G company's attack on the heights of Bois de Grand Fontaine

G company's attack on the heights of Bois de Grand Fontaine

To mark the 100 year anniversary of the US entering ww1 Kati and I decided to do something special(at least to us).

Obviously, we decided to to a ww1 scenario, and we wanted to use our Americans. But to add a personal touch to it we did something I have been throwing around a long time: we built a scenario around a battle my great-grandfather, Ronald Cleland was in.

First, while I never met my great-grandfather my grandfather talked about him quite often.  He was obviously in ww1 and his unit was:

5th division

The Red Diamond Division

9th brigade  

61st regiment 

2nd battalion

G company

we have his helmet and it still has the red diamond on it.

A while back I shifted through the 5th division's official history of ww1 and found a section on the battle of  Saint-Mihiel in September 1918. Saint-Mihiel is an interesting battle in itself as it was the first American planned offensive of the war(not the first battle just the first offensive that Perishing planned and was the commander of)  As I read on I found an account fro.m the battle of that actually referenced my great grandfather's unit down to the company! It was a short passage about an event that happened on September 16th, 1918.  I will go ahead and quote it, the highlighted section is about his company:

Orders were issued for the relief of the Sixth and Eleventh by

the Ninth Brigade on the night of the l5-16th. At 7 o'clock Major

Bankhead (11/61) and Major Baldwin (11/60) advanced from their

support positions in rear of Bois Gerard to take over the outpost

lines of Major Mahin's (I/ll) and Major Leonard's (III/6) battalions.

The Army Objective Line, or main line of resistance, through

Bois Gerard and Hill 361.4, was taken by Major Henley (1/61) on

the right. Lieutenant Colonel McClure (III/61) in the center, and

Major Davis (III'60) on the left. Major Palen took over the Intermediate

Position with the first battalion of the Sixtieth. The

troops of the Tenth Brigade moved back to the old positions north of the Metz highway.

On the east half of the sector, Major Bankhead's (11-61) troops

went forward with instructions to occupy the heights of Bois de

Grand Fontaine. Companies G and H on the left advanced without

finding any signs of the enemy and at 7:00 a. m. of the 16th had

almost reached the crest of the ridge in Grand Fontaine before they were discovered. Seven machine guns were captured and their crews killed. Others were routed and the height was won. 

This is a map of the section of the line the 5th division was assigned.

Thanks to google maps I was able to pinpoint the heights referenced in the history and the line of attack they would have taken.

The heights were defended by 123rd Saxon Division A unit that had been in the war since 1915 and had fought on both the western and eastern fronts.  By this point in the war, it was a shell of its former self but I have to assume it still had some core veterans built in

Using this info we put together a very simple ww1 scenario using Chain of Command.  This is such a tiny event in history but seeing as its huge to me I was beyond excited to do it.

we basically built a table with a hill covering the north edge with some trench works but we made it patchy on purpose as the 123rd had only been there 2 days.  the base of the hill was mostly forest but I figured anyone that was building a defense would have cleared some area in front of the works.  We only used small craters as there was no bombardment mentioned in the record.

The objective was simple the American forces had to advance and take 2 points, part of the lower trench and the top most section of trench.

The American platoon from the 5th division was fresh and at full strength for the scenario.  I didn't give them any support as again I didn't know if they had any.

4 squads

1 bomber squad with nco, 5 bombers, and 6 rifles

1 rifle grenade squad with 3 rifle grenades and 4 rifles

1 rifle squad nco, and 17 rifles

1 support section with two teams each of 2 chauchat automatic rifles and 2 rifles.

As the 123rd Saxon Divison was understrength at the time I figured it would be best to make the platoon the same way.  

It had 3 sections 

2 sections were made up of an nco, 6 rifles, and 2 bombers

1 section had a MG team and 5 rifles.

We gave them 2 MMG as support as it is obvious from the record that MMGs were present.

the jump off points were pretty standard Kati(always the Germans) put two in the front trench and 1 in the top section.  Mine were pretty spread out in the woods.

We decided that one of her MMGs should and could start on the table in the sandbag bunker on the far left of her line.

The Germans had first phase and Kati went ahead and deployed everything but her spare mmg.  She had two  units in overwatch.

I started off with my rifle grenade section on the right-hand side of the field.  I was hoping they would wear down the defenses early on.  One of the german sections opened up on them and they lost a man.

I then deployed my Chauchat squad in the center.

The Germans spent their phase firing at the 2 squads.

And the doughboys returned fire from the tree line.

I deployed the almost unwieldy rifle squad on the right behind the grenades who were being pretty beat up.

The Germans pinned down the rifle grenades the next phase.

