Landing at Lemo 19 June 1808, AAR

As you know I during the summer buillt me a Gun Yawl for my Finnish War 1808 project and of course I needed to use it in a game:)

So I found the Landing at Lemo that took place on June 19 with landing and initial fighting and on the 20th the actuall battle at lemo took place rendering in the russians puching back the Swedes so they had to retreat back to the landing fleet.

Anyway... I put together a small scenario for Sharps Practice inspired bu the landing at lemo on the evening on the 19th June 1808. The area, slightely compressed, depicted on the gaming table are the area withing the red squar on the maps.

I have now have played it out two times, in the first game my matey Mattias commanded the Swedes and in the Second game my matey Jonas commanded the Swedes and I commanded the Russians in both games.

Below you will find OOB for both games, hade some adjustments for the second game using smaller forces to get a quicker game. For the Russians I used the Army list from TFL blog and for the Swedes I used my own army list that you can find in Wargames Soldiers and Starategy magazine Issue 86

OOB Game 1

Sweden

Officer III - Lieutenant von Vegensack (son to the Force commander Major General von Vegensack
Officer I
Colours
Musician
4 groups of Line Infantry

Officer I
1 Gun Yawl (Heavy artillery but may not use Controlled Volley)

Officer II
Officer I
2 groups of Line infantry Skirmishers (Light Infantry)

Russia

Officer III Colonel Vadovsky
Officer I
Officer I
Colours
Musician
2 groups of Line Grenadiers
4 groups of Line Infantry

Officer I
1 group of Hussars

Officer I
1 group of Heavy artillery with limber

OOB game 2

Sweden

Officer III - Lieutenant von Vegensack (son to the Force commander Major General von Vegensack
Colours
Musician
3 groups of Line Infantry

Officer II
2 groups of Line infantry

Officer I
1 Gun Yawl (Heavy artillery but may not use Controlled Volley)

Russia

Officer III Colonel Vadovsky
Colours
Musician
3 groups of Line Infantry

Officer II
2 groups of Line Grenadiers

Officer I
1 group of Line Jäger Skirmishers

In both games the Force Morale was 10 for each force. The Objective for the Swedes was to execute the littoral landing and seize the Russians primary Deployment Point to get a beach head. For the Russians the objective was to seize the Swedish primary deployment point to stop the littoral landing and throw the Swedes back in to the sea. In the first game we used only a Primary Deployment for each force but in the second game we used a Primary and a Secondary deployment point.

The two games developed in different ways, of course much due to the card activation and tiffin card that can be very hard at some occations, not letting you activate your units but it is also give a very good fog of battle effect that I really like.

Game 1

Here are a short re-cap of the first game. I splitted the 6 russian Units in 3 different units of 2 groups each sending 2 of them out on a quick march along the road as the last one was advancing forward the coast line through the farm. The Swedes started of lightly only deploying a group of skirmishers...much due to bacd activation cards...

My Russians got plenty of time to surounding the swedish Deployment Point so when the Swedes at last sent ashore their main unit and also sent in the Gun Yawl the Russians already had good possitions.

The final blow to the Swedes was the Russian Hussars that after some de tours managed to cross the fence and at the gallop charged in to a unit of Swedish Line Infantry... the Hussars had to withdraw but the 2 groups in the Swedish formation broke and the loss of Force Morale for the Swedes was to high... Russian Victory !

Game 2

This was a smaller game just 3 officer on each side and we also used an additionall Deployment Point for each force. I was opting for the same king of tactic in this game, leting my Russian forces use the road to make a quick advance to box in the Swedes by their Primary Deployment point. 

My plan worked fine to an start, my Skirmishers really made a rapid advance on the right flank aiming to capture one of the Swedish Deployment Points. My 2 groups of Grenadiers also made a good advance throught the small farm. BUT... my main unit under command of Colonel Vadovsky didn´t reallu live up to their reputation from the first game... road moves are good as you get an extra D6 in the move, but that dosent matter if you roll 1´s on most of the dices...several turns... and if the Commander manages to lose the Map of the area so he have to spend an entire activation to look for the way you won´t be to happy...

When my main Officer after several turns at last had found his way to his possition in the Battle line the Russian Grenadiers and Skirmishers was so beaten that they was on the run...

Swedish Victory !

Below you find pictures from both games.

Game 2