Battle of Guarda - Part 2

From: Marshal, Prince d'Essling, Duc de Rivoli,Andre Massene, commanding 'lArmee du Nord' in Portugal and Spain;
To: Napoleon, Emperor of the French, King of Italy etc etc

Sire -
I have the honour and pleasure to beg to report upon the recent victory by French arms over the forces and allies of the Perfidious Albion. After much manoeuvring, marches and countermarches, the larger portion of the Corps of the Duc d'Elchingen, Marshal Ney, brought to bay at the town of Guarda in north central Portugal that part of the Allies known as the Army of Portugal, under command of a Marshal Beresford of England. Owing to the difficulties of the terrain, the Duc d'Elchingen was instructed to take 3rd and 5th Divisions - the latter in brigade strength only - preceded by Lorges's Dragoons in a sweep into the right rear of the Guarda town, whilst 4th Division and P.Soult's light cavalry conducted a holding action in front. The latter was to become an all out assault if the opportunity presented itself.

The early attacks upon Guarda rapidly spread to both flanks. Soult uncovered a pair of Portuguese battalions in the North Woods; Guarda itself was strongly garrisoned, though a preliminary bombardment by the 12pr guns of the Reserve artillery somewhat reduced the strength of the buildings as strongpoints; the lead elements of 3rd Division ran into an English battalion and a battery flanking the south side of the town. There they discovered elements of another Brigade extending the enemy line into the South Woods.

With the action becoming general along the line, most of 6th Brigade of Marchand's Division, and all of Loison's and Lorges's commands were free to carry on their march deep into the enemy's southern flank. When it became apparent that 26eme Legere (9th Bde, 5th Div.) had swung north prematurely to engage the south face of the woods on their right, I felt it necessary to send to remind their commander of his instructions, which indeed he carried out much to my satisfaction thereafter.
Progress upon Guarda hill and the woods to the north was necessarily slow, given the difficulties of the ground even to light infantry. I and III battalions, 25th Legere (7th Bde) attacked the town itself...

...whilst their companion battalion (II/25eme legere) engaged the Portuguese Brigade to their right,...
...and II and III/6eme Legere attacked along the southern slopes of Guarda Hill.

With parts of 5th and 6th Brigades gradually driving back the enemy, and the rough going on the enemy flank found to be clear of the enemy, Marshal Ney could be seen resolutely striking out with his troops for the distant ridge.

Our earlier appreciation having determined there must be at least as many more enemy foot troops hidden as had already been disclosed, plus his horse and much of his artillery yet to be developed, we had some reason to apprehend what might lie upon the further side of that long and lofty eminence guarding the Anglo-Portuguese right rear...
When at last the lead elements of Ornano's Brigade (15eme Regiment de Dragons)crested the heights, the sight that greeted them was such as to afford considerable relief from the tension of not knowing what lay on the far side of the hill.
A whole brigade was found on the near bank of a stream, hastily forming square. Some distance to the Dragoons' left front, and on the far bank, a redoubt had been built that contained a battery of guns, sited, fortunately for us, facing due south, and so unable to quite to bring the dragoons under fire. Also upon the far side of the stream, could be seen the mass of General Grant's Division of Dragoons, more infantry at least another brigade, and a gun battery that caused some damage to our 15th Dragoon regiment before it could retire behind the crest.



Altogether, what had been disclosed gave us confidence that this action would end favourably to us...

To be continued...

Battle of Guarda - May 1810

Marshal Massena's first battle as Commander in Chief of l'Armee du Nord, has taken three campaign months of strenuous marching and countermarching to bring about. The Vive l'Empereur Peninsular Wargame campaign has been going on for over a year, now, interrupted from time to time by earthquakes and heavy snowfalls, with very little action in Portugal to show.

In the South, Marshal Soult and his subordinates (Generals Suchet and Sebastiani de la Porta, and I think Marshal Mortier) have been beating the Spanish time and again, though the Iberians seem still to be popping up here and there to create nuisances of themselves. The only involvement of the L'Armee du Nord occurred when Junot's VIII Corps march upon Badajoz was briefly interrupted by a Spanish force defending the sole river crossing of the Guardiana River. Junot's operations in the western parts of Estremadura had to be rethought when the pitifully small garrison in Madrid was driven out by a popular uprising.

Meanwhile, it was looking as though Massena was being forced out of Portugal without a major action. Having fortified Guarda - an important road nexus - Massena reluctantly evacuated the place and fell back upon Almeida, just barely inside the Portuguese frontier with Spain. But then, certain intelligences brought by his aggressively handled cavalry operations suggested there might be at Guarda an Anglo-Portuguese force of a size worth attacking, but not so large as to make the undertaking too hazardous.



