Battle of Germantown October 1777 Part 1 : The fight for the Chew House

Back to our AWI campaign yesterday with the first part of the battle of Germantown. Given the rules we are using and the challenges of remote gaming I felt it sensible to split Germantown into two smaller battles and I was keen to see if we could have a skirmish focussing just in the fight for the Chew House.

A painting of the fighting around the Chew house.

The overview of the battle histprically. This part ‘one’ would effectively cover the highlighted area.

A second map of the battle from a wargame scenario perspective. The battle for the Chew is quite hard to balance as the British really are completely outnumbered. So the scenario sees a delaying action by the British with units of Pickets and the Light battalion trying to inflict as much damage as possible before the 40th Foot with Colonel Thomas Musgrave will try to hold the house. We had a number of specific scenario details. The battle starts in fog so range is limited until the fog lifts. We extended the movement rates for the first few turns as with R&P it could take a long time to get to the House itself. The British are all veterans. The Americans fire cant effect the troops in the house itself, effectively this reflects history as  even though they brought up cannons they had no impact. We also had a slightly amended combat result so the British even if they lost a combat wouldn’t flee the house until they actually failed a test. Col Musgrave who is in the house would also provide a plus 2 leadership, making the 40th Foot pretty tough to shift.

Our setup at the start of the battle

General Sullivan with his force march through the fog up the main Germantown road.

With an early lifting of the fog the British pickets open fire and start to pull back. They have little effect but the British light infantry use their First fire to knock the leading skirmishers back, the Americans are pushing forward their artillery along the road. Sullivan is slow to get moving.

Quickly the Americans drive forward and a sharp fight occurs around the church

The Americans are able to open up with their light cannons and this cause a real problem for the British light infantry

After an initial wobble the external portion of the 40th move forward to contest the advance knowing that every casualty caused before the Americans reach the house will help.

Ouch despite the fog lifting some Americans friendly fire into the rear of their own infantry. Sullivan is lucky the damage is not too great

The pickets are pretty much wiped out now, but the British infantry outside the house open up, they will be a tougher nut to crack

On the American right, the British light infantry are still holding just and causing casualties 

The 40th form into line they are not going to give ground !

Some tough fighting across the front, as you can see the British defenders are almost lost, but just clinging on, every minute will count

Finally the external defenders are driven back and Sullivan advances towards the House knowing that it can only be taken in hand to hand combat.

The Americans surround the house and charge in…….

Given that Musgrave had been given a key role in the defence with a 2 plus leadership, I was not too happy when in the first round of combat, with only one casualty caused Musgrave was killed ! Suddenly it was far more likely the British would fail a morale check and be forced to withdraw.

The Americans charge in again and again are driven back …..

But with Musgrave dead the inevitable happens and the British defenders finally fail a morale check forcing them to flee the building…. An American win arrghhhhhh

So despite the casualties a win for the Americans as they have forced the house, musgrave’s leadership might have made all the difference, but he died a hero much too early in the fighting. A fun battle full of twists and turns and challenge for both sides. Everything worked well and balanced apart from the Colonels untimely death. Were we to replay I might reduce this risk and give the occupants in the house the 2 plus so they can’t lose it so quickly. Nice of course to get my Chew house on the table 🙂

Next up I have been thinking about terrain for my Greek/Italian 1940 project. Much of the fighting took place in the mountains and in winter in quite desolate areas. Specifically I felt I needed more rocky terrain and more winter-looking trees. First up the trees…..

I picked up a packet of these railway type trees off eBay

These were then stuck to heavier bases to make them more stable and painted before I set about twisting the branches into suitable shapes, I then cover the base in some leaf type debris which I had in my terrain box.

The results are quite pleasing and give a sense of ‘winter’ trees obviously these can be used in other theatres eg the ACW when we fight battles in winter. I didn’t want snow as this makes them just a little too specific. In total I have about 20 of these and plan to make the  other slightly smaller trees into olive/fruit trees as I need some more of these.

