Sorauren (French Left) - the Game

 Today Stryker and I played the game which I set up on Tuesday - as mentioned, this is a scenario lifted straight from the Commands & Colors user site. It gave us, not surprisingly, a close game. I was Marshal Soult, and Stryker played the role of Wellington, and we used Zoom. 

The game features no cavalry at all, and not much artillery, and the French, who have a decent advantage in numbers, have to set about a defending Allied army on a couple of ridges - seem at all familiar? There is a central (8-hex) hill in the centre of the table - occupying more of this hill than the enemy gets 1 extra Victory Point for the Allies, but it's worth 2 to the French. We agreed that 8 VPs for the win would give the French, with their greater numbers, a fair chance to wear the Allies down.

My troops started well - my intention was to have Maucune's Divn make a demonstration attack against the ridge on the Allied left (which did not offer bonus VPs), and push home a decisive offensive against the main hill in the centre, which was occupied initially by Spanish troops.

We used my Ramekin version of C&CN, which does away with the Command Cards (which makes the game possible to play via Zoom), and used the "strategic movement" add-on, whereby any unit which does not come within musket range of the enemy (2 hexes) during a turn may add 1 hex to its move - just the thing to allow those reserves to nip up to the front...

 

The French (on our right here) get their attacks under way - the one at the far end was supposed to be a demonstration, to keep the Allied left pinned there. To help with identification on a Zoom screen, we've used some large coloured counters - yellow for light infantry, red for Spanish troops. As usual, we are using white loss counters, since they show up well on Zoom.

 

The 24th Foot are installed in the only village, which was also worth a potential bonus VP to the French. They had a very quiet day, apart from some chaps firing cannons just next door.

 

The French attack on the central hill didn't go smoothly at all - in fact the feint on the right looked far more promising at this stage, which encouraged Soult to change his mind about the priorities, though he would probably have done better to concentrate his orders on bringing up reserves for the main attack.

 

This is the intended demonstration on the French right - the British 58th Foot are taking heavy losses from the French fire. Maucune fancies his chance here - he led a charmed life - while those around him fell in heaps, he escaped unharmed, though his laundry bill may have been substantial.

 

 

The main attack is getting bogged down - Soult really needs Reille and Lamartinière to bring those fresh units up from behind the stream.

 

 

A general view at this stage, from the French right. In the foreground, the British 58th Foot have gone, and the 79th are suffering as well. Maucune is incoherent with excitement.

 

 

Still not much success in the centre for the French - at this point the Allies have 5 units on the main hill, the French none at all, though they are working on it.

 

 

Soult's main problem - behind the stream, he has 5 completely fresh battalions - more than enough to win the battle if he could just get them up to the front [they were still there, still fresh, at the end...]

 

 

The French finally have a foothold on the main hill!

 

 

Now there is a glimpse of what might be - for the first time in the day, the French achieved parity on the main hill - 3 units each, so the Allies lost the VP which they had held throughout for controlling it. 

 

 

In the distance, the Great Scoreboard of History tells us (blurredly) that the score is 6 each - 8 needed for the win. Soult and his staff plan to get some reserves up, and finish off a classic victory.

 

 

No need to get excited - the British 88th Foot now routed the 1/50eme Ligne, which event also restored the Allied control of the hill, so the bonus VP came back into play. The French had eliminated 6 Allied units, the Allies had eliminated 7 French, and also got the extra point for the hill. Allied victory - 8-6. Soult was disappointed, of course, and will start work on his report...

I really enjoyed the game very much. My thanks, as ever, to Stryker for his uplifting enthusiasm and good humour, and my compliments on his very skilled defence. Next time, d'Hubert...

[Footnote: this game was not without some tension, as you will appreciate - at the end of each turn, Stryker would kindly remind me to take photos. After one such photo-shoot, I noticed that I had left my camera on the battlefield, and just for a moment I was concerned that it might have got into the last batch of pictures - only for a moment, mind, and there was a war on at the time.] 

 

***** Late Edit *****

Soult duly submitted his report to the Minister of War, and claimed all manner of misfortunes, not the least being the insubordinate and clueless behaviour of Reille and Maucune. By the time it reached the Emperor, who was in Saxony, and who was beginning to appreciate that the Sixth Coalition had worked out how to defeat him, it definitely did not improve his mood. In fact he was so upset that he had to get his surgeons to give him a rub-down with tripe and vinegar (traditional Corsican remedy for apoplexy).

