Vyazma, Nov. 3, 1812, AAR

Our last Napoleonics game was Vyazma. This battle occurred as the French retreated from Moscow. The French army was strung out and the Russians attempted to cut off Davout's Corps, the rear guard. Two days after this battle, the first snow fell. This was the last time the French army would fight as an army.

The French starting positions. There are stands of French stragglers on the road. Davout's Corps is near the top of the photo.

 

Gary, commanding Eugene's IV Corps, advanced boldly to link up with Davout. By the second turn Davout was heavily engaged by the Russian main force and Russian Cossacks and Cuirassier had appeared on the French left flank. Also by turn 2 Eugene had linked up with Davout and the rest of the French forces were moving to support Eugene.

The attacks on Davout wiped out 2/3 of his force. The Russian Heavy Cav was exhausted by French musketry. The Cossacks shot through a gap in the French line and threatened Vyazma before attacking the French right.

By the end of the game the French were able to withdraw what was left of their army, but it was battered.

Cossacks!

Russian Heavy Cavalry

Uniformology Review

My daughter gave my The Westphalian Army of the Napoleonic Wars, Uniformology Book No. 40, for Christmas. I am very pleased with it. It is a very valuable painting guide. There are very good descriptions of all infantry and cavalry uniforms with a basic history of the army as well. This booklet is 45 pages and includes 12 plates.
My friend, Jerry, and I are building the Westphalian Corps for 1809 and 1812 and this will make the task easier.
I have quite a few Osprey's and I can honestly say that the Uniformology product is now my preference when looking for a painting guide.
And they are currently on sale!

AAR. Eat Hitler a Nazi Taste Treat

I downloaded these rules from Wargamers Vault after reading about them on The Miniatures Page. The premise is that Hitler has a secret time machine and attempts to go back to 1933 to try again. He winds up in the Jurassic Age. The players control dinosaurs and who ever eats the most Nazi's is the winner.

We played two games with five players in each game. In the first, I started the carnivores too far away and the herbivores did most of the killing by walking over the Nazi's. I managed to snatch half a Nazi out of the mouth of an allosaurus for a tie.
In the second game the carnivores were among the Nazi's quicker. One of the Nazi's put a rifle shot into a herbivore which fell on him and crushed him.
Great fun, I highly recommend it!

I Remember, Veteran's Day, 2012

Below is one of my favorite articles by Ernie Pyle. It is very appropriate for Veteran' Day.

The Death of Capt. Waskow

By Ernie Pyle

AT THE FRONT LINES IN ITALY, Jan 10 (1944) (by Wireless) — In this war I have known a lot of officers who were loved and respected by the soldiers under them. But never have I crossed the trail of any man as beloved as Capt. Henry T. Waskow of Belton, Tex.
Capt. Waskow was a company commander in the 36th Division. He had been in this company since long before he left the states. He was very young, only is his middle twenties, but he carried in him a sincerity and gentleness that made people want to be guided by him.
“After my own father, he comes next,” a sergeant told me.
“He always looked after us,” a solder said. “He’d go to bat for us every time.”
* * *
I was at the foot of the mule trail the night they brought Capt. Waskow down. The moon was nearly full and you could see far up the trail, and even part way across the valley. Soldiers made shadows as they walked.
Dead men had been coming down the mountain all evening, lashed onto the backs of mules. They came belly down across the wooden backsaddle, their heads hanging down on the left side of the mule, their stiffened legs sticking awkwardly from the other side, bobbing up and down as the mule walked.
The Italian mule skinners were afraid to walk beside dead men, so Americans had to lead the mules down that night. Even the Americans were reluctant to unlash and lift off the bodies, when they got to the bottom, so an officer had to do it himself and ask others to help.
The first one came early in the morning. They slid him down from the mule, and stood him on his feet for a moment. In the half light he might have been merely a sick man standing there leaning on the other. Then they laid him on the ground in the shadow of the stone wall alongside the road.
I don’t know who that first one was. You feel small in the presence of dead men, and you don’t ask silly questions . . .
We left him there beside the road, that first one, and we all went back into the cowshed and sat on watercans or lay on the straw, waiting for the next batch of mules.
Somebody said the dead soldier had been dead for four days, and then nobody said anything more about him. We talked for an hour or more; the dead man lay all alone, outside in the shadow of the wall.
Then a soldier came into the cowshed and said there were some more bodies outside. We went out into the road. Four mules stood there in the moonlight in the road where the trail came down off the mountain. The soldiers who led them stood there waiting.
“This one is Capt. Waskow,” one of them said quickly.
Two men unlashed his body from the mule and lifted it off and laid it in the shadow beside the stone wall. Other men took the other bodies off. Finally, there were five lying end to end in a long row. You don’t cover up dead men in combat zones. They just lie there in the shadows until somebody else comes after them.
The uncertain mules moved off to their olive groves. The men in the road seemed reluctant to leave. They stood around, and gradually I could sense them moving, one by one, close to Capt. Waskow’s body. Not so much to look, I think, as to say something in finality to him and to themselves. I stood close by and I could hear.
One soldier came and looked down, and he said out loud:
“God damn it!”
Another one came, and he said, “God damn it to hell anyway!” He looked down for a few last moments and then turned and left.
Another man came. I think it was an officer. It was hard to tell officers from men in the dim light, for everybody was grimy and dirty. The man looked down into the dead captain’s face and then spoke directly to him, as tho he were alive:
“I’m sorry, old man.”
Then a solder came and stood beside the officer and bent over, and he too spoke to his dead captain, not in a whisper but awfully tender, and he said:
“I sure am sorry, sir.”
Then the first man squatted down, and he reached down and took the Captain’s hand, and he sat there for a full five minutes holding the dead hand in his own and looking intently into the dead face. And he never uttered a sound all the time he sat there.
Finally he put the hand down. He reached up and gently straightened the points of the Captain’s shirt collar, and then he sort of rearranged the tattered edges of his uniform around the wound, and then he got up and walked away down the road in the moonlight, all alone.
The rest of us went back into the cowshed, leaving the dead men lying in a line, end to end, in the shadow of the low stone wall. We lay down on the straw in the cowshed, and pretty soon we were all asleep.

