The Battle of Almanza 25th April 1707 (Refight)

Before I detail my report of the Battle of Almanza game at the club on Monday night, I shall recap on other things first. Monday morning I rang up Vendel again to enquire about my order. Once again they apologised but did seem a little mixed up as to whether they had sent it or not. Once again, I told them my details though this time I mentioned I was from the Grimsby Wargames Society, had left some posts in their forum and that Derek at Vendel did say he was going to put a link back to us on the Vendel site. He was still interested in doing so. Derek also mentioned that Vendel had recently been in Wargames Illustrated, which I did not know at the time. I will have to get a copy. Once he had made the connection between myself and the club and checked up my details he said that I should receive them on Tuesday. Tuesday came but the Border Reivers still hadnt.

The Battle of Almanza 1707 refight was huge. Paul had set it all up on the day before for that game. He had also written up details of each army, which were:
ANGLO-PORTUGESE ARMY:EARL OF GALWAY (pictured)

(on right) 4 BATTALIONS PORTUGESE, 7 SQUADRONS PORTUGESE HORSE,
2 FIELD PIECES
(centre) 4 BATTALIONS ENGLISH, 4 BATTALIONS DUTCH, 6 BATTALIONS PORTUGESE ,1 FIELD PIECE
(left) 4 ENGLISH BATTALIONS, 3 SQUADRONS PORTUGESE HORSE, 5 SQUADRONS DUTCH HORSE, 2 SQUADRONS PORTUGESE DRAGOONS, 5 SQUADRONS ENGLISH DRAGOONS, 1 FIELD PIECE

FRANCO-SPANISH ARMY: DUKE OF BERWICK (pictured)
(on left) 6 SQUADRONS FRENCH HORSE, 4 SQUADRONS SPANISH HORSE, 2 SQUADRONS FRENCH DRAGOONS, 2 SQUADRONS SPANISH DRAGOONS, 1 FIELD PIECE
(centre) 14 FRENCH BATTALIONS,
12 SPANISH BATTALIONS,
2 FIELD PIECES
(right) 10 SQUADRONS SPANISH HORSE, 2 SQUADRONS SPANISH DRAGOONS, 2 FIELD PIECES

Myself, Paul Robinson and Ron Skeet were on the Franco-Spanish side. Andy Hamilton and Mark Alcock were the Anglo-Portugese. Ron took the left, Paul took the centre with me on the right. All my figures were spanish. There were 3 artillery guns I was able to fire. As usual, I took my own photos. There was a tough fight in the centre of the table. I could not see how well or not Ron was doing. For quite some time, I didn't do too badly before Mark's british had broken through with infantry and had begun to take the hill I was on. I only missed a few times with my artillery but otherwise always got some kills. One of my artillery guns kept killing Mark's british horse. Mark's horse even charged that same artillery gun unsuccessfully before skulking away. If nothing else on this game, I thought my artillerying and my dice throwing were quite good. Most of the photos I took were from my part of the game. Both my spanish and mark's british horse started meleeing at one point as I had charged towards him. The Melee was still in progress when the game finished. The photos are below.

A View of the centre of the table showing both sides as they had begun clashing. Note those rings on the infantry.







A Close-up of some of the British Infantry facing me with a view of his field guns and artillery in the background







The Melee between my spanish horse and mark's british horse. As the Melee continued, the horse in the background of this photo joined in along with his general. My general also joined in which is when I lost him.

A really good game. Probably the biggest I've taken part in since I came back to the club earlier this year. During the night Danny Malone dropped by to see us. We hadn't seen him in months. There was also a Seven Years War game going on upstairs between Tony Walmsley and Dave Hewins. On this occasion I did not get to take photos of that game being so caught up in this one.
Martin Buck lent me the book "The Red Badge of Courage" set in The American Civil War. I did not have a bag so asked Mark to look after it so I could pick it up another day.
Paul's game report of the Battle of Almanza can be found on his blog at http://grimsbywargaming.blogspot.com/2007/04/almanza_24.html
The History of this battle can be found at the Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Almansa