The Battle of Sandershausen, 23rd July, 1758

With no Cotswold Wargames Day on this year, instead Keith Flint invited a group of his regular wargaming chums over to his house for a game. He chose the Battle of Sandershausen, using the scenario from the recently published Scenario Book One, by Dionos Antoniadis, but using his Post of Honour rules. Rather than having the 'usual' Austrians vs Prussians bach, instead we had Hessians vs the French, so a nice change and not the sort of thing you get to see much. Full details on the engagement can be found here.

Adam and Jon took on the command of the Hessians, with Stu and myself the French, with Keith umpiring. In essence, the French had to break the Hessians or gain enough VP's via two objectives or casualties caused to see if they might claim a minor victory. Simples!

I took lots of photos, which will hopefully job my memory as to how the action unfolded. I'll simply add annotations where appropriate, but leave it until the end for a more thoughts etc. Enjoy!

An overview of the table, with the French on the left, the Hessians the right.

Hessian troops occupy Ellenbach with a good view of the advancing French.

The main Hessian line on the right wing.

The Hessian Cavalry on their left wing.

Light troops in the woods cover the Hessian right flank.

The French right wing, which was my command.

Hessian Cavalry move forward to take the fight to the French.

The Hessian Cavalry charge in.

Hessian troops withdraw to avoid being bombarded by the French light guns.

The Hessian Cavalry drive the French Line Infantry back, but are rather exposed.

The French guns limber up as they have no targets.

Hessian troops trade space for time by making a tactical withdrawal.

A large Cavalry melee develops.

Honours are even after the initial clash, but the Hessian Cavalry is still exposed.

The French left wing slowly moves forward.

Troops clash in the woods, a combat that would go on all game.

Another round a Cavalry melee as both sides pile in.

The terrain severely limits the French ability to push on towards Ellenbach.

The guns continue to try and move to a better position to provide supporting fire.

The terrain means that the classic Linear Warfare look is rather absent here.

It's taken some time, but the French Cavalry have prevailed, with the Hessian Cavalry forced to retreat to try and reform.

It's all a bit messy, but if the French Cavalry can force the Hessians back, then the French Line Infantry will have to room to manouevre and deploy in better positions.

A view from the Hessian right flank.

The French left wing closes up with the Hessians, whilst the Cavalry battle in the centre resolves itself, but is still a bit messy.

Ellenbach is still not under threat just yet.

The Hessian Cavalry in a parlous position and their Artillery is under threat from the French Cavalry.

The Hessians bravely meet the French, despite having 3 Militia Battalions.

The French Cavalry struggle to find room to exploit theur numerical advantage.

The French Line Infantry charged the Hessians but to a man were thrown back!

The French close in on Ellenbach.

The Hessians move up to meet the threat.

The Hessian left wing is broken but time is against the French.

In the last Turn the French manage to capture on objective.

An overview of the table from the French right.

The French are able to push on past Ellenbach.

The French Cavalry ready to exploit.

The French Line Infantry try one last push.

A view from the French left.

End of the Game

After the agreed 8 Turns game length, Keith totted up the VP's, with the French gaining 6 1/2, but needing 7 to claim Victory! So close yet so far. We all agreed that if we played one more Turn, the French would win, given how close some of the Hessian units were to breaking and the fact that the French Cavalry had space to exploit into.

Post Game Thoughts

Well that was great fun and a much needed gaming tonic as my mojo has been very low of late. Great fun as always playing with these chaps, with plenty of good natured banter and the game played in the right spirit from start to end. As always a few musings etc on the game.

• The scenario was great and the terrain really funnelled the French attack, which made for plenty of interesting decisions as the game unfolded. So well done to Dinos for creating this scenario and to Keith for tweaking it slightly for his PoH rules.
• It was nice to see a game go right down to the wire. The French shooting was poor in places, but then we shouldn't complain as Jon rolled some double 1's several times in a row, which could have affected things some what.
• We forgot to use the French Line Infantry ammo limit of only 4 shots, but I don't think they got enough shots in until myabe the last Turn for this to have come into effect.
• Adam and Jon played a good game of trading space for time. Well done to them for actually deciding to stay in place so we could shoot them, as they could have kept on retreating, thus meaning the French would have had little chance of gaining a Victory.
• We did discuss the above in terms of trying to re-create an action, but also make it a fun game for both sides. We did discuss some tweaks if we played this again, but I honestly can't remember what they were!
• This game has made we want to try this out at home using How and the scenario as written, which is a good thing as already mentioned, my gaming mojo has been low. Not sure when this might be though...

Thanks for getting this far and as always thanks for reading and any comments greatly appreciated!

TTFN.