Tuesday 24 April 2012

The Battle of Lecinena

A fictitious battle of December 23rd, 1808 during the peninsular campaign. Two Brigades of French men and Bavarians under General Jean-Antoine Verdier, Brigadier Raymond Dubreton and Colonel Ludwig von Brandenburg have been sent south fresh from France to join the other French and Polish forces besieging the Spanish stronghold of Saragossa. However on their march down along the Saragossa road they are confronted by a Brigade of Englishmen and Scots entrenched in the town of Lecinena.
After our last game of black powder all those Tuesdays ago, my Napoleonic opponent had decided to get himself some Italeri Redcoats and highlanders for black powder. Thirty emails later and we had our armylists up and ready for what promised to be a great battle. The idea was that the French were heading to the second siege of Saragossa when they had been faced with the British held village of Lecinena. The British force was outnumbered three to two but they had the advantage of being deployed inside or in front of the building complex.
The models are a mixture of Italeri and Airfix (my general is front rank actually), the buildings are airfix and the ruins and rocks are citadel. We were using Black powder rules, which I have to say are by far the best for the 1700- 1914 period.

The British order of Battle
General cuts
Brigadier Fitsmashel
Brigadier sir Geoffrey Barck
54th west Norfolk Regiment (1 company)
65th (2nd Yorkshire North Riding) Regiment (1 company)
42nd Highland (black watch) Regiment (2 companies)
Hanoverian skirmishers (1 section)
The Royal artillery (1 cannon)
The French order of Battle
General Jean-Antoine Verdier. The hero of the successful first siege of Saragossa, Jean has now returned to aid General Bon-Adrien Jeannot de Moncey in his second siege of the Spanish city.
Brigadier Raymond Dubreton
Colonel Ludwig von Brandenburg. A Prussian member of Napoleon's staff and veteran of the wars of Bavarian succession, Austrian succession, the Jacobite rebellion, the seven years war, the American war of Independence and the wars of first, second and third coalitions, Ludwig is now approaching his 81st Birthday.
Old guard chasseurs (2 companies)
1st company, 8th fusiliers (1 company)
4th company, 8th fusiliers (1 company)
Bavarian Landwehr (1 company)
Regimental Artillery Company (3 cannons)
 The British stood strong and resolute in front of the town of Lecinena, two companies of the 42nd arranged in attack column and  one company of the 65th arranged in Line with their Brigadier, sir Geoffrey, strutting up and down behind them along the front of Lecinena's walls.

 To the North the East they could see the French and Bavarians coming on in their characteristic massed attack columns, supported by three atillery pieces. The German Landwehr took made up the centre of the French line with the 1st and 4th companies of the 8th Fusilier regiment to their flanks and the Old guard to the flanks of them.

 As the French were still arranging their formations the hotheaded highlanders, with fixed bayonets, charged headlong for the French right. Their orders from Brigadier Fitsmashel had been to advance, but they threw themselves forward at double pace. However unluckily for the plucky Scots their charge did not quite make the ranks of the French, who were aiming their muskets in await for the order to fire.

The French line then broke ranks as it advanced on Lecinena. The left flank rushed towards the town gates, with the 1st company of Fusiliers charging straight into the 65th Yorkshires whilst the Old guard marched on the town gates. Colonel Von Brandenburg then sent the order for the 4th to form a line in the face of the highland charge, the French artillery then manoeuvred to face the highlanders using the line for cover. After all this had been done the Old guard counter charged straight into one of the highlander companies.
The French then opened up on the highlanders. The line opened fire and was followed by a close range bombardment from the French artillery before the very last breath less highlanders were cut down by the Bavarian muskets. The black watch centre company had been cut down to a man by the massed fire from the French. However the flank company struck out at the old guard in combat and shook their spirit, but these veterans of the very finest battles of France's history would not be broken that easily and being reminded of this by their resolute general as they fled; the guard reformed themselves behind the fusilier line.

 Things were not looking good for the British Garrison as the Old guard finally broke down the town gates and thundered in to the courtyard to come face to face with General Cuts who was sitting on his horse. But these guardsmen were alone and the 42nd seemed to have done a good job of holding up the rest of the French line.
The 65th Yorks were also doing spiffingly, as they shook the morale of the 1st fusilier company to only light casualties. Behind them Sir Geoffrey stood, his upper lip as stiff as ever.

