
David Dockter emerged from a field of 37 players to win the 5th BPA PBEM tournament for the Great Campaigns of the American Civil War. The tournament participants played a total of 62 games over almost two years, and the finals saw David play Ed Beach, winner of multiple WBC and PBEM tournaments of the game series. Other laurelists, for coming in 3rd through 6th, were Ken Lee, Rob Mull, Al Owen, and Laurent Tisseyre, in that order. Rob, Al, and Laurent each earned their first BPA laurels for the Great Campaigns series.
In the final round, David’s Union forces prevailed over the Confederate troops commanded by Ed in the Pipe Creek Plan scenario from Roads to Gettysburg II: Lee Strikes North. The Union undertook a daring forward defense of the Pipe Creek Line that lay in northern Maryland to the south and east of Gettysburg. In so doing, the Union absorbed significant combat losses at the hands of the Confederates over the six-day battle, but they slowed the Confederate advance. The exciting game came down to Union General Meade engineering a successful grand assault on the last battle of the game, with forces on both sides otherwise all but done for the day, to retake the town of Union Mills from General Ewell’s Confederates. Ewell had undertaken a bold flank march on day five of the battle and successfully evicted the Union forces from Union Mills, but Ewell could not hold the town through day six. Although bloodied, the Union held the Pipe Creek Line, Baltimore and Washington were safe, and David had earned his first BPA championship plaque for the Great Campaigns series.
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