Slow and Steady Does It

 I have a number of refurb jobs on the go at the moment - quite a lot of them, in fact - and I find it satisfying when I complete one, but increasingly I find that the unfinished ones nag at me. It's not that I was better organised when I was younger, it's just that I seem to worry about it more now. Perhaps I have less confidence in there being plenty of time? - Let's not go there.

I'm spending a few weeks - during the start of the Spring temperate painting season - clearing off some of the Napoleonic backlog, to clear the mind and free up some boxes for re-use. One of these has been on the go for about 4 years - a pile of old, rather bashed figures I got very cheaply from the worthy Steve Cooney, which I lined up for one of my "cannonfodder" projects. This is not intended as any kind of a poke at Steve, I hasten to add - I knew exactly what I was getting into when I took them on! This batch consisted of old Der Kriegsspieler castings, and - Steve being Steve - he had taken his soldering iron to bayonets, gaiters, bases...

 

Five additional battalions; the rank and file are mostly tweaked Der Kriegsspielers, from many years ago. There are SHQ, Hinton Hunt and Schilling among the command figures. I was short of grenadiers, so recruited some Alberken Old Guard to make up the numbers - I had some misgivings about these, since the castings are relatively crude, but they came out all right, I think!

These chaps are never going to win any prizes for beauty, and have actually been quite a lot of work to paint up, but in the end they are pretty much what I was aiming for - hoping for the old Featherstone objective of "looking good in the mass".

During the intervening 4 years, I have had an occasional peep at their current state, noted that the Refurb Fairies had once again failed to come to help out, and I had rather quailed at the prospect of resuming work on them, but this has all been cowardice. Since I set my mind to finishing them, I've rather enjoyed the painting sessions, though I've listened to an awful lot of BBC Radio 3 and drunk a lot of black tea in the process.

So I have added 2 battalions of the 65e Ligne and 3 battalions of the 22e to Brennier's (Sixth) Divn of the Armée de Portugal, circa 1812. I already have one battalion of the 17e Léger and a solitary battalion of the Regiment de Prusse, so I only need the missing light battalion, a couple of groups of combined voltigeurs and some staff, and I need to allocate one of the spare foot artillery batteries to them, and the Division is done.

In the unlikely circumstance of anyone being interested, I must explain [to myself, really], that it has taken me about 3 months to break my new house rule of no 3rd battalions. The 22e really do need a 3rd battalion, or their brigade will be a runt. I have, however, stuck to my existing rule that 3rd battalions don't get flags [that'll teach them].

Finishing little projects is good - even sub-projects. Must nurture my enthusiasm... 

Thanks to Steve for supplying the figures back in 2017 - worked out fine, and his boys will fight on.

 

Hooptedoodle #394 - Auprès de Ma Blonde

 Here we go - a song from the time of Louis XIV, reckoned to date from the Franco-Dutch War of 1672-78, and much loved as a marching song by French soldiers right up to modern times. The informal performance here is by the remarkable Olivia Chaney, who is English, though her accent is spot-on. I'm very much in favour of Olivia, generally.

I was taught this song by my mother when I was a toddler. Years later, in my French class at school, we were asked if anyone knew any French songs, and I offered this, for which I was put on detention by our teacher (the Headmaster, as it happens), because the song was inappropriate. When I protested that it was a very old song, and told him where I had learned it, he said it had been inappropriate for a very long time, and my mother could take a detention too.

The romantic drama in the verses has been hand-polished over the centuries, I am sure, but the chorus is straightforward enough:

Next to my blonde, who does it well, does it well, does it well;
Next to my blonde, who makes me sleep well.

The Headmaster, Bill Pobjoy, has been dead for years - his biggest claim to fame was the fact that he expelled one John Winston Lennon from the school (before my time, I hasten to add), of which he was always rather proud. In truth, I think old JWL needed to be expelled. 