The Marshal Prince of Essling at once seized his chance. Wishing to report to Paris that if he had to abandon Portugal it would not have been without a fight, he was prepared to take a chance on the enemy proving even somewhat stronger than his own. The estimates were that numbers in all arms were roughly equal. As it happened, Massena slightly misinterpreted the information, thinking the enemy infantry to be numerically somewhat stronger. As it transpired his overestimation of the enemy foot was matched by his underestimate of the enemy artillery.

Arriving east of the town the Marshal was faced with a formidable position: the place itself crowning a lofty, very difficult, ravine-scarred eminence flanked by woods that presented an almost insuperable obstacle to his cavalry. His initial idea of a sweep around the north he ruled out of court after a close reconnaissance of the terrain. It had to be a left hook - and that didn't look very appetising, neither.

Fortunately, in Marshal Ney (Andrew Taylor, who had under his own hand 9 battalions and the 8pr company of Marchand's Division), and his Divisional commanders (Geoff had Loison's single [9th] Brigade [4 bns], Lorges' sole [2nd] Dragoon Brigade [3 regiments] and an 8pr company), the Prince had subordinates of the same mind. It was a simple matter to draw up the battle plan, based upon the line he expected the enemy to occupy. I (Massena) doubled up by taking the roles of General Mermet (7 battalions of 4th Division), the 12 pr guns of the Reserve artillery, and General Soult (2 light cavalry regiments). That seemed to me a fair division of roles among the three of us.


Directing the Marshal Duke of Elchingen to lead the left hook by Marchand's and Loison's Divisions, preceded by Lorges's dragoons, 'Massena' adopted an overseeing role, content for the most part to let his subordinates to get on with it (What this meant was, the 'Marshal Massena' figure stayed close by 'Marshal Ney' whilst I also took command and spent most of my time as 'General Mermet' of 4th Division and 'General P.Soult's' brigade of chasseurs-a-cheval. Occasionally I would check out how things were going and take pictures. Once I did 'send a message' to 'General Loison' (Geoff) when I thought his troops were swinging north prematurely, but that was much later in the day).

The French general advance shortly before 9:00 a.m. Already the general plan of attack is taking shape. In the foreground, Soult's Chasseurs have discovered two Portuguese battalions lining the woods north of Guarda; and the leading elements of Bardet's 7th Brigade are beginning the climb towards the town itself. Meanwhile the rest of Ney's VI Corps are marching into the Alied left flank and rear...
The first contacts upon Guarda Hill itself, and in the thickish woods (classed as 'medium' in Colin's rule set) to the south. The sole unit of light infantry in the Allied army - a corps of tiradores - were lucky to survive being attacked front and rear by French light troops. They flung back their assailants and managed to extricate themselves behind a unit of Portuguese line infantry (classed as militia in this campaign).

In the Comments to a previous article, I was asked about the little blocks of wood with the two nails sticking out. The rule set we are using have been authored by Colin Foster, the Duke of Wellington in this campaign, and at whose place we fought this action (and as fine a wargaming venue as you could wish).

To the blocks can be pasted labels identifying units and commanders, and the nails hold beads that log information. The black beads (which for some reason we call 'pips') tell us whether and to what extent the unit may act. Each bead signifies an action and is removed when the action is carried out (shooting, moving, changing formation). A unit can continue acting until it runs out of 'pips'. 'Pips' can be carried over into an opponent's bound, which allows it to react to opponent's action. They aren't carried forward any further, but are renewed at the beginning of the player's own bound. In effect you top up unused 'pips' to the unit's maximum allowanc). This allowance, the number they receive, depends upon the unit's quality (raw, experienced, veteran) and whether it in under command (i.e. within the command radius of its brigade commander). Additional 'pips; may be allocated by higher command when certain conditions are met (which is why 'Massena' (the figure) remained close to the main action throughout the day).

The other nail holds beads of other colours, and shows the unit's morale state - from extremely enthusiatic to completely routed. A given unit's 'ground' state is 'beadless'. When a unit takes a hit, it receives a white bead (in addition to any beads signifying atate of morale). A second hit means an element (roughly 100 infantry, 75 cavalry in scale terms) gets removed, along with the bead. The bead signifies a 'helf-element' loss.

I find the system quite simple to use, quickly informative and visually not unappealing. It reminds me somewhat of John Sandars's log-pin system for his Sandskrieg game. Mind you, threading the beads on the nails when one eye doesn't function properly can be a bit... awkward...

To be continued...

Counter-offensive at Lahtidoh

Another action on the Raesharn-Kiivar front. This time I've just posted pictures and a battle map...




A Raesharn battalion-sized battlegroup commanded by General Kohl ready to advance and take, seize or carry the village of Lahtidoh, a road nexus needed for the final assault upon the Kiivar city of Kavi.
That there was no covering for the tabletop was due to the keys to the Club terrain room going walkabout. Most of the terrain you see is mine, except for the village buildings, which are Jono's.



