Friday Night Games: Formosa Campaign - 2nd Battle of Heng Chun

Played on the evening of Friday 12th July, this was one of Mat's Formosan Campaign Games which saw the sneaky Japanese return to the port and city if Heng Chun, with a fresh Division under the command of Phil San.

The game was in teeny tiny 6mm scale, with Mat as umpire, using his own rules and with Mike W & Phil playing the Japanese and with Mike N, playing the Formosan defenders assisted by Dave and Steve. We had a camero appearance form Graham, before he was called away on urgent matters!

The battlefield, Japanese entering rmo bottom of the table
and the Formosans defending the city and lands around.

Unsurprisingly, Phil employed 'edge of world' tactics to successfully attack and seize the city of Hung Chen, with his vetran division, fresh from the boats as they arrived from Korea. As such the initial deployment of the troops was on the centre and right tiles of the table and the army attacked along the flank, to the right of the river.

In an audacious move the Japanese blew the bridge on their left flank to secure themselves form any potential flanking attack and began a Naval bombardment of the outer city defences.

A revisit to the Buddish Temple at Heng Chun

Ultimately the Japanese took the city, after several assaults that were ablely defended by the Formosan Black Army units. Eventually, however, the encircling Japanese units eventually reached sections of  the walls that were not defended and they surged into the city.

The walled city of Heng Chun

The Umpire reports that the Japanese took quite heavy casualties, but in taking the city they have released 1,000 captive Imperial Guards and captured about 2,000 enemy.

Japanese troops poor accross the bridge to attack the City Gates,
only to be surprise by infernal French Machine guns

Part of the problem the Japanese faced was the enemy had unexpectedly been supplied with machine guns by the French. By good fortune  the Japanese Naval force that landed the Infantry, Artilery & Cavalry were able to impounded the French freighter and crew, who supplied said MGs.

The encircement begins

The  Japanese will no doubt will exploit this diplomatic gaff by the French at the highest levels, to gain leverage with ongoing international treaty negotiations.

By the time the Japanese had encircled the city,
it was all over for the formosan defenders, which surrendered en masse.