In truth, Soult could have won our Sorauren game - there were a few occasions when he could reasonably have expected to win. The last few photos do show that his reserves were advancing at the end, but it was too late by this stage. At the point where the numbers of units on the central hill became equal, he only needed to march one more unit onto the hill to win the day - one more turn would have done it - two at the most.

The fundamental issue for C&CN - including its Ramekin cousin - is that the number of available orders is small each turn - it is variable, but it is always small, so that the commanders are encouraged to focus on real priorities. The turns are short, but they come round quickly. Soult used precious orders to attack the Allied left - his supposed diversionary attack; the problem was that it was fairly successful, and he felt obliged to continue to push, though in fact he could have held the diversion back, out of musket range, and still kept the enemy left pinned. With those extra few orders each turn, he could have brought his reserve up more quickly. Yes - quite so.

Even at the stage when the VP score was 5-all, 6-5, whatever, Soult's superiority in the centre was proportionally greater than it had been at the start, and he could actually have stopped the first attack, replaced the worn units with fresh ones, and started again - he should still have won. He was tantalised by the fact that his first attack seemed to be on the edge of success - for a long time - and frittered his orders away in trying to maintain some imagined momentum. Idiot.

***************************

 

Wargame on Thursday - Sorauren

 On Thursday, Stryker and I will play a Zoom-based Napoleonic game. This one is a scenario snappily entitled "Sorauren (French Left)", which neither of us has played before, and is taken straight from the commandsandcolors.net scenarios. It looks like a slugfest, and I noticed after it had been chosen that there is no cavalry on either side, so Stryker and I are going to be wondering how to spend the first 15 minutes of the game, if there are no cavalry units to throw away.

I spent this evening setting up the field, while listening to a football match which I shall not mention again. There is something quite liberating about using someone else's scenario; whatever happens, it will not be my fault. I think these things probably do matter. It is different from my usual scenarios, since the field is quite bare and there are far fewer units than I'm used to. I may learn something here.

 

Initial view from behind the Allied left flank

 

And from the Allied right

 

From behind the French left. There are bonus Victory Points for possession of the ridge just above the centre of the picture (with Spaniards on it). The French had better get cracking...

On the scenery front, I am delighted to announce that I've finally found Wellington's Tree (yes, it was in the wrong box), so it will be appearing, as is required by the terms and conditions of my franchise, and I was also delighted to find the missing top for one of my Iron Age Merit fir trees, this time in a box which has nothing to do with scenery at all. I have superglued the tree-top into place. 

Ha.

 More on Thursday - rural broadband permitting, we have a 10:00 start.

Zoom Game - Fuentes de Oñoro (3rd Day) - 5th May 1811

Yesterday I hosted/umpired a "distanced" game, featuring - nay, starring - Stryker as Wellington and nundanket as Massena - lofty company indeed. We used my Ramekin variation on C&CN, on a 17 x 9 hex table, and the forces were scaled to about 60% of the original, just to get everything on board (so to speak).

I spent some time studying the available scenarios - and eventually constructed my own. Some challenges for Fuentes - it is a very big battle, by Peninsular War standards, but also rather an odd battle in some ways. I chose the 3rd day (which, confusingly, for me, was the second day of fighting - the battle was 3rd-5th May, and the 4th was mostly spent manoeuvring, while Massena tried to come up with something rather more clever, and Wellington extended his right flank, in anticipation of this more clever thing which Massena might do).  The great, received British traditions of this 3rd day are mostly surrounding the early morning action, when Montbrun's cavalry and Marchand's and Mermet's divisions of VI Corps made a left hook through forests and swamps, and flushed Houston's 7th British Division out of the village of Pozo Bello. Craufurd was sent with the Light Divn and some cavalry support, to rescue the 7th Divn - Houston managed to retire to Freneda, which is to the west of the main battlefield, and took no further part. Craufurd then undertook a celebrated withdrawal, with his infantry in square, and with gallant support from his outnumbered cavalrymen. This section of the action is also famous for Norman Ramsay's "charge" with a couple of guns from the RHA, and so on - if you want a truly dramatic account of all this, Napier is your man, though how accurate the depiction is may now be a topic for discussion.

Whatever, I reluctantly decided that much of this early-morning caper is splendid stuff, and would lend itself beautifully to a big game of Sharp Practice or similar, but is far too tactical and fiddly for a big game with a blunt instrument like C&C. Thus our game started with Houston gone and Craufurd on his way back - I would have to grit my teeth and do without the Brunswickers and Chasseurs Britanniques, and our field would have Pozo Bello a mile or two off the south-west corner.

