5th August 1758 more or less next to Mehr

Less can be "Mehr", as Angus decided to unearth the old Grant‘s scenario of the Seven Years  combat/skirmish/little battle. We chose 28mm and my new rules "Seven Years", and Angus brought his Frenchies and some Hanoverians and me my (AWI) Hessians. Bart and Alisdair sided with the French intruder and me and the old/new Mike defended North-Rhine Westphalia (of course that is what it would be called today, charming land and lovely people, I remember passing the "creativity test" at their University (Krefeld) 30 years ago, just almost barely, after on of their commitee members "analysed" my stlye as "morbid" ... aach bless them).

The French were outnumbering us and had (light) guns and were sticking behind a wall of hedges in an otherwise very swampy, muddy, wild flat farmland in the Northern Rhineland. In the historic battle the Allied Hanoverians made a short work of the oncoming disease plagued French. They made the mistake to try to top up their ranks with probably Colognians, Ardenner farmers or other conflict avoiding alcoholics ... dysentery? ...  more likely a hangover ...

To our demise me and Mike weren‘t able to repeat the success. I tried and advanced with my centre, trying to loosening up what was in effect Militia. One or two status reductions to the "rally" state would have been a "lift-off" for these!!! In the meantime Bart tried a Frederizian move with his Cavalry (and some Infantry) and moved from one flank to the other. He also engaged in a fierce Cavalry fight with Mike‘s Dragoons.

I guess I remember it was a kind of a draw, but the French pressure was surely mounting. We were not be able to "sent" off their softer troops to hell, while Barts Horse seemed to slightly win the struggle at our flank ...

It was good to see how the rules worked and the fire fights of the lines were softening up lines and forced them to withdraw ... you can see a lot of smoke on the images ... thats units that need to re-load ... maybe next time ... but all in all I very much enjoyed the game. Also the Cavalry cannot be a sledge hammer "all the time", they need to withdraw and re-group – sorry Bart! ;)

Initial set up

The Allied thin line  ... all a bit mis deployed ...

The French over crowded in the mud

no wonder they were getting sick

Both Cavalries are moving to the south 

The French are coming!

Hold the Line!

The Fire fighting starts ... soon with casualties

and the fire fight goes on ...

... but the Militias hold today 

and the French Line draws nearer!

The Horses clash in the South

while first charges were made

but closing /opportunity fire can be a bitch

But our Cavalry ... where is our line?