Natural Bridge battle game: the defense of Tallahassee
A river that runs underground for a quarter mile, one dry crossing, and Florida's reserves, militia and cadets dug in at the far end. Natural Bridge is part of River Crossings in Civy War.
One scenario, playable from either side. Every battle runs five minutes on the clock against a Green, Regular or Veteran enemy: the attacker has to break the line before nightfall, the defender has to hold.
Natural Bridge
River Crossings
March 6, 1865 · 6:30 a.m.
As the Union, force the Natural Bridge and open the road to Tallahassee. General John Newton's column has marched all night up the east bank: the 2nd U.S. Colored Infantry leads, the 99th is behind it, and the dismounted 2nd Florida Cavalry and sailors with boat howitzers cover the flanks. Do not just pile into the bridge. Get your guns working, send a wing around by the ford below Rhodes Springs, and hit the line from two sides at once.
As the Confederacy, hold the Natural Bridge and keep the Federals out of Tallahassee. Colonel Scott's 5th Florida Cavalry Battalion, the Florida Reserves and the Kilcrease Light Artillery hold breastworks bent around the end of the land bridge, and more are coming down the railroad: the militia, Abell's battery and the cadets of the West Florida Seminary. Stay in the works and let the sinks and the swamp break up their attacks.
The battle
In March 1865 a Union expedition under General John Newton landed at the St. Marks lighthouse on the Gulf coast of Florida, aiming at the Confederate works at St. Marks and the country beyond. The Navy's gunboats stuck on the bars below the town, and the bridge at Newport was burned in the column's face. Newton marched up the east bank to the Natural Bridge, where the St. Marks River sinks into the ground and runs under a quarter mile of dry land. The Confederates got there first.
Newton attacked across the land bridge again and again through the morning and was thrown back every time by the guns on the ridge and the sinks and sloughs on either side of the crossing. Major Benjamin Lincoln of the 2nd U.S. Colored Infantry was killed leading one of the charges. By afternoon Newton gave it up and fell back to a line of works on the east bank; the Confederates came over after him and were checked, and the Federals marched back to the lighthouse and their ships.
Union losses were 148, Confederate about 26. Stopping the expedition at Natural Bridge meant Tallahassee was never taken during the war. The cadets of the West Florida Seminary, the school that became Florida State University, fought in the line, and the university's ROTC still carries a battle streamer for it. On the Union side, the two Black regiments did most of the fighting and most of the dying.
Free or paid
Paid: part of River Crossings, a one-time purchase that unlocks Dam No. 1, Fredericksburg, North Anna and Natural Bridge (Ball's Bluff, the first, is free). No detailed period plan of the battle survives, so the map is the U.S. Geological Survey's 1954 Woodville quadrangle, which shows the same ground.
Fourteen battles, the Drill Field and the Field Manual are free. The Historical Campaigns, Grant's Campaigns, The Western Campaigns and River Crossings are optional one-time purchases that restore on every device signed in to the same Apple ID.