The game, then.

This is my rather basic version of a C&C set-up plan.

Start: general view from north-east corner - Anglo-Portuguese on the right, town of Fuentes (worth 2 temporary Victory Points to the French if and while they hold both hexes of the town) right in the middle of the photo

Start: looking along Wellington's main line, from his right - those big Foot Guard battalions look impressive, but they had a quiet day...

Start: view of the Allied right flank, with Craufurd's force strung out across the field, and Montbrun's cavalry appearing through the trees from the direction of Pozo Bello. Below you see Fuentes itself, with the garrison looking across the river towards Ferey's Divn [I substituted fords for the original bridges, just to avoid that annoying and rather undignified business of balancing sabots on the handrails]

Start: Beyond the Allied left, you see Ferey, with support from the Divns of Conroux and Claparède - the counters on the table edge are further battalions which are still to arrive - Drouet D'Erlon kept back part of the IX Corps force as a reserve. The river is shallow, but the section in the foreground (from the wiggly bit) is in a gorge, and unfordable.

Start: The French centre, with Montbrun's cavalry, Marchand and Mermet beyond. The centre was intimidated by the Allied artillery facing them (for once, the French are outgunned), and served mainly to pin Wellington's main force, and limit the extent to which the Fuentes town position could be reinforced.

Start: Drone shot of Montbrun's cavalry, making a fairly dismal job of harrassing Craufurd. The Allies won the first initiative roll of the game, which was a good one to win

Right from the beginning of the action, the fight for Fuentes began, and it was as bloody as Napier says; to everyone's amazement (especially Massena's), the French gained immediate success and took the southern end of the village. They were promptly driven out again, but came back with equal success. The theme was set - this was the main area of fighting for the day - very quickly, the French were 3-2 up in VPs (9 needed for the victory). Ferey is #17 - he had a very active day.

General view, about an hour into the game. Not much happening in the centre, though the 6eme Léger are taking a bit of a bashing from the artillery.

And still the fighting goes on at Fuentes - I really did lose count of the number of times it changed hands. At this point, the French brought up a battalion of grenadiers (red counter), but they didn't do very well.

On the French left, Montbrun sends a regiment of dragoons up, forcing the 52nd Foot into square, but they were seen off by Slade with the British 1st Dragoons.

Unusual sight - Montbrun's two dragoon units take shelter in the woods - the official story was that this was to clear the way for more troops and the French horse artillery.

Still not a lot happening in the centre, though the French had now pushed one of their own foot batteries forward, where they provided good support for the troops holding Fuentes.

More troops crossing the river, and still the situation at Fuentes is half held by each side, and heavy fighting.

Under the claim that Massena was having problems with his old injury from Essling, I took the opportunity to field him in a carriage. He looks peaceful - he may, in fact, be asleep. The young ADC in the white hussar kit is the Marshal's 17-year-old son, Prosper, who is definitely very wide awake.

The French now have both bits of the village, so the 2 bonus VPs are shining on the scoreboard, and Picton brings up some Portuguese troops to try to do something about it.

The British dragoons attack - and defeat - the French dragoons in their wood - never seen one of these before...

By this stage, with the IX Corps chaps coming up in support, it is becoming obvious that Wellington is not going to be able to do much about recovering the town; his supporting units on that flank are already badly battered. From memory, I believe the VP count was about 7-3 at this stage, so something desperate was needed from the Allies.

General view after about 3 hours fighting - the French hold the village, and Wellington's troops on the high ground are a lot more sparse than they were.

Wellington leads a general advance in his centre, to inflict some losses on the French troops opposite, and to cut off the Fuentes position.

General MacKinnon, who commanded the area around the town, was seriously wounded in the fighting, and Picton became personally involved in the effort to recover the position - here he is attached to some of the Portuguese from Powers' brigade, who are obviously nearing the end of their day.

Here is General Claparède, of IX Corps, leading some of his men against Fuentes town. I took a great affection for the General, whose name is obviously really Clapper-'Ead (his family were bell ringers). Round about this time the 79th Highlanders, after a long and arduous fight, were finally eliminated, and the French had won 9-4. Someone went to wake up Massena and let him know.

As ever, thanks to my colleagues for their courage and enthusiasm - sitting watching a big battle on a laptop requires not a little fortitude and stamina, so I appreciate their efforts very much! I very much enjoyed my day umpiring and watching fake history come to pass, and it was terrific to have someone to talk to!