***** Late Edit *****

My old friend Norman, who is something of an expert on all things to do with the Beatles, has gently taken me to task over the Lennon episode - he points out that, strictly, JWL was not expelled, but the school arranged for him to transfer to Liverpool Art College. Technically, that is correct, and there are a number of books which testify to this now (some of them almost certainly written by Norman), but there is no doubt that there was no way that Lennon was going to be allowed to stay - the place at the Art College was engineered (partly under pressure from one of the teaching staff, Philip Burnett, who was convinced that Lennon was a mad genius), but JWL was very firmly escorted to the exit.

A digression follows - possibly an unnecessary one, but fairly conclusive in my mind.

It was the practice at the school for successful or prominent Old Boys (former pupils) to return from time to time, to give an address to the senior school (this was a boys' school, by the way). On one such occasion, Peter Shore, who after many years of active work for the Labour Party had finally been elected, a few years before, as MP for Stepney, came to speak to the 5th and 6th forms about his life in politics. The talk was pretty boring, I regret to recall, but it was also heavily Socialist, which caused very apparent unease to Mr Pobjoy, who shared the platform with our guest speaker.

Shore finished off his talk with an unbelievably weak call to glory (this was mid-1960s): "...and let us work to make sure that the Britain of the Beatles is a Labour Britain!".

There was a smattering of routine applause, then the headmaster, po-faced, stood to offer very taut thanks to our guest, and added the message that one of the Beatles had been a pupil at the school, and that he was pleased to say that he had expelled him. Dead silence - we all filed out, listening for pins dropping, to return to our classes.

It goes without saying that no musicians were ever invited to speak.

 

Peter Shore, MP

I raise the matter only to give the unofficial, but obviously whole-hearted, view of the individual involved. Further claptrap: Peter Shore went on to hold a number of Shadow posts in Labour Opposition cabinets, and held some real offices in Harold Wilson's government. His political career is thought to have been hindered by his lengthy devotion to the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (to which he became strongly opposed in later life). He died, Wikipedia tells me, in 2001. As a side issue, I am delighted to note that his father-in-law was the Canadian-born historian and academic, EM Wrong. A finer name for a historian never existed, surely. This is straight out of Monty Python.

Enough - I hope that gets Norman off my back.

***********************

Dondaine

 Moving swiftly on (before I get a glimpse of Mr Trump's pardons and have an aneurism), here's a workmanlike wargaming picture. My original reasoning for my WSS basing scheme was that, since the units only have 3 bases and they'll be doing some Old School tactical manoeuvring, I wouldn't bother with sabots, though I've become very used to using them of recent years.

After just a few test games, I confess I have changed my mind. Sabots there will be. They will not be magnetised, and - since my cunning WSS base sizes give a standard footprint (approximately) - I have adopted a one-size-fits-all plain sabot. Current thinking is that sabots will be a resource for the battlefield, and will be issued when needed. My Napoleonic units each have their own magnetised sabot, and they spend their lives on them, so this is a conscious departure from my standard system.

Because the sabots are a bit long and narrow, I was worried that 2mm MDF might warp if painted on one side only. I ordered in some samples from Uncle Tony Barr at East Riding Minis, and am pleased to find that they give no problems, so a bigger order will be on its way.

 Here's a quick photo, to give the idea. These should save time and broken bayonets.

Infantry and cavalry in line or column of march - even one of my strange limbered batteries 

 

Oh yes - dondaine. One of the many French nursery rhymes my mother taught me when I was an infant was En Passant par la Lorraine, a lengthy tale of a peasant girl who may or may not have captured the heart of the King's son (the song has a quirky, uncertain ending) through her fetching appearance, complete with clogs. This song contains the chorus hook-line:

avec mes sabots, dondaine,
oh! oh! oh! avec mes sabots

I have never been able to find out what dondaine means - and still haven't really got to the bottom of it. I am assured by one of my French relatives that in fact it means nothing - it is just a song-filler expression (equivalent to "tra-la-la" or, I suppose, "hey-nonny-no"). That's kind of an anticlimax after all those years of wondering, but I guess life is a bit like that.

If anyone knows different, please shout.

Here's a noble rendition of the song - just to prove it exists. I am confident you will not last to the end of the clip, but - take my word for it - this version only uses about half the verses my mother taught me. Obviously French kids had a good attention span in the days before Instagram.

