English Civil War - Warr Without an Enemie

Cuckold Wee Come Parliament Horse Troop

Bluebear Jeff again hosted the wonderful Warr Without An Enemie ECW game on 26 June, this time the battle of Montgomery.

Rob P was to command the Royalists and Jeff took on the Royalist horse.

I was alone to command the Parliamentarians.

So this was the set up for the largest battle in North Wales ... with my building Royalist forces having a Welsh flavor I believe this battle may be re-fought again some day.

We set up via the historical lay-out as given in the scenario, this left the Parliament with smaller horse forces on each flank and stretched out line of foot.  While the Royalists had a double line of foot and a flank heavy in horse.

The Royalist troops were a mix of Rob's painting and Jeffs collection.

Parliament line looking from the far left

Meldrum in command

Horse on the Parliament left, facing twice their number in Royalist horse

Royalist command from the center looking to their left at the foote brigade

closer view of the foote brigade

Rob P's wonderful painted troops with their new laser cut MDF bases

Parliament center and command

Royalist commander Sir John Byron

The Royalist layout left one massive advantage for them to exploit, a cavalry charge on the Royalist right could sweep all the Parliament off the field.

field seen wide, Parliament is next to the river

Sir John Meldrum, Parliament commander

Parliament horse moved up to commence distant pistol shooting

Royalist dragoons moved to invest an enclosed field.

The Royalist line on the ridge top

The next few turns were shooting from Parliament and charges by the Royalist horse.

Turn 3 the Parliament horse foraging parties returned.

Turn 4 and the Parliament left flank is being chewed up by the Royalist horse

while on the Royalist left all those foote regiments were forming hedgehogs

and taking fire from many surrounding horse troops

an overview of the mass horse charge on the Parliament left, last time there were three Parliament horse troops

The Royalists drove back the Parliament horse on the left, by turn 6 only one troop remained, though for the benefit of the Royalists they were able to 'reign in' a pursuing horse troop with a high enough die roll.

the lines were stable for a moment

exchanges of feeble fire continued in the hedgehogs

Royalist lines came off the hill with some DPs due to poor die rolls

the final cavalry engagement that could hope to hold back the Royalist horse ... ultimately only one turn was able to be gained

More rallies were needed all over the battlefield, and it was here that the +3 strength of the Parliament commanders got to show.  For with a couple of good Command Points die rolls the Parliament forces were able to 'redress ranks' and build back into better ability than the Royalists could who had a couple of turns of below average Command Point rolls.

The moment of truth for Parliament, the forward hedgehog was at 4 DPs and two horse troops of equal number to the foote were in range to CHARGE!

Derbyshire were 1/2 of the charge

by now only one Royalist foote unit was still in line

all the others were in hedgehogs

Royalist horse was also worn down with 3 or 4 DPs on each unit and not enough CPs to recover all of them in one go

Parliament horse had kept one unit alive on the flank and now they were shooting away at the Royalist horse

while not 'secure' the flank was holding ...

The last turn we played out was 11, by then the hedgehog had been broken, though not run off in rout, they were still fighting; now a loosing battle.

tabletop at game end, Parliament had cracked a hedgehog and not lost all of their own horse to do it

Turns out we 're-created' the same results as came out in history at this battle, something that a simulation ought to be able to achieve.

Next up appears to be a re-fight of this battle, though this time using Black Powder rules with some ECW 'modifications'.