When, on the second day at the bloody battle of Chickamauga, Confederate General James Longstreet's devastating attack sent reeling the Federal Corps of McCook and Crittenden, the outlook seemed black for the Union. But doughty old General George H. Thomas refused to be shifted from his earthworks on the rutted slopes of Snodgrass Hill, and later conducted a fighting withdrawal which could not win the battle for the Union but allowed them to leave the field with honour. However, Thomas would have never been able to maintain his line but for a spirited and quite unique artillery action taking place amid remote rocky crags to a flank, where units of General Steedman's division of Granger's Reserve Corps prevented the Rebels from working their way into the gullies in the rear of the Federal line.
Captain Tryhorn of the 2nd New York Artillery had but one gun still in action when the General led him to a bend in the track where there was a depression in the sharp crest of the hill, a notch through which the track ran before falling away sinuously to the area below where the battle was raging. To their front were clouds of billowing smoke, and the air was filled with the familiar noise of War - the rattle of musketry, cries, shouts, drum-beats and bugle-calls. Pointing downwards, the General said: "We are outnumbered twenty to one and in open ground. I must get my men back here amid the rocks if we are to hold them off till nightfall. I want you to bring your piece here, to this notch and keep the Rebels off while my men withdraw."
Soon the Captain has his 12pdr Napoleon set in position in the notch, barrel depressed to cover the open ground to his front, but could not fire until the scurrying groups of blue-coated Federal infantry made their fighting retreat up the slopes. Then, with the last of them out of the field of fire and Confederate infantry rapidly climbing the steep ground, he gave the order to fire, at maximum range of about 1,500 yards with spherical-caseshot, using 2.50lbs of charge and a fuse of .65 inches. Weighing, with the charge, 15.5lbs, the missile spewed its 70 musket-balls amid the advancing infantry, sending them immediately to ground. Ransacking the limbers and ammunition chests of knocked-out guns of the battery, Tryhorn had more than a hundred rounds of discarded ammunition, so was able to maintain a steady fire that only allowed the advancing Rebels to very slowly creep upwards so that it would be some time before the gun crew would come under fire from skirmisher's muskets.
If that had been all, the gallant gun would have had little trouble in doing what was asked of it, but Fate played a dirty trick on Captain Tryhorn. When Bragg had evacuated the town of Chattanooga two and a half weeks earlier, he had brought away, at considerable trouble, a number of 10 inch L.S. Mortars on travelling carriages drawn by teams of horses - and one of these massive weapons, by cruel mischance, just happened to be passing-by in the rear of the assaulting Confederate divisions. It caught the eye of the frustrated divisional commander who immediately saw in it the answer to his prevalent problem of how to winkle that danged gun out of the notch - only the missile of a mortar, rising high and dropping down out of the sky could do this!
These mortars were transported with their beds in carts and this particular piece of artillery had a bed provided with axle-tree arms on which wheels could be mounted for movement and removed for action. The setting-up of the mortar on a level platform - in this case a large slab of rock completely out of sight of Captain Tryhorn above - its laying and the careful measurement of the amount of powder needed in each charge so as to accurately adjust the range, was a lengthy process taking much longer than for a gun, and its time in and out of action was correspondingly greater. And there was another factor, unluckily not known to Captain Tryhorn - the mortar's travelling carriage, which normally carried 12 roundshot and 12 common-shell (weighing nearly 20 cwt) in the hurry to get out of Chattanooga, had only loaded four of each type!
In the late-afternoon the Federal artillerymen were surprised to note a complete halt in the Confederate advance (word had been passed forward to the infantryman to go to ground well short of the notch to avoid being caught in their own fire). Then their practiced eyes saw high in the air, whirling towards them, a fast-moving black speck with sparks trailing from it - it fell well short with a tremendous roar, a cloud of black smoke and a hissing of fragments that skitted and ricocheted from rock to rock. There was no doubt, however astonishing it might seem, that the Rebels had brought up a huge mortar and that with average luck, would eventually get the range and it would only take one hit for such a huge missile to wipe them out.
And so the uneven battle went on, with Tryhorn's Napoleon firing five or six times more frequently than the enemy mortar, whose intervalled missiles allowed the Confederate infantry to edge forward until some were within rifle range and able to irritate the Federal gun crew - they could do little else as the sides of the rocky notch gave protection to everything - except a huge ball or shell falling out of the sky. Once the Napoleon was out of action there was nothing to prevent the Rebels from penetrating to the rear of the federal line - and, for the purposes of this wargame, winning the battle.
PRACTICAL NOTES
To represent the more rapid rate of firing of the Napoleon field-gun, it should be fired EACH move, while the mortar only fires every THIRD MOVE.
Keep a chart and tick-off each missile fired by the mortar, whose ammunition is limited. A refinement is to allow the Napoleon crew - experienced artillerymen - to anticipate the move in which the mortar fires and, by sacrificing their own entitlement to fire, pull the gun back out of the notch during the mortar's firing-moves. Of course, it might be that the mortar-shell will fall just where the gun has moved to! To do this, the player with the Napoleon writes down before the move that he is moving the gun and not firing; conversely, the mortar crew can out-smart him by delaying their fire until next move!
To simulate the affect of the spherical case and the missiles from the mortar, make a firing-device from a piece of card or transparent plastic 8 ins by 4 ins with six numbered circles 1- 6 cut out in a pattern; the first states his point-of-aim and the card is laid with its centre circle laid over that target; a dice is then thrown and the shell is considered to have fallen or burst in the circle whose number corresponds with that on the dice. All within that circle can be considered killed, or some modification permitted by use of dice. In the case of the mortar-missile in our scenario - a direct hit will put the gun and its crew out of action permanently.
When the target comes sufficiently close to the gun for it to be able to fire its most deadly missile canister shot, a triangular wire frame as long as the close range of the piece (say 5 ins) and 2 ins wide at its widest point. Lay the wire-frame with its point touching the gun missile; all enemy figures within the frame are considered casualties. A refinement can be to divide the frame into halves and rule the figures in the half nearest the gun are killed, those in the further half are wounded, or subject to a saving-throw of the dice which means each figure throwing 4,5 or 6 is only wounded and can continue.
Casualties - the gun crew can be hit by rifle-fire, but in this case they are well protected and could be considered killed only if a six is thrown on the dice, either one dice for each man firing or an entire unit or group. Otherwise, were the gun crew to be in the open, them they could be hit by a score of say 3,4,5 or 6 or perhaps less severe if desired. It all depends upon how many casualties one wishes to incur - and how long the game is to last!
Effect of Gun-fire on Infantry - in wargaming it is often preferable to make units fall back (both after receiving fire or hand-to-hand fighting) by affecting their state of MORALE, or their ability to withstand the stresses and strains of battle. American Civil War soldiers were markedly prone to hurriedly pulling-out on first stress (particularly the first time hit) but equally noted for their ability to pull themselves together and return to the fray. When the Rebel infantrymen advancing uphill towards the notch first receive fire from Captain Tryhorn's gun, they could be given a fairly stiff morale-test to determine if they stand or fall-back. Say, they require a dice throw of 5 or 6 to stay put; on later moves when it is considered they have become accustomed to fire, then the score can be increased to 4,5 or 6. Attrition can be represented by noting each unit's reaction, and making it successively more difficult for a unit to stand of once they have faltered, until they come to a point where no dice score will allow them to stand or to return to the battle.
[It is hoped to get more ideas from Don in the future, so watch this space. Kenn].
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