 

WSS Flags - looking for clues

 Very quick post today - I'm looking for a bit of information, if anyone can help. I don't think this is at all complicated, but I've read different opinions on this topic, and am uncertain about what to do.

 

Photo of flags of a French regiment from someone else's army, someone else's blog. Two flags is a nice look - colonel's colour on the left here - is this applicable to all battalions in a French regiment?

My emerging WSS armies use a vanilla, one-size-fits-all-nations establishment scheme. I know that this is probably not awfully clever, but the convenience suits me nicely.

In particular, my infantry battalions consist of 3 bases; two of these have 5 other ranks and 1 officer/NCO (and one of these two bases may contain grenadiers, depending on national practice), and the third one contains 3 other ranks, a standard, a drummer and a mounted colonel.

I'm now starting to plan for the French and British contingents. For each of these nations, I am tempted to be swayed by "the look of the thing" and go for 2 standards per battalion. Now that I've started to read about the French, it is suggested that a regiment's first battalion should carry the colonel's (white) colour and the ordnance (patterned) colour, but the other battalions did not carry the colonel's colour, so that my planned two-battalion French regiments would have 2 flags for the first battalion, but only 1 for the second.

Of course, I've also read sources which say two for each. I'm happy to do two for each anyway, but wondered if there are any strong views? All ideas welcome!

Battle of Espinosa de los Monteros - the Game

Yesterday evening the Espinosa game was duly played out here. I was umpire (I feel that I was somehow born to be an umpire - it's a role I enjoy greatly), and the visiting generals for the occasion were Dave and - erm - Dave. Dave took the role of Joachim Blake, in command of the Spanish army, and Dave was Marshal Victor. Since this is all too much for a bear of little brain, I was pleased to adopt forms of address suggested by the visitors, derived from ancient British TV sitcoms - Marshal Victor (whose real name was Claude Perrin) became Reggie Perrin, of course (otherwise known as Vic of Belluno), and General Blake was "Blakey" - so that was much more comfortable all round.

Blakey

Perrin

The battle involved a minimal cavalry presence - both armies had just two light cavalry units tucked away at the back, but both the commanders threw their cavalry forward, which was a much more exciting start than I had expected.

The Spanish position on their right looked a bit suspect, having a river at their backs, but the ground was quite favourable, with hills and woods offering some advantages in defence, and this was where all the Spanish artillery was placed. Victor duly left this flank alone, and sent in Lapisse's division, to attack the Spanish left, which had no artillery and included a contingent of rather suspect milicias provinciales. The militia boys did rather well, considering, and after some early reverses they managed to drive Lapisse's force back, but it was only a temporary breather.

The narrative should become sort of apparent from the photos, I hope. One important theme was the heroism of General Blake, who seemed to be determined to die in action, but somehow survived. Another theme was that the Spanish artillery was ineffective throughout - that load of cheap gunpowder they got from the Gomez brothers was probably not a good idea. The Spaniards, under the house rules, are in real trouble if they attempt to move and fight at the same time, and the weak cavalry units are a problem.

Having said all of which, both generals conducted themselves very well, the battle was interesting (at least the umpire found it so!), and, though the final score in Victory Points was 8-2 to the French, General Blake comes out of the episode with some personal credit, certainly for his skill at getting in the press coverage. Marshal Victor, of course, won, which is what it's all about in Napoleon's army.

My thanks to my visiting generals for their good humour and enthusiasm, and for surviving an embarrasing collapse of our rural broadband which knocked Zoom out for 5 minutes or so!

Early view from behind the Spanish left and centre - the fighting on the ridge on the left is in a bit of a lull, but - yes - that's General Blake on the right edge of the picture, taking personal command of the cavalry. His staff were overcome with horror. The black square marker next to a French regiment indicates that they are in square (good eh?).

Again, from behind the Spanish lines - this time just to the right of centre - here you see the Spanish artillery, whose performance was - how do you say? - disappointing. The French were very circumspect about attacking this part of the line.