One of Fitsmashel's, incredibly incompetent, aide de camps was then dispatched to the remaining highlanders. The foolish man seemed to have the idea that the 42nd had been ordered to make a complicated flanking action rather than charge the French fusiliers as Fitsmashel had intended, so not wanting to disobey orders the Highlander attack column went marching off northerly.
One of the French guns then fired off at an incredibly close range into the highland flank, and the brave Scots went running for the hills.
Seeing that the Old guard would now be marching straight for a fortified artillery position, Von Brandenburg decided to grace the veterans with his presence on their march towards the guns, so hurling himself right into danger's way the Prussian joined their ranks.
However to contrast such courage as this was some much less plucky Germans in the form of the Bavarian Landwehr who simply refused to march any closer to the Town walls, even with the threats of court marshal being yelled out by Verdier. The French artillery seemed to be following the example of the Bavarians and had started to sit down on and around their guns and light their pipes and unwrap their lunch much to the fury of Brigadier Dubreton!
But in the face of this subordination the old guard were standing bravely in the Lecinena courtyard, taking the shots from the Redcoats like men and waiting for the orders from the Brigadier that would never come (he was far to busy yelling his head off at the artillery crews!).

 It wasn't long for the lack of support from the Artillery and Bavarians started to show and the 1st company of Fusiliers fled the field after a spirited attempt to brake the Yorkshire men, who had put up  an equally vigorous resistance in the face of the stronger opponent! The 54th Norfolk and the Hanoverians then opened up with all muskets blazing on the old guardsmen arrayed as though for parade in the courtyard of Lecinena. But the Guards stood and took the casualties like men.
This fusillade was followed by some equally vigorous fire from the royal artillery and the remaining Norfolkmen upon the other old guard, which shook their spirit considerably, but under the inspiring presence of the Colonel they kept up their march!

Raymond Dubreton then drew his sword and started beating at the crewmen with the flat of it! They hurriedly put out their pipes and packed away their lunch under the encouraging whacks from their Brigadier, before manhandling their artillery into forward positions. However General Verdier was still not having much luck with the Landwehr as some of them started to unpack their baggage and soon a vague chattering started up amongst the ranks.
The 4th company then formed a line and advanced to within a couple of metres of the redcoats, before opening fire all along the line with supporting bombardment from the French artillery. Once the smoke cleared every last Yorkshire man could be seen dead on the ground with Sir Barck standing pinned against the wall, facing off on his own against the French firing line.

Having been severely shaken by the Royal artillery's firing colonel Ludwig advanced towards Lecinena and called out "rally to me!", at this command the old guard formed up around the Prussian and he made his inspiring speech about French supremacy, the American war of Independence and Austerlitz which greatly cheered them.

 Seeing the French fusiliers fixing their bayonets Sir Geoffrey darted for the town gates, but as he dived through them there was a sudden blast of musket fire and the final old guardsmen (whom he had almost fallen over in his hurry to reach safety) fell to the floor, the entire comany slaughtered to a man.
He then quickly darted inside the nearest building at the very moment that the French fusiliers broke in, some men charging through the gates while others hurled themselves over the town walls into the courtyard where they opened fire on the Hanoverian skirmishers in their position.
The Bavarians now got up and advanced on the town, moving up to the wall of the building where the Norfolkmen were sheltering and firing their muskets in through the windows. Beside them the old guard, with Ludwig in their ranks, moved up to the wall and began to shoot on the artillery but the crewmen continued loading even under such close fire and with one last blast of their cannon they broke the spirit of the old guard and no matter how many stories about the american war of independence Ludwig could remember they would not return to the fight.

 This was the tipping point and as the Norfolk men and Hanoverians prepared themselves for the clash. The French men and Bavarians were fixing bayonets, the order to charge was given. General Verdier lept into the frey followed by Brigadier Dubreton, the two commander's were willing to risk their lives in the melee at this stage as they knew that their men would not continue the assualt on Lecinena if they did not shift the British with this last charge... and truth to tell they didn't. The Bavarians broke on the Norfolk men and fled the field followed by Verdier, while the Fusiliers retired in good order much dispirited at their failure to dislodge the Hanoverian skirmishers.

 Verdier went back Eastwards to the hills and marched North before arriving at Saragossa on the 1st of March, almost a week after the French had taken the city.
The British stand at Lecinena was a brave and triumphant one and it delayed the course of the siege for a month or two, however the city fell and its defeated Spaniard defenders were evicted by the French.
(this is all fictitious)

It was a great game, it definitely looked brilliant especially as we just played it on a small table in the sports centre cafe! What a difference three trees two clumps of rocks and a farm house make to a table.
We had both put in a great amount of work on our forces (my apologies for the unpainted Yorkshire men, Hanoverians, half the highlanders and Royal Artillerymen, they were from my own collection and I had not had time to paint them before this game. My opponet had put in a great deal of work on his own collection however) and they looked great.
Look out for more black powder and Napoleonic games!

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