Old Macfarlane's Farm A convention game in the making.

When my local gaming group decided to do some 40mm AWI gaming a few years back, I already had 1/72nd and 54mm armies, both aimed primarily at the Saratoga campaign.  While I didn't want to recreate them again and have very little interest in the campaigns further south (as in New Jersey or Pennsylvania let alone the Carolinas) I  did want to participate.  I  had some suitable Indians from my 40mm 1812 collection and some  F&IW Canadiens. I decided to build on these and look at the Oriskany campaign as a starting point.

The scene is set and the American militia have begun their advance.

Once I had a sufficient contribution to the group effort I slid it to the back burner but kept finding small numbers of the excellent Trident  AWI figures following me home from conventions. When I was looking for a game to run at Huzzah last year I didn't have enough AWI done so settled for a War of 1812 game based on Ft Meigs, Indians ambushing American militia on their way to relieve a fort beseiged by British troops.  This year I decided that if I put a push on and borrowed a few figures, I could have enough for Oriskany.  Lets see, American fort beseiged by British, relieving force of militia is ambushed by Indians ok, I could reuse the fort...oh.... ok, 2 historical scenarios from 2 separate wars but just variations on a theme. Maybe not 2 years in a row, even if there would be wagons and no river.

Gratuitous shot of elements of the 84th Foot or Royal Highland Emmigrants and the King's Royal Regiment of New York.

There are some interesting little fights on the Nova Scotia and Maine coasts including bombardments, shore landings and cutting out expeditions not to mention Nova Scotia rebels besieging Fort Cumberland but I don't  have the right figure mix, ships or terrain......... yet. So the search for a scenario began again. For a game rather than a test I like to use historical actions as inspiration rather than worry about precise numbers,  unifoms and terrain so having found a suitable action I set to work.

So it is that a force of Indians and Tories have camped at Macfarlane's Farm on their way home after a successful raid in the Mohawk Valley. Come morning, scouts bring news that a small force of Rebel militia is hot on their heels. They decide to wait and give them a drubbing.

Morgan's Riflemen lead the Belmont Blues and other Continental units along a forest path to cut the Loyalists retreat.

For the first game I decided to give  each "player" a commander and 3 x 8 man "companies" in the  old style. Since I removed both multi-company battalions and the replacement battleline rule, the companies were on their own for morale and to maintain dressing using variable length moves. At first the attacking militia showed admirable restraint, not taking advantage of long rolls, using commanders to chivy along lagging units. Then the shooting started and discipline crumbled. The more excited the player became the easier it was to let units get scattered and isolated on the attack.

 The attack by a single company on the gun didn't go too well and the right hand commander apparently forgot about the possibility of indians emerging from the woods behind his flank. Oddly so had the indians for several turns but they woke up to the possibility first, or maybe they just got bored.

Realistic enough but I'm running a game not a training session for would be battalion commanders. I've been down that route before with these rules. Since most of the militia companies were already shaken as well as being surrounded, I decided to play the next turn   and then reset.

5 or 6 turns after I decided  to quit an attack by the regulars looked like it might reverse the decision.
At least I was having fun.

So, 7 or 8 turns later when the flank attack by continental units which had almost turned the tide was finally repulsed,  and after the indians who were being shot to pieces  by the riflemen made a desperate charge with warclubs, unexpectedly scattering their tormentors,  I finally did  manage to reset.

OK I guess not. Shortly after this shot the Highlanders fired a devastating volley before charging with the bayonet and sweeping the field.

So, I shifted the terrain a bit, added more troops, reorganized the units and  so on then played a bigger, better, more exciting,  closer game, but that's another post.