Hundred Days British

42nd Royal Highland (who later became the Black Watch) & 92nd Gordon Highlanders
42nd Royal Highland (who later became the Black Watch) & 92nd Gordon Highlanders

Life has been a bit hectic over Christmas – with holidays, work, catching up on gardening & clearing clutter (both wargaming and general household accumulation), and a few other matters – so I haven’t had much chance to progress any posts in January at all, even though I do have several part-written or drafted in outline. Meanwhile here’s a little eye-candy of a couple of my 28mm Napoleonic British units that featured in my ‘Hundred Days’ games in 2011!

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Lasalle: The Trouble With Tribbles

The Battle For the flux de Tribble - as the Carabiniers storm across!
The Battle For the flux de Tribble - as the 1st Carabiniers storm across in foreground!

Okay – it’s got nothing to do with Star Trek & Tribbles – but I thought it sounded a cool title for a blog post (and AAR)! Anyway back at the end of July (2011) Cam and I played another Lasalle game – we reverted to the basic Army Builder List of a core force and 1 support option with standard troop values (1815 Hundred Days French & British) – the idea was to try out a proposed alternate scenario that was going to be used in the Lasalle Tournament at  “Call To Arms”  a convention in Wellington (New Zealand) in the second half of August. The proposed scenario in simple terms made both sides the ‘attacker’ (so Core Force + Attack Bonus + 1 Support Option) and placed 3 objectives instead of 1 on the table – all 3 having to be on the centre line, with one in the table’s dead centre, and one placed by each player not within 4BW or so of either of the others or the table edge. The following is a brief summary of the game with photo gallery…

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The Crossroads

Frederick William, Herzog von Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel-Oels (Duke of Brunswick), leads his forces in the action at 'The Crossroads'.
Frederick William, Herzog von Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel-Oels (Duke of Brunswick), leads his forces in the action at ‘The Crossroads’.

Today we played a Lasalle ‘Big Battle’ with over a Division of troops a side and had a very successful game – our first true large game with Lasalle. The scenario was based on “The Crossroads” from C. S. Grant’s “Programmed Wargames Scenarios” (Wargames Research Group Publications 1983 – Pages 79-81) modified to suit Lasalle (most especially the game turn limit and our forces). Both Cam and I did the mad panic thing during the preceding week getting extra troops and such either painted and/or based for our ‘big bash’ which allowed us to field 31 Infantry Battalions (14 French & 17 Allied)  supported by 4 Batteries (2 each) and 5 Cavalry Regiments (3 small Allied and 2 large French – we had more cavalry available but did not deploy them to avoid a too ‘cavalry heavy’ game.

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Picton Holds On The Chaussée de Charleroi

Picton's Troops Advance...
Picton's Troops Advance...

Having taken rather a beating the last two days, Picton’s division had spent the day retiring North towards Brussels and collecting stragglers, looking to join up with the balance of the Anglo-Dutch-Belgian-Brunswick-Nassau forces heading South and East towards them. Picton had received instructions from Wellington to ensure he delayed the French sufficiently to allow such a concentration of forces – and to that end Picton deployed on the fourth day to again offer battle to the pursuing 6th French Division of General de Division Prince Jérôme Bonaparte.

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The Hundred Days Continues…

The 1/32nd (Cornwall) Foot in action.
The 1/32nd (Cornwall) Foot in action.

It had been a tough 2 days – having taken a heavy knock from the advanced elements of Napoleon’s invasion force (Lasalle in the Hundred Days), the elements of Picton’s Division involved had withdrawn, thankful for their temporary superiority in light cavalry, and gradually collected the stragglers and remnants of their regiments to be reconstituted as fair fighting forces again, albeit in reduced numbers… The 42nd Royal Highlanders had been detached to rejoin 9th Brigade on flank guard duty, but the latter had sent the 3/1st Royal Scots in their place – Picton was glad for the fresh, as yet uncommitted battalion. The Duke had sent word of his intent to now try and rally the Anglo-Dutch forces at a position to Picton’s rear, but that Picton must hold his position for a day to allow them time to assemble – so Picton found himself staring at what must be the most desolate part of the Southern Netherlands (i.e. Belgium), scanning the horizon for sign of the French…

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Lasalle in the Hundred Days

The Thin Red Line
The Thin Red Line: 42nd Royal Highland (the Black Watch) & 1/28th North Gloucestershire.

Somewhere near the Franco-Belgian border, Lieutenant-General Sir Thomas Picton surveyed the ground before him, by a strange quirk elements of his ‘reserve’ division, the 5th, had ended up near the border just as the first reports of Napoleon’s crossing reached the Allied forces. Wellesley would need time to concentrate his forces, so his Division would need to delay the initial advance elements as long as possible – and it wasn’t long before news of their arrival was received. Choosing a place with some hope of defence and a good line of withdrawal Picton deployed his troops, Major-General Sir James Kempt’s 8th Brigade on the left and centre, and elements of Pack’s 9th Brigade on the right, supported by Rogers’ Foot Company of 9pdrs on the high ground. Major-General Sir Dennis Pack meanwhile had hastened to the rear to collect and organise reinforcements and lead them forward to the battle…

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