Calling all armchair generals! Boudica's Last Stand.

[Renatus]

Interesting! And quite plausible. But if the entire second legion was in North Wales with its legate, why does it fall to Postumus to refuse the reinforcement order? Surely the order would have gone to the legati, who would have been responsible for passing it on down?

I think that you have answered this yourself in response to Vindex: as governor, Paulinus could over-ride the usual chain of command. In this case, time was at a premium and sending a messenger to the legate directing him to send another messenger to Postumus ordering him to march would have created an unnecessary delay. However, you raise the interesting point (as you hinted at in the same post) that, perhaps, Postumus was doing things by the book and insisting on waiting for the command to come from his legate. On my scenario, the other praefecti recognised the situation for what it was and followed Paulinus' orders immediately.