General Blake again, posing for the camera with the Cazadores de Olivenza. This figure, by the way, is an OOP Falcata, and was (whisper it) actually painted by Hermogenes, the man who founded Falcata. There are few known examples of evidence of Hermogenes having actually done something, so this is a rarity indeed. Yes, General Blake does look like Brendan Rodgers - in which role he is almost certainly proud of the spirit and character of his team, who were thrashed again...

More of the same - the French cavalry in the background are obviously intending to do something about this, and this area of the battlefield became a little hectic for a while.

The Spanish cavalry, rather reduced in numbers, pull back for a rest.

At this stage, the French are leading 4-1 - there is a lot of space between the Spanish left and centre, and Victor's men are coming forward.

From the French view - town of Espinosa in the background. Having been forced to give up his spell as a cavalry commander, Blake has now taken command of a battalion of line infantry.

From above the Spanish centre, looking left - yes, Blake is at it again, this time leading the infantry forward.

Still the Spanish artillery have only scored a single hit on the infantry opposite, but the grenadiers in the wood, with a stunning volley of musketry, have done some damage to the French battery on the road.

General view, looking toward the Spanish left flank. By this stage, the game was almost over - the Spanish had lost enough infantry on their left flank, plus their cavalry, to get the score up to 7-2. Then, a final attack on the right by some Spanish light infantry ran into very heavy opposition, and the battle was over - 8-2 to Victor.

This is what remained of the Spanish left at the end - view from behind Lapisse's position.

Coup de grace (French for "lawn-mower") - The Freitag battalion (1/26eme - centre foreground) emerged from the woods at the end to rout the Spanish lights and clinch the victory. Job done.

Battle of Espinosa de los Monteros (10-11 Nov 1808) - Set-Up

There'll be a wargame here during this week - to keep myself entertained I set up the battlefield yesterday. Looks OK - I am using a slightly expanded version of the official Commands & Colors: Napoleonics scenario, the table is 17 hexes by 9, so there are a few extra units, and the terrain is corrected very slightly.

I may produce a write-up sometime - a lot depends on whether or not I remember to take photos!

General view, from the French left flank - yes, the Spaniards will be defending with an unfordable river behind their right - it's OK - that's how they like it

And from the other flank - the Spanish position on the ridge in the right foreground looks promising, but there are a lot of Provinciales up there (and we are talking triple retreats...)

Marshal Victor, the French commander, gets some reports - we should always remember that Victor's real name was Claude Perrin, so leaves on the line may be a hazard to be watched out for. Those dreadful chairs will be tidied away before any action

WSS - King Louis' Footbath

Time to get back to the WSS refurb work, so I'm starting with some easy stuff - let's soak the old bases off some ex-Eric Knowles French infantry, and clean them up, ready for retouching. In fact these guys look pretty good - there are a few bent muskets to sort out (and associated flaked paint) but by and large these look mostly like a wash and varnish job. [If I had a pound for every time I've thought this, I would have - ooh - several pounds, I would think]

First WSS job in the queue, strictly speaking, is an Austrian regiment, IR Haßlingen (2 battalions), which is hanging over from Phase 1, so I'll get started with them. These French chaps, once I have counted them and sorted out what's what, can get boxed up as potential battalions, then the next footbath load will be some more French, from elsewhere. After that I'm looking at British and Dutch, and goodness knows where we get to from there, but first off I need to work out a supply of cavalry - I have a load of cavalry figures, but they are all strip-and-start-again stuff. There will be a shortage of vintage figures for cavalry and artillery, so I'll also check out what I need to get in from Irregular. I'm also thinking seriously of having two standards per battalion for both French and British, just for the look of the thing, so I'll have a look at that. I also rather fancy getting some mounted officers from Irregular to provide French colonels, since the no-cuirass look is better for them

So - one step at a time - these French chappies can be soaking for a few days while I get set up to paint Haßlingen. Once they are clean and I have played around at organising them into units I can decide what else I need to get in. Busy busy. Idle hands are the Devil's fake news.


