Fireships for Xmas!

Burning of the Royal James at the Battle of Solebay -Willem van de Velde.

On the run into Xmas, I have allotted my current modelling time to working on some projects for friends and fellow naval enthusiasts, which for one of them has seen me embark on some work to produce some seventeenth century fireships for my pal 'Captain Steve' whose company I have enjoyed on several of my own French Revolutionary and Napoleonic projects, but whose real passion is for an earlier period in the age of sail that has seen him dallying with Mr Barry Hilton's amazing models that accompany his Mad for War rules, and which I have enjoyed seeing up close at shows like Partizan in previous years.

Barry Hilton's marvellous game recreating the Dutch attack on the Medway, seen at Partizan in 2022
JJ's Wargames - Partizan 2022

Barry has produced some extraordinary vistas with his models and terrain boards that really bring to life the battles that characterised the post English Civil War period and of course the Anglo-Dutch War, and I find his work very inspirational for my own efforts, in a completely different era and scale of age of sail, but with plenty to admire in the modelling skills on show.

Mad for War Facebook Page
The League of Augsburg Shop - Mad for War

I have spent the last four and bit years working on 1:700 age-of-sail models that I can virtually build, paint and rig in my sleep these days, and so turning to focus on some 1:1200 models caused me to do a bit of planning prior to starting them, scouring all the sites, YouTube videos and other sources for painting and modelling ideas before preparing these little masterpiece sculpts for putting together, they needing to be affixed to the bases they are supplied with, which is a nice touch if you prefer using acrylic clear bases instead, and then priming them prior to painting. 

A fire ship or fireship is a vessel deliberately set on fire to be used against enemy ships during a ramming attack or similar manoeuvre, and have been used to great effect against wooden ships throughout naval military history; with the prospect of a fiery demise also serving as a considerable shock and awe strategy to harm the morale of enemy crews.

A depiction of an 18th century French fireship displaying its specialized features that include an exit door between the two aftmost gunports; the chain securing an escape boat; an aperture below the exit door to light a fuse; and grappling hooks on the yardarms.

Ships often used for fireship tactics were sometimes surplus, obsolete or purpose-built vessels filled with gunpowder or other combustibles, but could also be improvised from active warships purposefully set on fire during engagements, such as if a vessel expended its munitions or had some other reason to be abandoned in battle.

The systematic use of fire ships as part of naval actions peaked around the Third Anglo-Dutch War, with the Battle of Solebay in 1672, the opening battle of the Third Anglo-Dutch War, 1672-74, seeing both the Dutch and English fleets employing some 20 and 30 fire ships.  

The Burning of the Royal James at the Battle of Solebay, 28 May 1672 - Willem van de Velde, the Younger.
In the left foreground is a Dutch ship sinking, viewed from off the port bow, with only the fore part above the water but with bowsprit and foremast still standing. This is presumably a fireship expended in an attempt to burn the 'Royal James'. The 'Royal James dominates the right side of the painting. She is shown in port-broadside view with Jan van Rijn's fireship, the 'Vrede', in flames and about to run aboard her by the fore chains. The 'Royal James' has her torn topsails set and her fore and main courses have the clews hauled up. Sandwich's blue flag at the main is blowing out in the light wind. Men are shown jumping overboard and hanging to the rigging to avoid the fire both fore and aft. In the right foreground is the ship's boat in which the fireship's crew is escaping after setting light to their vessel.

On the evening before the battle, Admiral Edward Montagu, 1st Earl of Sandwich, urged the Duke of York to take the fleet to sea to avoid the risk of being surprised by the Dutch while at anchor on a lee shore in Solebay (Southwold Bay, Suffolk) on the English east coast. 

Admiral Edward Montagu, 1st Earl of Sandwich

The advice was not taken and the Dutch fleet, commanded by Lieutenant-Admiral Michiel de Ruyter, did appear and attacked Sandwich's unsupported squadron in the bay. 

Sandwich, in the 'Royal James', 100 guns, was heavily engaged with the squadron of Admiral Van Ghent, who sent in two fireships. The 'Royal James' sank them both but a third fireship, commanded by Jan van de Rijn, grappled the English flagship and set her ablaze. When she was engulfed by the flames Sandwich tried to escape by boat, but it was swamped by people who jumped into her with him and he was drowned.

