The Battle of Lessie's Moor : ECW using For King & Parliament

Steve came over for a game today and the table had been set up in readiness, using this play test scenario available on Simon Miller's website "Big Red Bat Cave".

Here are the combatants and their dispositions

and here's the back story

To fit my room, it was shrunk a little to 10' x 8', fighting across the central walk way. This is the Royalist side

and this the Parliamentarian

Steve won the toss, so his Parliamentarians moved first and his first effort was to get his left wing cavalry brigade forward and over the hedge line

His artillery opened fire

Plenty of noise and smoke - but they missed !

Not what the Parliamentarian commander expected !

Did I mention that a friendly land lord, Al Murray, has a pub in Lower Loxley ? 

Now the Royalists get to move and their right wing cavalry moves towards the enemy cavalry opposite

The Royalist Foot brigade also moves up

The Royalist cavalry have succeeded in charging the enemy brigade and immediately cause disorder to both of the Parliamentarian regiments

The Parliamentarian foot advance and exchange fire with the Royalist regiments 

Royalist cavalry over on their left have gone forward, turned ready to charge enemy infantry in the flank, only to fail their next command !

Naturally, Steve charges his cavalry into the exposed flank of the Royalists

Amazingly, they survive this and cause disorder to the attackers !

Over on the Royalist right, the two Parliamentarian cavalry regiments have broken and fled, the Royalists must pursue.

The Parliamentarian left flank continues to take hits

But the Royalist cavalry in the centre has broken and fled, so honours are even at this stage.

The Royalist Commander, Lord Pargetter moves forward with his Cuirassier Lifeguard unit

Steve's right flank cavalry now advance - a flurry of cards mark their progress

Royalist commanded shot have succeeded in beating off a Parliamentary cavalry attack and indeed have broken another unit

But its "tit for tat" as a Royalist infantry unit breaks through excess losses

The Royalist cavalry commander has managed to rally his pursuing horsemen, preventing them from disappearing from the field

Parliamentary dragoons have turned to face this new threat to their flank

Parliamentary cavalry attempted to charge some Royalist commanded shot but fail their command and get shot at for their troubles

Too many troops are leaving the field !

However, an inspired charge by Prince Gustavus Adolphus's regiment not only takes out an enemy regiment from the flank but breaks the rest of the Parliamentarian cavalry brigade 

These losses have tipped the balance - Steve had to surrender his remaining Victory tokens, so the Royalists had won in the nick of time.

This was a closely fought contest and could have gone either way, so quite absorbing - and yes, if you are wondering, we did go to the pub for lunch !