First Bull Run a refight.

Last week John hosted a battle that we had never fought before, The First Bull Run and what an encounter it turned out to be. Both armies were made up of poorly trained regulars and 'led' by barely trained commanders, so perfect for my type of generalship.

 Even better we used probably our favourite wargames rules, Volley and Bayonet. These rules for brigade sized games were written by Frank Chadwick and Greg Novak and released in 1994! [was it that long ago?] and from their first release we used them. They were perfect for our large 6mm armies and whilst appearing simple to use were in fact very subtle and needed some careful thought.

The initial problem for the Confederates is that they have no commanders with their troops! and therefore the player has to throw a dice which on a 5 or 6 allows the troops to be classed as 'in command'. Other brigades which fail their throw are classed as out of command and can only move half their normal move and if they do move they are classed as disordered, and cannot move towards any visible enemy, so just a few issues initially for the rebels.

The Union meanwhile have brigades stacked up on the entry points and not where they need to be.The confusion was to cause the Union a lot of problems in attempting to seize up to three of the five objectives on the battlefield in order to gain a victory.

It was a battle that started in confusion using troops barely trained but in truth it was to the credit of the real life troops that they performed at all.

As Union commander my biggest issues initially were the fact that the main objectives were scattered across the battlefield and my troops were well away from them giving time for the rebels to get organised.

John suffered from lack of commanders initially but somehow was able to organise his response better than me.By the time I was ready to drive the rebels from the field, Beauregard and Jackson had appeared to steady the rebel ship.

I attempted to co-ordinate my attack against Henry Hill but found the woods around the base offered the rebels a great defensive position. I attempted to drive their smaller division away from the woods three times and failed completely.

Luckily I was able to grab three easier objectives and cling to them although John nearly recovered one by the judicious use of Hampton's cavalry.I managed to chase their coup de main away and hold on with a very weak brigade. At the end of the game I could actually claim a victory, but only just. My divisions were in danger of collapse whilst the Rebels still had troops capable of fighting but no where near any objectives. So a Union victory but hardly a resounding one. I'll take it though, beggars cant be choosers. So what about the rules? Well we both thought they were as good as we remembered them and they were easy to pick up again. They are a credit to the writers that these rules are still a great set to use.