Battle of Espinosa de los Monteros - the Game

Yesterday evening the Espinosa game was duly played out here. I was umpire (I feel that I was somehow born to be an umpire - it's a role I enjoy greatly), and the visiting generals for the occasion were Dave and - erm - Dave. Dave took the role of Joachim Blake, in command of the Spanish army, and Dave was Marshal Victor. Since this is all too much for a bear of little brain, I was pleased to adopt forms of address suggested by the visitors, derived from ancient British TV sitcoms - Marshal Victor (whose real name was Claude Perrin) became Reggie Perrin, of course (otherwise known as Vic of Belluno), and General Blake was "Blakey" - so that was much more comfortable all round.

Blakey

Perrin

The battle involved a minimal cavalry presence - both armies had just two light cavalry units tucked away at the back, but both the commanders threw their cavalry forward, which was a much more exciting start than I had expected.

The Spanish position on their right looked a bit suspect, having a river at their backs, but the ground was quite favourable, with hills and woods offering some advantages in defence, and this was where all the Spanish artillery was placed. Victor duly left this flank alone, and sent in Lapisse's division, to attack the Spanish left, which had no artillery and included a contingent of rather suspect milicias provinciales. The militia boys did rather well, considering, and after some early reverses they managed to drive Lapisse's force back, but it was only a temporary breather.

The narrative should become sort of apparent from the photos, I hope. One important theme was the heroism of General Blake, who seemed to be determined to die in action, but somehow survived. Another theme was that the Spanish artillery was ineffective throughout - that load of cheap gunpowder they got from the Gomez brothers was probably not a good idea. The Spaniards, under the house rules, are in real trouble if they attempt to move and fight at the same time, and the weak cavalry units are a problem.

Having said all of which, both generals conducted themselves very well, the battle was interesting (at least the umpire found it so!), and, though the final score in Victory Points was 8-2 to the French, General Blake comes out of the episode with some personal credit, certainly for his skill at getting in the press coverage. Marshal Victor, of course, won, which is what it's all about in Napoleon's army.

My thanks to my visiting generals for their good humour and enthusiasm, and for surviving an embarrasing collapse of our rural broadband which knocked Zoom out for 5 minutes or so!

Early view from behind the Spanish left and centre - the fighting on the ridge on the left is in a bit of a lull, but - yes - that's General Blake on the right edge of the picture, taking personal command of the cavalry. His staff were overcome with horror. The black square marker next to a French regiment indicates that they are in square (good eh?).

Again, from behind the Spanish lines - this time just to the right of centre - here you see the Spanish artillery, whose performance was - how do you say? - disappointing. The French were very circumspect about attacking this part of the line.

General Blake again, posing for the camera with the Cazadores de Olivenza. This figure, by the way, is an OOP Falcata, and was (whisper it) actually painted by Hermogenes, the man who founded Falcata. There are few known examples of evidence of Hermogenes having actually done something, so this is a rarity indeed. Yes, General Blake does look like Brendan Rodgers - in which role he is almost certainly proud of the spirit and character of his team, who were thrashed again...

More of the same - the French cavalry in the background are obviously intending to do something about this, and this area of the battlefield became a little hectic for a while.

The Spanish cavalry, rather reduced in numbers, pull back for a rest.

At this stage, the French are leading 4-1 - there is a lot of space between the Spanish left and centre, and Victor's men are coming forward.

From the French view - town of Espinosa in the background. Having been forced to give up his spell as a cavalry commander, Blake has now taken command of a battalion of line infantry.

From above the Spanish centre, looking left - yes, Blake is at it again, this time leading the infantry forward.

Still the Spanish artillery have only scored a single hit on the infantry opposite, but the grenadiers in the wood, with a stunning volley of musketry, have done some damage to the French battery on the road.

General view, looking toward the Spanish left flank. By this stage, the game was almost over - the Spanish had lost enough infantry on their left flank, plus their cavalry, to get the score up to 7-2. Then, a final attack on the right by some Spanish light infantry ran into very heavy opposition, and the battle was over - 8-2 to Victor.

This is what remained of the Spanish left at the end - view from behind Lapisse's position.

Coup de grace (French for "lawn-mower") - The Freitag battalion (1/26eme - centre foreground) emerged from the woods at the end to rout the Spanish lights and clinch the victory. Job done.