Footnote: today I have switched back to the "legacy" version of Blogger, since the new one will not allow me to set up a new post. The new one also will not let me collect a folder of images, to be inserted one at a time as I require them. With New Blogger, as far as I can see, you have to upload your images as you need them - if you don't insert them immediately, in a single lot, you will lose the folder and have to upload them again. Oh well. The new version has been going fairly well, and offers some facilities the old one didn't have - no doubt I'll like it again in a week or two, but at the moment it is a pain in the erse.

French Refurb - 70eme Ligne

With an enforced break in the WSS factory, I have had a chance to make a return to my ongoing rescue of some bought-in French Napoleonics - the boys of "Carlo's Army". Here are another two battalions, 1st and 2nd of 70eme Ligne, to join the 3rd Division of the Armée de Portugal, circa Spring 1812 - a period which has always been my natural home. The figures are mostly Les Higgins, vintage 1971 or so, with a few command bods brought in from Art Miniaturen, SHQ and Schilling. My approach to refurb work these days is such that there is probably none of the original paintwork of these figures still visible!

1st Battalion

2nd Battalion

I also took the opportunity to spruce up a couple of colonels which I have based to act up as brigade commanders - I was never happy with them; so here's this morning's picture of the newly-augmented 2nd brigade of the 3rd Divn, led by Colonel Dein of the 47eme, who is relishing his new, cleaner paint job.

Bde Col Dein - 70eme in front, 47eme behind - the brigade awaits the official 9-figure converged voltigeur "battalion", which will be along sometime soon. I've never been able to work out who the official GdB was. The brigade came to the Armée de Portugal from II Corps when Marmont re-organised his new command in Oct 1811, and the brigadier, GdB Roche Godart, returned to France around that time, subsequently serving in Russia. At Salamanca there is no official GdB in place, so maybe the colonels covered the gap throughout this period. GdB Menne had the other brigade. Sorry - this stuff interests me!

A Touch of Class

One of the things which continues to delight me in the world of wargaming blogs is the kindness people have shown to me over the years. I've been on the receiving end of a number of gifts and favours which have often far surpassed anything I might have expected (or might have deserved).

This last week I received a parcel from one Aly Morrison, gentleman and sculptor/painter extraordinaire. Included in this package was a unit of painted French cuirassiers, as he had promised, in return for something I had sent him - as is often the case, the repayment was out of all scale to my original effort. I'm really very pleased with them, so now I have based them up I thought I would share some pictures.

12eme Cuirassiers

The figures are 1970s PMD (Les Higgins). I am impressed not only by the painting, but by the quality of the conversion work. The Higgins range was a bit eccentric in some ways - there never was a cuirassier officer, but there was a dragoon trumpeter which would work well with the cuirassiers. When Aly first mentioned that he had some figures he would paint up for me, I had a brief wonder about what I would do for command - usually I have used Art Miniaturen figures in recent years.

I underrated the man. Not only did he convert a couple of troopers to provide an officer and a standard bearer (a feat which I have been known to achieve by painting the epaulettes silver, and maybe going for a black sheepskin) - he carved off the carbines and all the support belting and cartridge pouches, he corrected the eagle bearer by removing one of his epaulettes and adding a sword handle to the top of his scabbard, and he removed the officer's portmanteau, recarving the dog-tooth sheepskin edging which is now exposed.

Detail close-up of the carving on the officer conversions

I am, as they used to say, knocked out. My cavalry reserve becomes bigger and better. Let's see Stryker chase this lot the length of the Danube, then.

Thanks, Aly - really pleased with them.

WSS - French Books and That

Progress with my Henry Ford-style production of a big refurb batch has been pretty good - never since the golden days of my purchase of Peter Welsh's Napoleonic collection has anything as mind-numbing as this taken place here. All being well, I should have 4 more battalions based and flagged by Wednesday (famous last words).

