Bir Hacheim Refight

Hello Again. After a number of minor disasters at home I had to spend time reorganising my house furniture while a new carpet was fitted. Now I a, back to normality and posting the Bir Hacheim refight which took place on Saturday 10th November at the New Buckenham Historical Wargames Club.

Here is the table. I set this up in the morning using the staging tables from the village hall and the trench and barb wire sections from my collection. The joins between the tables were covered in 2" wide masking tape and the surface scattered with Cotswold buff stone chippings and loose sand. This game represented the south west corner of the defences and allowed the attackers to have plenty of space to deploy their forces. 

In the actual battle German and Italian forces sent patrols out to cut the barb wire surrounding most of the perimeter and remove the mines from the minefield. I included a number of points where the wire had been broken.

The game started with a pre game bombardment The German forces approached from the left hand side of the table. They penetrated the barb wire line but their losses steadily mounted.

The armoured forces kicked up a lot of dust as they advanced. 

Supported by infantry.

Meanwhile on the other side of the table the Italian forces advanced and also took some losses before they had reached the barb wire. With the infantry support lorry borne and behind the tank I decided that the dust kicked up by the tanks would not allow the defenders to spot anything behind them, as long as the tanks were still moving.

Although the attackers knew their opponents were manning the trench sections the defenders did not place their troops on the table until they had been spotted by their enemies. This stopped the Italians and Germans from planning their attack based on what they could see of the defenders forces but on what they know of the defences instead. That is why the positions in the picture above are empty at the moment.

The defenders found themselves under artillery fire as they were spotted by the enemy artillery, (especially the Italians), who fulfilled their competent 'Royal' status by keeping many defenders heads down as their tanks approached.

Here a unit of Italian artillery plan their next salvo.

The German artillery divisional artillery also contributed to this tactic.

The French defenders maintained a steady fire, despite a number of their positions being masked by smoke for part of their game.

Some Free French forces moved in to position where the Axis appeared most threatening.

The Italians lost their reconnaissance unit quickly but this helped them locate the French gun positions which were neutralised before their infantry assaulted the trench line.

Once through the barb wire the German Recce unit fared little better.

As you can see! Thankfully the tanks following them up took the space they left and proceeded to the trench line.

French reinforcements ran to the second trench line, opposite the German attack. Despite their losses they continued their attack.

Also the Italian forces reached the entrance of the defensive box. Looking behind them they could see the losses inflicted by the defenders.

Here through the smoke the Italian infantry breached the trench line and fought their way along the line.

As we came to the end of the day it was apparent that while the attackers had many losses they would not have been easily evicted from the first trench line they now occupied.

This was a very enjoyable game which kept everyone occupied and both sides had their minor victories for the day.

Further pictures are available on the New Buckenham Historical Wargamers facebook page here.

The photographs used here are a mix of my own and some from the above facebook page.

I shall post a feature on the changes I made to the Rapid Fire rules and in the future I shall write a feature for Wargames, Soldier Strategy magazine.