SIGNAL CLOSE ACTION

One of the club games played on this evening was a fleet action between the British and French, as a way of trying out some of the advance rules of the signal close action system.

Mike W and Simon both provided equal number of vessels from our Trafalgar Fleets and had an eight-a-side naval action.  The British were at a disadvantage as they were sailing into the wind. This caused awful problems when they tried to do any complicated maneuvers.

The French on the other hand kept it simple and just sailed straight towards the British line, which were trying to tack into the wind causing an awful lot of problems as four of the lead vessels failed to turn and even before they got into action inflicted damage on to each other from the effects of collisions.

This left the French a better chance to sail straight up and break the British line, which they did and inflicted substantial damage with broadsides going through sterns and bows from racking fire.

Apart from loosing a substantial part of the British Fleet it was good to have another go at the advance rules and if nothing else it taught the British Commander how not to command a fleet of the line into an on-coming wind. 

 Click here for more photographs