ACTION AT NÉRY

        Western Front 1 September, 1914

Setting up

Amidst the splendour of an average Adelaide winter the table is constructed, terrain modified, rules rewritten, 10mm WW1 figures touched up, and sides decided.

Nery in lower Flanders slumbers in the mist and fog of early September 1914. The British 1st Cavalry Brigade under Brigadier Briggs has spread out through the village and is preparing to move off in the ongoing retreat after Mons. A patrol from the 11th Hussars reports Uhlans in the forest as the German artillery opens up.

Briggs orders the 5th Dragoon Guards to throw out two squadrons to guard the. Left flank. The mist hides everything and the Guards peer into the ravine.

The 11th Hussars race forward to man the leading edge of the houses bordering the ravine. They have nowhere near enough troops to man the necessary frontage.

L battery Royal Horse Artillery should never have been here; they straggled behind the Corps assets and came into Nery late. The 6 guns of the battery were lined up between the Main Street and the ravine with the limbers in pole down condition awaiting the renewed retreat. Hurriedly the gun sergeants attempt to get the guns into action. The Battery Major is killed in the first barrage. Targets appear out of the mist and disappear just as quickly. It is impossible to range the guns accurately. 

On the far right near the sugar beet refinery the 2nd Dragoon Guards take cover behind a sunken road. Runner have been sent to Corps HQ urgently seeking reinforcements. However given the army is meant to continue the retreat, it is unknown whether any assistance can be provided. 

1st Brigade peers into the mist.

2nd DG catch a glimpse  of what appears to be a Brigade sized mounted force approaching on the Refinery road. These are full strength German cavalry units and the 2nd DG feel very outnumbered. 

On the left 5th DG see another cavalry Brigade emerge from the woods and form a firing line along the edge of the ravine.

Not to be outdone, the 11th think they can identify an entire machine gun company and a full regiment of 77mm artillery. 

Briggs receives the various reports stoically atop his lookout in the Main Street. If the reports are accurate he is up against a full cavalry division with an attached field artillery regiment and brigaded machine guns. He estimates that the Brigade is outnumbered and outgunned by about 3:1. He can only pray that the reinforcements arrive in time. The only advantages he has are good old British pluck and the SME Lee Enfield rifle in expert hands.

Next time : Tsog gets down to the desperate biffo.