The Rail Bridges - Battle of France 1940 Chain of Command

You should complete the writeup soon after, preferably the day of, the game. Unfortunately weeks have passed and a lot has happened since we played this penultimate battle of our Chain of Command Montmedy campaign, so I've forgotten exactly what happened. However, I do remember it was a great game, a great challenge and a learning experience.

The Mission

In the immediate aftermath of A Company's retreat from Verneuil-Grand in the face of 90. Aufklarungs' rapid advance, 11 Platoon, B Company of the 12th Derwents was tasked with holding the railway overpass and the bridge over the River Chiers while engineers from 5 Platoon could arrange their demolition. The railway line enters Montmedy, and the Derwents have been ordered to defend the town. However, considering the speed of the German advance, the higher-ups expect the town to fall, so demolishing the rail line at these points is considered important to slow any German rail movements into Montmedy.

We played the 'Going Out With A Bang' scenario from the Blitzkrieg 1940 handbook, with slight modifications to fit the map positions of the 'culverts' to be blown.

The mission map (Google Maps plus edits in MS Paint).

11 Platoon, I decided, would be a bit more representative of a hastily-raised and -trained Territorial Army formation, which the 12th Derwents (kind of) are. Therefore 11 Platoon, under the leadership of Sergeant-Major Silvester Victor, are a green-level LOC Platoon, but hey, at least they have a (single) Bren gun. In support I brought two Engineer Demolition Teams (required to blow the rail bridges), a Vickers MMG and an extra couple of guys with an AT Rifle.

The Battle

The Germans had the first turn, so coming down the road were a section of a motorcycle recon platoon and a full platoon of armoured cars.

First turn. The bypassed Maginot casemate is on-table but was not part of the battle.

The first Brits on the table were an Engineer Demolition team at the river bridge, who got to work immediately under the direction of Sgt-Maj Victor (no photos unfortunately), and a section to the north of the road to warn the Germans off too rapid an advance.

British rifle sections, with 2 Section in foreground, deploy to hold the rail overpass. (Peter Pig miniatures).

3 Section, in kilts, took a real battering but held the bend in the road (until they were whittled down and broken near the end of the game).

The Vickers MMG deployed to the hill and initially laid down some effective fire on advancing German motorcycle infantry. However, the Germans rapidly concentrated on, and broke them with fire from the motorcycle infantry and armoured cars.

A German armoured car leads the advance.

The British concentrated fire on an understrength motorcycle recon section on the road and wiped it out before it had a chance to deploy, inflicting some damage to the Germans' Force Morale. 2 Section contributed the most to this success, as Corporal Jerrold 'Napoleon' Hunnicut (no idea why, but the random name generator gave him that nickname) effectively used 'Five Rounds Rapid' to boost the section's firepower.

An understrength motorcycle recon section is destroyed on the road, as the German commander drives onward.

Ready ... NOW!

Meanwhile, the priority was always demolishing the rail bridges/overpasses. The engineers had rigged the rail bridge over the Chiers to blow and pulled back to the other side, just as a dismounted German motorcycle recon section arrived. I needed a full Chain of Command die to push the plunger, which I luckily already had - it was all in place - time to blow the bridge (and hopefully take out some Germans with it...)

... click

Nothing happened. There was no explosion.

I rolled to detonate the charges on the bridge and rolled a malfunction, meaning the charges had to be rigged again. Since the Germans were already on the bridge in strength and had started to remove the explosives, and with no second Chain of Command die in sight, I realised I had no choice but to concentrate on trying to get the second objective - the overpass - rigged to blow.

With two Engineer teams on the job it did not take long to get the explosives (almost) ready. However, getting a second Chain of Command die was just not happening (the downside of taking a Green LOC Platoon with only four Command Dice).

The explosives are 95% complete on the second demolition objective, but where is the plunger!?

The Second Objective

Also, German firepower was starting to tell, and 11 Platoon's Force Morale began to plummet as 1 and 3 Section (newly arrived on the hill) were driven off, and 2 Section was hit hard, even CPL Napoleon (I mean, CPL Hunnicut), was wounded. I was down to just two Command Dice at this point and barely a 5 was seen. With no way to blow the rail overpass, 11 Platoon had to retreat, leaving a few men behind as POWs and quite a few more dead.

11 Platoon is beaten. Check out all the shock!

After taking about 65-75% casualties, 11 Platoon is pretty well lost, though a few characters might be brought back for the next battle. Several of the 5 Platoon engineers were killed or wounded too, and of course the objectives were not met.

The next battle, Battle 6 of the campaign, is coming up in the near future. It is expected to be a big one, as the Germans assault the town of Montmedy directly, and the 12th Derwents will throw whatever they can into the fight!