As a final thought I put some autumn type lichen on the armatures and I guess they could also be used like this?

Well that’s it for now, we played a CoC battle down at George’s this morning but I’ll let him tell the tale before I share a couple of photos.

Thanks as always for passing through, you are most welcome

Matt ❤️

Battle of Paoli September 1777 : plus lots of other stuff

I seem to be busy on other stuff so posting less often which means a bumper catch-up this week.

First up the next instalment of our AWI campaign, after the battle of the clouds General Wayne has pulled back his force. They are encamped in a wooded area close to the Warren Tavern in Chester county. The British under General Grey carry out a night attack. Historically this was a chaotic engagement in which the British were accused of carrying out some brutal murders of surrendering troops, giving rise to the name of the battle the Massacre of Paoli.

This map gives the overall position of the British advance

A more fun period map of the engagement

Our scenario once again for R&P starts at the point when the British have driven off the Northern pickets, so the alarm has been raised and the Americans have formed up to escape. The American still have three pickets to the south as shown. The Americans must try and get 50% or more of their army off the table to the left. All ranges reduced to 12” as it is dark. Part form their skirmishers and light troops the British, will have to stop and load as they went into the combat with unloaded muskets to avoid alarming the Americans. The British are veterans and aggressive as they have their bayonets already fixed . The cannon blocking the exit in the fence must be activated on a reducing D6 to open the gap (this blockage occurred historically causing some of the American confusion). To give some variety the British will arrive randomly from the three location shown rather than all in the centre.

The alarm raised in the camp as the meridians prepare to exit left ?

The British flood on and their light infantry chose to open fire, other infantry moves forward to assault the stragglers in the camp

Some of the american pickets are brought back to try and hold the British advance, the cannon is starting to move after turn 3, but some of the Americans in the rear are now isolated

Three units of american infantry find themselves separated in the camp, they are brutally dealt with in hand to hand combat.

The camp now nearly clear but the rest of the Americans are being chased out of the camp.

Unfortunately for the British their commander General Grey advances from the Tavern and makes slow progress, with his troops unable to shoot he advances only for them to be surprised by and temporarily thrown back by some American pickets.

Having despatched the last units in the camp the chase continues but now the Americans have the advantage as the British don’t have time to load their muskets

Hot foot the Americans make their escape

The final British shots ring out into the darkness but the Americans have managed to escape with about 2/3 of their force. So ultimately a win for the Americans given the victory conditions we had set. A fun battle and As always the battle felt close and tense right up to the last couple of turns and there was certainly no guarantee the American would get enough troops off the table. The British failed a couple of key activations and it didn’t help with two units coming on around the tavern which was too far away to impact the battle. 

I have been painting and prepping lots of stuff but the only finished unit is the last ! Of my french Curassiers, these were a slightly mixed group left over, some of which needed repainting but the unit has come out ok, I think I need a French cavalry parade ?

Other games in the last week or so, I met anther wargamer through George who invited me down for an ECW game, a beautiful collection. Using his house rules we played through the Battle of Adwalton Moor.

Beautiful collection of ECW in 28mm but. Tough battle for the Parliamentarians who are heavily outnumbered.

We did make a good fist of it though and nearly chased off the Royalist infantry, we’re just planning a return trip up to the dungeon, and I have a few possible ideas to adapt our KoW rules?

Last weekend we had our annual shopping trip to York wargame show ‘Vapnartak’, actually I didn’t want to buy much as I have a lot in the various lead and plastic piles already but the bring and buy is always fun. The show was noticeable reduced in terms of traders with quite a few spaces and a further reduction in games on display. But there were plenty of punters and it was busy right up to when we left around 14:00

What looks like random stuff but all super bargains from the B&B. Yes I now have a Tirpitz to make in 1/350 scale it is over twice the length of the destroyer I blogged a couple of months ago !!!! The only disappointment was the green American truck which I thought was a WW2 artillery transporter, but on closer inspection when I got it home it turns out it is probably an M8 artillery tractor from around 1950, so too much of a stretch to squeeze it into Sicily. If anyone can think of a use let me know. It came with the two halftracks for next to nothing anyway. The packets contain 1/3000 WW1 ships and I have been putting together a small force for. Few games later in the year.