Before I started this latest batch - two battalions each of Bavarian IR Bettendorf and IR Kurprinz, to be retouched and freshened up. The ultimate Henry Ford touch would be to spray them all black, but I'll try not to do that

Assuming I don't destroy my morale completely in the next few days, the plan would be to do two further, similarly-sized batches, this time Imperialists, over the coming weeks. They may be rather more fiddly, since there are more replacement figures needed, and my research into flags is - how do you say? - doing my head in.

Anyway, all good. Since I will certainly become very peculiar if I paint all day, I am deliberately setting aside non-painting times, so some suitable reading is going on too.

I also have some British troops to refurbish, and I've been dipping a toe into the subject of the French army for the WSS. I have the CS Grant paperbacks on the period, and I've been very kindly sent some copies of uniform plates and old magazine articles, but I thought I should get something just a little heavier, to give me some good background and some reliable detail. My French forces will be starting from zero, so it would be useful to build up a small army for 1703 which can sensibly grow (God willing) into a rather larger army without too much disruption and too many U-turns.

I intend to buy Mark Allen's book, which gets some criticism because it is not The Bible, but it looks very useful anyway. Rene Chartrand is also an obvious source, but I start to get into problems with potential overlap between different publishers (primarily Osprey and Helion), and also there are a lot of books with similar sounding titles.

This is a period for which it is possible to spend money very quickly and find that what you have bought isn't quite what you were looking for. I have obtained titles by Robert Hall and Bruno Mugnai on the Austrian army, but I'm aware that trying to doing anything like this for the French is risky and potentially ruinous. Thus I am starting out at a gentle stroll.

I identified the following as books I could get easily and without huge expense - I'm still dithering about this, so would welcome any comments.

This last title is potentially interesting but, looking at the contents summary, am I to gather that this covers the Line Cavalry etc only up to 1697? Hmmm.

Unless there's a good reason to do otherwise, I might start with a few French units that would be OK at Schellenberg (for example), but could grow into a larger presence. My War of the Spanish Succession is very likely to be almost an imagi-nations set-up, with long-winded and largely imaginary campaigns between Bavaria and Austria to start with. [To quote from the Gallacher Book of Axioms, "If actual history is useful on a particular occasion, then use it, otherwise it's just a luxury (like the sick-bag on an aeroplane journey)".]

Anyway, British and French are a little over the horizon, but could come into sight fairly soon. Thinking and reading about them can't do any harm.

After a late rush of maniacs last weekend, the beach here at the farm has now been closed to the public (well, closed to their cars, which is effectively the same thing), so here's a sort of post-apocalyptic photo - by 9am on Saturday, the only footprints are mine.

Look after yourselves - please keep well. I'm also intrigued by the reported huge demand for dried chick-peas - is this recommended stuff for the fallout shelter? Any good recipes will be welcome.

Maria de Huerva (15th June 1809) - I've just played a game named Maria...

Wargaming yesterday. Things have been a bit confusing lately, but luckily Goya was able to organise a free day, and he came down to these parts for a Peninsular game, which offered a very welcome diversion for me.

Suchet (that's me, folks) thinking that these Spanish fellows fight a lot better than he had expected

This was an engagement between GdD (later Marshal) Louis-Gabriel Suchet and part of the Spanish Northern Army under Joaquin Blake. Our game was based upon the scenario published in Expansion #1 of Commands & Colors: Napoleonics - tweaked a little to reflect the relative strengths in the actual battle. In the historical battle, Suchet, having left a garrison in Saragossa, and having split off Leval's Division to protect the roads to that city, had some 10,000 men in the field. Blake was advancing north on both sides of the River Huerba, Areizaga's (large) Division being some miles from the action, so he had about 14,000.

We used the latest edition of the Ramekin Versions (based on CCN); both armies had a small off-table reserve available - Suchet spent the day waiting for Robert's brigade to join him, while Blake sort of hoped that Areizaga might condescend to send him some help when he heard the guns. In fact, neither of these reserves played any part - Robert arrived right at the end, when the game was already decided, and Blake was so stretched keeping the French at bay that he had no spare orders to do anything about a reserve, so Areizaga's chaps, wherever they were, were not much help.

