Barely able to Cope - Prestonpans, July 2021

Sleeves rolled up, need to get back to some rule writing and publishing. Next on the list is the late 17th/early 18th century rules, which now rejoice in the name "From Pike to Bayonet". They're basically "Va t'en guerre" and "Va t'en Ecosse", merged back into one another with some added mechanisms and a whole lot more playtesting.

For a quick game using the new variable "Confidence" rating for troops what would do better than Prestonpans from the '45 Rising, where the complete lack of confidence shown by the British cavalry was decisive. We were down on numbers, only having Jon and Richard available to play. Jon's report on the game is here.

Jacobites are to the left, the British are to the right. Yes, there's an industrial pre-steam rail track, with wooden rails and sleepers. The far end is a ditch that closes that flank off.

The green "tabs" sticking out the back of the units are Confidence Markers. There are four levels from "Fearless" to "Wavering", and they are allocated semi-randomly. The idea is that I'll put in scenarios and that for each brigade you'll be given a mix of predefined confidence cards, which are shuffled and placed. So for the cavalry here there were three units and eight cards, one Confident, three Unsteady and four Wavering. The best you can get then is one Confident and two Unsteady and the worst three Wavering. This should mean commanders have a general idea of how good each brigade is, but not be certain. The British infantry had a 50:50 mix of Confident and Unsteady, with one Wavering, and twice as many makers as units.

The opening positions are as they were historically, with both Jacobite wings wide apart having got separated in the foggy approach march. I need to look at the exact deployments for final publication, as they're probably too far apart.

Turn one, and the Jacobites go first. They move off a little bit tentatively (!) and Jonnie McFreitag rather than heading off madly to turn the flanks angled one of his clans in towards the infantry line.

Richard rather nervously enquired if his troops were set up for Platoon fire (yes they are) and then fired his artillery. This failed to inflict any hits, then all the gun crews ran away, which is what happened historically (this was pre-determined and not the result of any morale checks). Richard was non-plussed. However, he was moving his reserve cavalry to shore up his right flank.

Jon passed up the chance to rush through the vacant gun line and swung another clan regiment in towards the centre.

On the British left there was a charge/counter charge. Despite being Wavering (+2 is bad in this context) the cavalry charged. The Highlanders let off their volley, and the cavalry lost the melee, dropping to Shaken as well as being Wavering. Not looking good, but at least they didn't run away immediately, and were able to break off.

Jon has slowed his assault to bring Prince Charles' reserves into line. He's aiming, I think, to get all the clans in line and launch a massed charge at the infantry line. In the distance Richard gets clever, and passes his left hand dragoons regiment round the outside of the Highlander left flank.

Richard steps his infantry line forward, and delivers a round of Platoon Fire all along his front. He inflicts quite a bit of damage.

Undaunted, Jon charges home. Charges are resolved individually and first before any normal movement and firing. One of the British Regiments is revealed to be Confident. This may not be so easy for the Clansmen.

Their neighbours, despite being Unsteady stand in the face of the charge, and with the damage inflicted by their defensive volley, the Highlanders are broken.

On the left of the line, however, the Clans followed up on the retiring dragoons, and broke them.

The result of the first charging units is that the infantry line is holding relatively firm, and there's another Clan fleeing at the far end of the line. Two Jacobite units routing already!

On the right of the line the British battalion stands in the face of the Highland onslaught. Richard's dragoons that had scooted round the flank about faced, and stormed into the rear of the Highlanders.

Surprisingly the Cavalry were bounced (I need to go back and look at the dice scores needed to break the unit attacked in the rear) having inflicted minor damage, but failing to rout the target.

The next round of combat breaks the infantry on the right.

They also break the left hand end of the line.

The centre is more tense, with the British line holding on - just.

As you can see, the British centre  is holding, but the flanking infantry have caved in. Richard still has two cavalry units on his right, but his army is perilously close to its break point and alas for him Jon has rallied his routing clansmen.

It's desperation time now. Richard pushes his left hand battalion in the hope that he can avoid being outflanked whilst seeing off that rallying clan regiment, and maybe, just, kill Prince Charlie.

Alas, the other infantry battalion finally caves in and breaks, and that's game over.

As a rules writer I was pleased with the general thrust of the game and the eventual outcome. The changes made worked well, and the core mechanisms like the firing and the intimidation test held up fine. There were some issues that are ill defined and I resolved on the fly during the game.

My take on Prestonpans is that the infantry are unfairly maligned. The problem is that the cavalry on the flanks simply cave and flee, the Clansmen then swing in quickly and roll the line up from either end. Given the slowness of infantry formation changes for regulars in the period and the lack of need for much formation for the Highlanders (note to self - this needs looking at) then once the flanks are opened up there's little you can do, regardless of quality. Cope didn't have a lot of choices. He didn't have enough troops to form a second line - which is what makes the difference at Culloden - without ending up with being completely outflanked, regardless of the performance of his cavalry.

I realise this may be at odds with what "everybody knows" about the battle, but it fits the facts better, and is more believable than every British unit was rubbish and ran away when a Highlander shouted at them.