Finally for this post this morning I was down to George’s to continue (finish) or early war French campaign. Once again a beautiful table setup, one of the most complex battlefields in the campaign book. Germans on the attack again, loads of cover. George I’m sure will cover the battle in more detail.

The Germans took their time deploying in cover in the woods and moving up to take the station, after some exchange of fire on the German left the french started to pull back.

But Gaston a local Nazi sympathiser was behind them and started taking pot shots with his shotgun ! Whilst the french tried to deal with him.

The German panzer IV got lucky hitting the french tank as it rumbled down the road. The tanks actually exchanged several shots but it was the Germans who rolled lucky and got the decisive hit. Actually I was pretty lucky the whole battle with multiple double turns and loads of 5/6’s when I needed them. At this point the french decide the battle was up and the Germans would inevitably break through to win the campaign.

A great campaign with several difficult battles for both sides, perhaps the Germans have the edge but then they are attacking most of the time which is generally harder, looking forward to our next campaign ?

So certainly keeping busy and likely an ACW battle on Saturday, and I now have the Tirpitz to make 😂

Thanks as always for taking the time to check what I’ve been upto.

Matt ❤️

Battle of Iuka September 1862 ACW

Monday I travelled across to play an ACW battle at Martins. He had set up the Battle of Iuka not one I was aware of but a good sized battle with three brigades per side as he had enough figures the soldiers and terrain are all his.

I’m going to leave it to you to read the background. But essentially both sides have sent a smallish force of three or so brigades to push the enemy out of the way. The terrain is very wooded and they basically bumped into each other. Historically the Confederates took the lead and were the more aggressive, but as I was playing the Union forces we thought we would get stuck in ! Just a couple of shots to show the action.

Battle field setup, both sides have a brigade in reserve to be brought in on a D6 roll. As it happened the Union side were much more successful in bringing their reserves on 

The main assault is focussed in the centre/right. Whilst the left wing of the Union force simply looks to hold their ground

Hoorah Union reserves arrive almost immediately giving them the advantage of numbers

Tough fighting but the Union drive the confederate centre back, but their forces are close to breaking beyond the small road in the distance

Eventually the Confederates bring on their reserves, much of the leading Union units are close to breaking a red ‘ring’ means the unit is shaken and close to breaking 

The Union reserves stabilise the position

And despite their own fatigue they are able to drive the confederates back who start to break and run back to Iuka. Good fun and a good sized and balanced battle which I will look to play again sometime.

A bit more painting time this week and I have managed to finish up some stuff

These were a Christmas gift from last year so I was determined to get them finished before next week, warlord figures which come with alternate heads, I put them on square bases as I have an idea that I might squeeze them into Spanish units in the Peninsular when I’m short of a base ? Obviously they can also be baggage or simple eye candy vignettes.

Just before I picked up all the EVW stuff at Battleground I had ordered some 15mm tents off eBay so I made a couple more ‘camp’ bases for the ECW. I’m not sure what to do with the other tents as I have too many now ? I guess if I painted them green they could be WW2 command tents. Otherwise I don’t have any 15mm stuff. I might even put a couple on the railway somewhere ? If anybody wanted a couple let me know.

Finally a proper unit painted for the AWI these were the last metal figures picked up ages ago at the York wargame show as part of a big job lot. Hence the unit has three musicians, two standards and an unarmed officer. But they work (just) as a unit. I think I might have one more plastic American unit in the box although I’m not really looking to expand the collection too much as I have enough figures to fill the table. I might just get some French though at some point.

We have another battle planned for tomorrow Edgehill ECW and I have been playing with the stats to give some historical feel to the battle. After that one more remote game before Christmas hits, when I am hoping to get some Zombie games played ?

In the words of a famous cartoon, ‘thats all folks’ thanks for looking

Matt ❤️