The rifle squad in classic ww1 American fashion got up and headed right in!

firefight in the center.

Take the MG boys!

the german center pinned down.

the rifle squad takes fire from the MMG.

The rifles jump right in and kill the mg crew to the man!

Katis center breaks...things are looking good for the doughboys.

Kati, ever the tactician begins to regroup and deploys her reserve MMG facing down the exposed rifle squad on her left.

My bomber squad enters on my left.

Kati gets a double phase and rattles my rifles with MG fire and grenades.

the bombers push forward.

The rifle squad breaks,  Kati then uses a CoC point to end the turn driving them from the table.  She also had her LT. clean the shock from her squad to keep them on.

I finally get in and throw grenades into the trench and make short work of the defenders.

they break and run.  not pictured the firefight in the center continued the whole game and at this point, I had rebroken the MG section.  I decided to end the turn and force her to take 2 moral checks that pushed her moral to a 0 and ended the game.

Final shots of the table.  The game ended up being a lot closer than it may appear.  My moral at the end was a 3 and after losing the rifle squad there were a few phases where my assault was losing steam.  

It ended up being a pretty simple scenario but it was a lot of fun and we both hoped it did a homage to both my GG and anyone else that was there that day. 

Camulodunum 60AD

Ambush on the road to Camulodunum 60AD

Today Kati and I played a modified scenario(because we didn't have the same troops as the scenario) out of Warlords Hail Ceasar supplement Britania.  We plan on running this battle as an event at Little Wars this year and figured we had better play it a few times.

The battle itself is an interesting event that is almost washed over by Tacitus in his record of the Boudica rebellion of 60AD. it occurred early in the rebellion after the rebels sieged and sacked Camulodunum.
What he does say is this:


"The victorious enemy met Petilius Cerialis, commander of the ninth legion, as he was coming to the rescue, routed his troops, and destroyed all his infantry. Cerialis escaped with some cavalry into the camp, and was saved by its fortifications."

Not a lot to go on here but that does leave a lot of room to explore different scenarios.

What we can guess is that he didn't have his full legion as they were scattered around in garrisons and they were most likely ambushed on the road to Camulodunum and had no idea that the city had already been sacked.

We set up a pretty simple table with a road running down the middle and forest on both sides.

Kati deployed her warriors "secretly" by placing green squares with the name of the unit on the bottom.  Just for fun, we included a couple of dummy squares so that I wouldn't know exactly which were real.

The rules of the scenario were pretty simple.  The Romans had to march down the road in column formation unit the Britons army appeared.  At the beginning of any Brit turn the army could be revealed and placed on the table, but no initiative move could be used the first turn to represent the men waiting for the command to attack.

The Roman army was divided into two brigades:
the first consisting of 3 veteran roman legions(the first cohort) and 2 regular legions
the second was made up of auxiliaries: 3 medium infantry and  2 medium cavalry units.

The Britons were 3 brigades two of which contained 2 warbands, 2 skirmisher units, and a light chariot unit each.  The third contained 2 units of medium cavalry and 2 units of light cavalry.

I decided to lead the way with the auxiliaries on the first turn.  As there was no room for my second brigade they waited off table.  The road stayed quiet for the first turn.

I continued up the table at a crawl due to a bad command roll on the second turn.  The first legion did make it onto the table, though.

The third turn saw almost my entire command on the road....hmmm this looks like a good place for an ambush

The trap is sprung!

the attack is a little more piecemeal than Kati wanted, but her cavalry jumped right in and she got some of her men into short range.

the luck of the dice.  her chariots hit one of my auxiliary units and roll a 6 which causes them to make a break test....the only way to break is to roll snake eyes, which I do.  The ambush really got to the germans I guess.

One of my cavalry units breaks and runs as well.

battle at the close of turn 3.

I organized my forces to the best of my ability.  getting a legion into melee as well as some auxiliaries.

The Britons quickly enveloped my center

My last cavalry unit was probably the heroes of the day.  They stayed locked in melee almost the entire game and while being shaken never actually broke.

More auxiliaries breaking under pressure.

The last unit of auxiliaries falling.  This left the legions to fend off the hordes.

They weren't really motivated to stick around either.

My last line of defense consisted of 4 legions.  We pushed back the skirmishers and moved in for an epic last stand.

Or...I could roll snake eyes on a ranged attack break test again

I did manage to fend off one warband before the end.

We called the game as hordes began to envelop my force.  While I lost and was probably losing from the turn 3 on this was a fun game and I think it will be a blast for people to play.  We are going to try a few tweaks that might help the Romans see the trap.  I will update the blog with anything we discover.