In time, admirals and captains became very experienced with the limitations of fire ship attacks and had learned how to avoid them during battle, seeing a great numbers of fire ships expended during the Third Dutch War without destroying enemy men-of-war, and seeing the use of fire ships as more of a way to harass and annoy the enemy, rather than destroy him. 

The successful use of fire ships at the Battle of La Hogue and Cherbourg in 1692 marked both the greatest achievement of a fire ship attack since the Spanish Armada, and also the last significant success for fire ships. 

These little models, and boy are they little after working with 1:700, were a very pleasant excursion from my normal painting roster and if you have a desire to build yourself a fleet from this era I would have no hesitation in recommending them as being very satisfying in terms of enough detail to be able to highlight and to the eye as a group of models when seen on the table.

This period of naval warfare is one I have never gamed so I will be looking forward to Steve building his collection so I might get to have a go, and my interest has certainly been peeked by the scenarios and glorious Mad for War rule book that has lots more in it in terms of scenarios, fleet lists and painting guides and other associated topics.

https://www.leagueofaugsburg.com/shop/product-1196.html

However I still have lots to occupy my time with, with several age of sail projects already in the ship yard to be getting on with for the foreseeable and a new fleet project to be worked on in the next twelve months which I will be showcasing in the next post.

As regards to other Xmas projects for friends, work has now turned to some merchant ships and Indiamen, followed by some privateers and naval raiders, that I have promised for Jack and his son Charlie - more anon

JJ

The Battle of Borodino, 7th September 1812 - Let the Festive Season Begin!

Panorama of Borodino by Franz Roubaud.

As we all know wargaming and wargamers, is and are, very much about the social side of our hobby, yes you can do the thing solo and if you live in a very large country where your fellow wargamers are thin on the ground then that might be your only option to play, but here in the UK we are fairly thick on the ground compared to other parts of the world, with a strong club culture that encourages getting together with friends around a table to roll bones and talk rubbish, and so with the start of the Season of Goodwill to our Fellows, what better way to express that goodwill than getting together to recreate another dramatic moment in military history.

Previous Festive Games at Chez Clive.
https://jjwargames.blogspot.com/2021/12/battle-of-antietam-in-grand-manner-fire.html
https://jjwargames.blogspot.com/2023/12/big-xmas-game-sword-beachhead-and.html

Here in our part of the world, I and friends who have been playing these daft games with each other over many years have developed a calendar of events that just seem to have become a regular thing over time and I now associate different seasons in the calendar with such a gathering; and a journey up to North Devon to join friends at Chez Clive is one such event, which in previous get-togethers has seen us enjoy battling away in the Normandy bocage or the Sunken Road at Antietam.

Borodino or Bust ! Our table plan for the day, viewed from Russian lines with 'Yours Truly' taking  command out on the Russian left flank under Lieutenant General Nikolay Alexeyevich Tuchkov, in front of Utitsa (5) bottom left, The Fleches redoubts and elements of Lieutenant General Borozdin's 8th Infantry Corps in and around the village of Semyonovskaya (3).

This year it was Borodino or Bust! to put a title on the planned fun with a big 15mm Napoleonic recreation of the famous 1812 encounter on the road to Moscow between Napoleon Bonaparte Emperor of the French and Prince Mikhail Illarionovich Golenishchev-Kutuzov-Smolensky,  Field Marshal of the Russian Empire.

The positions of the two armies at dawn on the 7th September 1812.

The Battle of Borodino or "Battle of Moscow" took place near the village of Borodino on 7th September 1812 during Napoleon's invasion of Russia, at which the Grande Armée won the battle against the Imperial Russian Army, but failed to gain a decisive victory and suffered tremendous losses. 

After the Battle of Borodino, Napoleon remained on the battlefield with his army whilst the Imperial Russian forces retreated in an orderly fashion southwards, and because the Imperial Russian army had weakened the Grande Armée, they allowed the French occupation of Moscow, using scorched-earth tactics on their own population to trap Napoleon and his men with their own capital; a plan I should mention, they developed from their observation of the Duke of Wellington's scorched-earth retreat through Portugal in front of Marshal Massena's army to Lisbon and the Lines of Torres Vedras in 1810, that had a similar effect on a French army used to living off the land on extended supply lines.