---

War of 1812 Reception and New Orleans Game

This past weekend was the War of 1812 Reception at Indiana University's rare books collection, the Lilly Library. My friend, Jim, and I presented our Battle of New Orleans game as part of it.



The Lilly is a little swankier than where we normally play with food and drink available at the reception.

 

 

 Friday evening's game was the historical set up with an historical result. The players and spectators were quite impressed with the terrain and figures.
On Saturday morning we played the game again, with free set up for both sides. The Americans reversed their line, putting Jackson's "Brigade" on their left, next to the cypress swamp, correcting anticipating that the British would make their main assault there.
The British set up their artillery in front of their infantry lines and bombarded the American line before launching their attack. This allowed them to create a few holes in the American line which required Jackson to commit part of his reserve. The British attack on the US right was a pinning move which worked very well. Two British brigades hit Jackson's left flank and exhausted that command. The American artillery exhausted the British artillery, but it continued to support the attack as best it could. The British crossed the canal and threw back the US left flank. On the other end of the line, the Americans annihilated the British facing them and started to move units toward the threatened flank. Due to scheduling at the Library, we had to stop at noon. On the last turn of the game, the 44th US charged the closest British unit and routed it, sending it back and causing disorder and routs in it's path.
The game ended with the issue still in doubt. One US command was almost gone, another was exhausted and the third was still able to fight.
The British has suffered one command eliminated, another one loss from being exhausted and the last one still in the fight. We will fight this again with plenty of time and see what happens. 

New Orleans Play Test

My friend, Jim and I have been working on our New Orleans project as part of the Indiana University Lilly Library's War of 1812 Open House. We had our first play test game this afternoon. Jim and I played the US and Troy and Brady commanded the British.
We used the battalion scale version of Volley and Bayonet. I painted one unit, built the model of the Macarty House, Jackson's HQ, and created the OB; Jim created the terrain board, and painted almost all of the figures.
The game was actually close. The British crossed the American line once and almost created a three unit wide breach further down the position. The dice were in our favor and we held the line. It is definitely a tough fight for the British, but winnable.
We will run this game at Advance the Colors next Friday and then again the next Friday at the Lilly Library. Don't be surprised if you see it at Origins and GenCon next year.

The American Line, looking toward the advancing British

Another view of the American Line

Keane advances at the bottom and Gibbs at the top

The British advanced the rockets and 9 pounders and unlimbered in close range on turn 2

The first British assualt

The 5th West Indian Rgt forces it's way through the American line

The American line broken!

Gibb's first wave thrown back in confusion

The Americans counter attack and restore their line

Lambert's Bde, the British reserve, goes in

Last of the British are thrown back.

GenCon 2012 Report

I attended GenCon this year on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday; an easy 50 mile drive each day. I carpooled with my friend Craig. We gamed a lot in the past, but our schedules have prevented this for years; it was good to reconnect and catch up. It was the first time I've done more than just briefly walk through the Convention Center. It is quite impressive. My only real frame of reference is Origins, which I've attended many times. GenCon is much bigger. The vendor area is probably three times as large as the one at Origins. I walked through it each day and am still not sure that I saw everything. I did buy 8 Ospreys for $2.00 each and a very good copy of the Funken uniform book covering uniforms through history. It's in French, a language I neither speak nor read, but it has a lot of great illustrations.
There are many more folks in costume at GenCon, at times it seemed that as many as 30% of the people moving around were in costume.
I played the newly released Spartacus board game; fun game. A friend demoed the game at the con and received a copy for his effort. It will be a better game with friends as a big part of it is to hamper the other players by any means available, and we all behaved in the demo game and didn't treat anyone too poorly.
I also played a game of the new Bolt Action WW II skirmish rules. Not really my cup of tea, I'll stick to Command Decision, Battleground WW II, and Flames of War for this period.
The highlight for my gaming was a two part Borodino game using Volley and Bayonet, my favorite period and rules. Played French in both games, two victories!
On Saturday night, I played a game of Free Blades, the new fantasy rules by DGS games. It is a great system.  I will do a full review of Free Blades in a few days, but until then, I highly recommend them. I would have bought a copy, but the vendor area had closed, they only had one copy for sale at the game, and Craig bought it! I'll order a set this week. I will definitely be back next year, maybe running a few games.
Haven't posted in a long time, but I plan to be a little more involved in the blog world.