28mm WWI: BART-SUR-AISNES SEPTEMBER 1914 (3)

This report covers the second days play in this fictional action.  For this continuation we had 6 players each commanding one of the sectors of the action.

The first days play had seen almost no German casualties amongst the defenders in the strongly built mine buildings.  This all changed on the second day as the French got their machine guns within effective range and brought on reserves from the eastern flank march.  The German fire was very ineffective with their MG completely missing for 2 turns!   The French stormed the 2 mine buildings and wiped out the flank guard.   The Germans detonated the demolition charges on the eastern temporary bridge but that did not halt the advance.  At the end of the game a small German remnant was still holding the mineshaft but the position had fallen apart.

Eastern bridge explodes in front of the French

In the centre the Belgians continued the struggle along the main highway.  The Minerva armoured car was driven back from the bridge but rallied and returned.  The Belgian infantry were all but wiped out but this action and the heroics by their cavalry charging a ford allowed further French reinforcement to close on the river bank. 



Belgian cavalry reach the riverbank and ford

On the Western flank the British supported by their massed artillery silenced the German MGs covering the western bridge.  Their first dash over the bridge caught the German engineer by surprise and he went down clutching the unused matches for the explosives!  The successful bridge stormers were wiped out at the walls of the western foundry but the British were now streaming over the secured bridge.  An attempted German counterattack was broken by the British artillery fire.

Up and at them lads - the western bridge falls intact to the BEF

So at the end of the action the allies had been successful on both flanks but Bart-Sur-Aisnes itself was still securely held by the Germans.  Given this I declared the game at least a German minor victory.  The Germans were been outnumbered by the allies 2 to 1.

All the photos with descriptions are on flickr at

http://www.flickr.com/photos/bill26048/sets/72157633170732433/

The Zeppelin manned by the ladies of the Fliegerschule proved the least effective unit on the day failing to score a single hit from its light machine gun!


The shape of things to come......

 

Good game – it was a rare outing for our WWI figures.  The vast bulk of the figures are by Renegade Miniatures except for the Belgians who are Great War Miniatures.  We really need to add artillery to the French and Belgian forces and we probably need more cavalry.  Is there any source of early WWI French artillery crew other than Foundry FPW figures?