Our table set up for play to commence looking north with the village of Utitsa (5) bottom right.

Approximately a quarter of a million soldiers were involved in the battle, and it was the bloodiest single day of the Napoleonic Wars, with the French estimated to have lost some 28,000–35,000 killed, wounded or captured, together with 50 generals, whilst the Russians suffered an estimated 40,000–53,000 killed, wounded or captured along with 27 generals. Napoleon himself summed up the battle and its ambiguous outcome, writing, "The French showed themselves worthy of victory and the Russians of being invincible."

The table from the north looking south with the village of Borodino (1) behind the River Kalatsha, centre right (number reference to our table plan above).

Napoleon fought against General Mikhail Kutuzov, whom the Emperor Alexander I of Russia had appointed to replace Barclay de Tolly on the 29th of August 1812 after the Battle of Smolensk, and the failure of the Grande Armée to completely destroy the Imperial Russian army, and in particular Napoleon's reluctance to deploy his Imperial Guard, for various reasons, has been widely criticised by historians as a large blunder, as it allowed the Imperial Russian army to continue its retreat into territory increasingly hostile to the French. That said, many historians have never run a police state where their hold on power relies on their ability crush any opposition within their capital city, thousands of miles away with a loyal corps of elite-veteran soldiers that haven't been thrown away in a useless frontal assault - just saying!

For our game, Clive had dug out his collection of vintage Minifigs 15mm French and Russian Napoleonics and was using the new rules from Jervis Johnson and the Perry's - Valour and Fortitude (V&F), which I had never played before, but had seen a few videos outlining how they worked, and I see are free online on the Perry's website, link below.

https://www.perry-miniatures.com/valour-fortitude/vf-rules/

I don't intend to take up too much space describing the rules as I know there is plenty of discussion about them elsewhere, other than to say that I had to smile at Mr Johnson's assertively provocative quote below from his introduction page which I think very much captures the ethos behind what you will find in V&F and the game it will generate.

'As well as keeping the rules short and precise, I have tried to make sure I avoided what a colleague at Games Workshop once memorably referred to as “game designer ****wittery”. What they were referring to with this pithy phrase was the tendency of games designers to come up with rather avant-garde or overly complicated rules, when using a more traditional or straightforward approach would have worked just as well.'

If you find yourself preferring more, “game designer ****wittery”, then V&F might not be for you, but as I always say, rules are like shoe sizes and just because I take a size 8 and you take a size 10, it doesn't make either of us wrong.

The view from behind the Russian right flank, with obligatory string on the table, together with various labels, to make it easier for the players to differentiate one command from another at the start of the game.

So with our table set up, everyone sufficiently refreshed with an appropriate morning brew we sorted out our commands with me taking the Russian brigades of Lieutenant General Nikolay Alexeyevich Tuchkov, together with elements of Lieutenant General Borozdin's 8th Infantry Corps looking to hold my ground around the village of Utitsa on the extreme Russian left flank up to and including the Fleche redoubts and the village of Semyonovskaya, with to my front the forbidding massed infantry columns, cavalry squadrons and gun batteries of Marshal's Davout's I Corps and Ney's III Corps, seemingly well set to crush the 'speed-bump' of a force I had ready to oppose their advance. 

  

The troops of Lieutenant General Borozdin's 8th Infantry Corps in and around Semyonovskaya.

However that 'wily old fox' Kutuzov had selected the position before Borodino precisely because of the terrain-force multipliers it offered, with the restricted avenues of advance towards the Russian main line sheltered behind ridges and woods with well placed dug in heavy guns sited to play on the French troops as they marched forward into the carefully prepared kill zones preparatory to a swift Russian counterattack.

The Russian centre, troops of Lt. General Raevsky's 7th Corps in and around the formidable Raevsky Redoubt.

Now all we had to do, as the Russian commanders, was to see if we could pull off General Kutuzov's plan by making best use of our position, coupled with a few smiles from 'Fortuna' as the dice tumbled to the bottom of the tower.

The lead elements of Prince Eugène's IV Corps advance from the village of Borodino.

