The Battle of Winnersh Landing

Wayne, Christophe, Richard and myself.

This week I have been working away from home for a few day, last evening was spent painting Spanish Civil War figures in my hotel room, this evening I popped over to meet Wayne and Christophe at the Reading Wargames Club who meet in Winnersh Community Centre to play a game of Black Powder ACW using Christophes extensive collection of 28mm figures.

Checking the blog archive, it was January last year when I last played Black Powder ACW, so I was likely to be a little rusty, but I was going to be tonight'd expert.

Christophe has got a few more Confederates than Union so they would be trying to break through the Union lines. Wayne and Christophe played the Confederates, Richard and myself the Union. The forces involved were:

Confederates
General: Staff 9, Hight Independence, Low Aggression
(Christophe) Brigadier Staff 8, One elite 5+ Regiment with Rifled Musket, five Regiments with Rifled Musket, one Rifled Battery
(Wayne) Brigadier Staff 7 High Independence, One elite 5+ Regiment with Rifled Musket, five Regiments with Rifled Musket, one Smooth Bore Battery

Union
General: Staff 8, Hight Independence
(Myself) Brigadier Staff 7, One Elite 5+ Large Regiment with Rifled Musket, one Elite 5+ Regiment with Rifled Musket, one Regiment with Rifled Musket, one Rifled Battery in redoubt.
(Richard) Brigadier Staff 7 Low Decisiveness, One Large Regiment with Rifled Musket, three Regiments with Rifled Musket, one Rifled Battery

Waynes troops advance against mine

The Confederates took first turn and Waynes troops surged onto the table towards me, Christophe failed to give an order so Wayne was on his own. The Union troops were like rabbits in the headlight and did not manage to react at all. Again Wayne surged on and Christophe again failed his order, the Confederate shooting was desultory though. Stirred into action my large unit moved up behind a wall supported by the two smaller units and started engaging the rebels to great effect, Waynes front line was now disordered.

Christophe now made an appearance and surged towards Richard preventing him from competing the manoeuvre to support me against Wayne. With a rebel yell the Confederates to my front charged but my close range volley was devastating and the disordered rebels broke and fled from the ensuing combat. With his superiority in numbers Wayne was able to keep feeding fresh units into the hard fight and although I broke or shook four of his Regiments, breaking his Brigade my Brigade was also shaken. It was all down to Christophe and Richard on my right.

Wayne and I in a struggle of mutually assured destruction

Having lost a regiment to long range fire Christophe continued his advance into point blank range and soon two of the Union Regimenst had been shattered, and things were looking bad as four Confederate units were pouring fire into three Union ones, it then started to fall apart, one Union Regiment took excess causalities and failed its Break Test while another Blundered, charged into the Confederate lines and was destroyed by the closing fire and subsequent Break Test.

Christophe pushes on to carry the day

In such a blaze of glory the game was over, both Union Brigades had been Shattered, but we were able to inflict grievous casualties on the victorious rebels.

Great game!

All the figures belong to Christophe and were painted by him.