In the real battle, Blake's troops demonstrated against Musnier's Division, on the French right, in an attempt to goad the French into attacking them (the Spanish position was along a very presentable ridge, and the Spanish Army - especially in this game - is at its best when defending ground of its own choosing). On the French left, Wathier's cavalry brigade advanced, and frightened the Spanish cavalry from the field, leaving the infantry's flank exposed - the Spanish right crumbled, but Blake did a creditable job of withdrawing his army, and the defeat was not the complete disaster it might have been.

So much for history. Our game didn't really go like that at all. The field looks a bit barren - that is correct - apart from the parallel lines of hills, the scene was more or less featureless. For the record, Suchet and Co were rated as "Good" commanders for the day, and Blake as "Competent". C&CN Tactician Cards were in use, and 7 Victory Points were required for the win.

General view at the start, from behind the French left flank. From this end, the French have Habert's infantry brigade, plus Wathier's cavalry, and on the ridge is Musnier's division, with the Vistula Lancers attached. The Spaniards, on the other side of the field are, from this end, Col O'Donnell with the flank force, then the Divisions of Lazan (front) and Roca (rear). The Spaniards were all regular troops - no provinciales, no irregulars. The Monasterio de Santa Fe is in the foreground.

Spanish in a good defensive position. Blake is visible with the yellow border to his base, in the background.

Spanish light troops - these are the Cazadores de Barbastro, on the left end of the line.

More general view of the Spanish position, with Musnier's French on the right edge of the photo. That gap between the two ridges was a real killing ground.

Musnier finds it hard to get started, as his men are taking casualties already.

Quick aerial view of the Monasterio, with prize-winning vegetable plot visible.

It's very rare for my Vistula Lancers to put in a good performance, but on this occasion they got it right, and probably won the day for the French in the end. Occasionally they strayed too far from their command to be able to receive orders, which was a nuisance, but when they were good they were very good.

View from behind the Spanish left - having gone off the idea of a straight frontal attack, Musnier sends out a force (just visible at the left edge) to attempt to turn the left flank of the Spanish front line 

Here his leading battalion gets up onto the Spanish ridge, though they look very short of friends at this point

They were repulsed, and again lack of command was a problem as the French tried to advance

Over on the Spanish right, O'Donnell, with grenadiers, light cavalry and light infantry (1st Cataluna, in the foreground), fought doggedly and impressively

There weren't as many as there had been, but Lazan's force sorted themselves out and began to win some VPs of their own. They got the situation back from 2-6 to 4-6, and Suchet was getting very nervous

Musnier rode out to take personal command of the flank attack - that's him on the left, with the white base-border.

Now there is a 3-pronged attack (dashing, but not much support available), in the foreground, Musnier with the 2/86eme attacks the Regto de Africa, who are still fresh; in the centre, the lancers turn to threaten the Regto de Ribero, who are already fighting (very well) against more French infantry

Musnier and friends are making short work of Africa - lots of red markers in evidence on the Spanish left flank

Leadership in action - Musnier encouraging his lads...

...when suddenly there is a dastardly Spanish trick, and they play a Short Supply card - we don't know what it was that the 86eme were running out of, but whatever it was they were obliged to whizz back to the baseline to get some more

At this point, at long last, Suchet was delighted to see Robert's brigade appear from the direction of Saragossa, on the edge of the field by Santa Fe - the sight probably didn't cheer up the Spaniards very much, but Robert had no time to contribute much to the French effort...

...because the Vistula Lancers, in a "Combined Arms" attack with support from artillery across the valley, now eliminated the battered Regto de Ribero...

...and that was that - the French had won 7-4

A good game - no real problems with the rules or the scenario. The Spanish put up a good show, but they always have problems - they fight well enough, but moving fire is poor, and in melees they are reliable only when they are standing firm. The biggest disadvantage is the double-retreat rule - if they do fall back, they fall back a long way, and if the retreat is blocked they suffer losses instead.

Afterwards we retired to Zitto in North Berwick for food and deep analysis - always a good idea. Subsequently, things slipped a bit when Goya's train of choice was cancelled, but he managed to get a later one without problem, and made it home safely.