With the Russian right flank effectively refused with the curve of the River Kalatsha  leaving acres of open ground in front of the Russian positions for Prince Eugène's IV Corps to cross, the heaviest fighting would, as it historically did, fall on the Russian centre and left flanks as Ney and Davout having a shorter approach march were able to close more quickly, with the bulk of their troops.

The balance of Prince Eugène's IV Corps, consisting of French line units and the Italian Guard bringing up the rear.

However the terrain played its part with the multiple river crossings and gaps between hills and woods causing bottlenecks with not enough deployment room to allow the French to achieve a decisive numerical advantage, and very often restricting the room for the different units of guns, infantry and cavalry to work together in that 'golden' all-arms formation which is Napoleonics at its best.

Marshal's Davout's I Corps (right) and Ney's III Corps (left) with elements of the Imperial Guard to their rear Ready to assault the Russian left and centre ahead.

Thus the early exchanges saw the Russian heavy guns secure in their redoubts take a heavy toll of French infantry columns coming forward as Russian infantry moved into woods to help break up and delay the French advance to allow the gunners to have more time to do their work.

Davout's lead elements begin the advance on Utitsa, skirting the woodland before the village.

Kutuzov's plan appeared to be working well as French infantry were mauled on the approach march with several units dispersed before the French and allied troops of Ney and Davout's corps were able to assemble an assault mass before the Fleches and Utitsa.

Cossacks under Major-General Karpov, move forward to cover the flank of the heavy foot guns manning the Fleche redoubt, as Ney advances with a mix of infantry and cavalry.

Pavlovski Grenadiers and the 1st Grenadier Division, along with Russian heavy cavalry wait in reserve behind the Raevsky redoubt.

However with the arrival of French troops in force ready to assault, they were forced to delay as the Russians brought up reserves, as yet untouched by the preceding shot and shell, which saw initial French attempts to attack with individual units beaten back with loss, compelling the French commanders to bring forward more artillery to batter the Russian positions preparatory to a full on attack by multiple units.

Polish lancers, Chaaseur a Cheval and Hussars of Sebastiani's Cavalry Corps await the order to advance.

This forced break in the seemingly irresistible French advance saw the first significant clashes as Karpov's Cossacks clashed with Poniatowski's hussars around Utitisa, Stroganov's grenadiers met Davout's line infantry in the woodlands close by, whilst the Russian gunners in the Fleche's and Reavsky redoubt continued to ply the French troops amassing before them with heavy 12lb roundshot.

The advance begins.

The fighting was battering both the attackers and defenders, with the Russians slightly on top in terms of standards captured, measured by the number of units dispersed, and indeed whole brigades dispersed as a result of the losses, and as we moved into the last phases of play, both forces braced themselves for the final battles to secure ascendancy in this struggle.

 

Prince Eugène's men prepare to cross the River Kalatsha above Borodino.

The view from the rear of Ney's corps as his forward elements press forward.

With the Russian defences somewhat softened up, the French assault began in earnest with Utitsa attacked from two sides by French guns and infantry before the latter moved into the streets to clear the Russian garrison.

The battle to take the Fleches reaches a climax as French cuirassier and infantry attack the Russian guns as Russian grenadiers move up in support.

Then this success was swiftly followed up by an assault on the rightmost redoubt of the Fleches that saw the French infantry attack with elan but the Russian gunners grimly holding on, battered but undefeated only to see the French expelled by a swift counterattack by Russian grenadiers.

Undaunted the second French assault went in against the second redoubt, this time initiated by French cuirassiers who clambered into the gun positions sabring the gunners desperately seeking shelter under their twelve pounders and unicorns as the Pavloski Grenadiers now badly shot up met the following French infantry.

French infantry clamber over the redoubts to attack the Russian gunners at the point of the bayonet.

The French attack managed to take the position but not without losses by which time Lieutenant General Borozdin had marched his Grenadiers across from behind Semyonovskaya to form another line of resistance for the survivors to fall back behind, creating a very historical feel to the end of our battle, with both forces severely battered but with the Russians likely forced to withdraw once again leaving Napoleon controlling the battlefield.

With the evening drawing in we concluded our game after a very enjoyable day doing what wargamers do best, having fun with the toys.

Thank you to Clive our host and to Mike, Mark, Everett, Nick and Steve M for our game.

Seasons Greetings to one and all and looking forward to the next adventure.

JJ