbers (and massed artillery) began to tell. The first reserve division was brought up to plug the gaps on the French left flank.

On the other side of the battle the Prussian feint suffered heavy casualties but succeeded in holding the French defenders in place whilst the flanking divisions slowly advanced. Reluctantly, the final French  reserve (a division of the Imperial Guard) was brought on and rushed out onto the extreme right flank to block the Prussian flanking attack.

The Guard fought well, destroying the leading German regiments, over-running their artillery and sending the rest reeling back with a bloody nose. But despite this success, it meant that they were effectively taken out of the more important action around the objective road junction. 

With their front division in tatters, the French reserve fought a fighting retreat to the junction, losing two regiments in the process, but just clinging on until nightfall. It was a French victory, by the skin of their teeth, another hour of playing time would have almost certainly seen an overwhelming Prussian victory. 

                          The Prussian Right Flank advance, that's a lot of artillery on that road. (Unfortunately I printed most of the Prussian unit cards upside down!)

                                               Getting their feet wet in the process

 

Over-running a unit of chasseurs

The heroic French regiment holds off yet another attack

                                                            The left flanking attack begins

                                                           With more wet feet

                                The French guard advance to stem the Prussian flank attack

         On the Right flank the massed Prussian units finally destroy a valiant French defender

                                 The final French rearguard prepare to hold back the German masses

The other game was an impressive 6mm refight of Borodino using Black Powder.