Looking east across the the Kiivar battle lines and no man's land between the rival forces. Lahtidoh village, lying between the armies, was also deemed necessary to be taken to aid the Kiivar war effort.
A Raesharn armoured car discovers the hard way where the enemy armour is... A scratchbuild by Jono...

A Raesharn air strike takes out one of Kiivar's tanks...

... but retribution is swift! It's flight path takes it within range of a Kiivar twin barrelled AA cannon, which brings it down.

Kiivar armour takes up hull-down positions on 'Blue-Towel' Hill. Not that it did them any good. A war correspondence know for his inability to resist bold and bad headlines remarked at length upon the 'towelling' the Kiivar tanks received...









The action ended with all the armour destroyed but for one damaged Raesharn tank. Infantry casualties were surprisingly light (8 Raesharn and 11 Kiivar) but the former lost rather more equipment. The action, like many such now that the Raesharn's early onrush has been stemmed, ended in a standoff...

Sideon IV - Battle of Dohremi

On the weekend before last, was fought part of a Kiivar counter-offensive against the Raesharn invaders. The models and figures were roughly in 1:35 scale. The forces were fairly equal, though Kiivar (Me) had a slight preponderance in infantry.

The Kiivar Battlegroup, commanded by Lt-Col Ptarmigan Thrapwordel comprised:
47th Rifle Battalion:
Able Coy (#1 and #2 Platoons)
Baker Coy (#3 and #4 Platoons)
HQ Coy (Anti-Tank Gun section [1 gun]; HMG Platoon; and 'T' Troop Assault Engineers, attached)
A Squadron, 34th Tank Regiment (3 Tanks: 2 gun and 1 close-support)
B Battery, 909th (provisional) Artillery Battalion.

The Kiivar 'Battlegroup Thrapwordel' at its startline, ready to advance. Armour on the left, with the Assault engineers riding on them. Like Johann Sebastian Bach, who sat on a tack, they soon got off...

Commanded by Major Tokarifa Yamahahahahaha, the Raesharn were defending a village but had no intention of waiting for their despised opponents. Their forces seemed to comprise elements of 123 Infantry Regiment in about Battalion strength, with an Assault gun, an infantry gun and an anti-tank gun section in support (1 gun or vehicle apiece); and Nr 1 Company 201st Armoured Regiment (3 tanks). As it transpired, the Raesharn could also call upon air strikes, against which the Kiivar had no defence.

Raesharn infantry in and about Dohremi village, and lining the hedgerows to the east.

Raesharn armour on the right flank, about to drive forward to meet their foes...
...and score an early success. The first Raesharn airstrike, also against the armour, proved (very fortunately for the Kiivar) unsuccessful at this time. Meanwhile, the Kiivar infantry are advancing, Baker Coy through the woods; Nr2 Platoon of Able Coy up the road (suggested by 'hedgerows') towards Dohremi. Out of the picture to the right is Nr 1 Platoon also advancing

The Kiivar infantry are organised 'two-up' from 7-man sections (squads). A subaltern officer commands a platoon of 2 sections, a captain commands a company of 2platoons. A battalion comprises 2 rifle companies, plus an HQ company of specialists, which might be Medium mortars, Heavy (Medium) Machineguns, Infantry guns, Recon group, Assault Engineer group, Anti-Tank guns, Signals. A 'Section' is one vehicle or heavy weapon; a Company or Squadron, 2 to 4. The Raesharn organisation is similar. The Kiivar 47th Battalion was a bit underequipped for this operation.

Raesharn infantry, rather rashly, advance to meet their Kiivars foes of Able Company. Accompanying them, the assault gun crashes through the hedgerow, and the Infantry gun crew hastily manhadle their piece to a gap in the hedgerow lining the south road to protect the flank. In the foreground field, but out of picture, a Heavy machine gun section was hurriedly setting up...

General view of the field, looking south from the Raesharn positions. A Raesharn 'pusher' ground attack aircraft approaches the battlefield...
Disaster! Nr1 Platoon, 47th Kiivar Bn, create havoc in Raesharn ranks, overrunning a heavy machine gun, wiping out the crew of the infantry gun and pouring a destructive fire into the Raesharn flank. The Kiivar AT gun also scores an early success...
Another general view. The Raesharn counterattack on the left has come to a complete standstill...
The view from behind Kiivar lines.Having knocked out the assault gun, the Anti-tank gun is being manhandled forward off the hill. Advancing up the road, Nr 2 Platoon (Able Coy) is about to come under heavy MG fire from the village...
Kiivar artillery in action - as seen from the receiving end. Do you think I could hit that front building? Not on your life! But the misses were occasionally destructive...
....here wiping out the entire Raesharn Battlegroup HQ (I didn't even know they were in the village). The guns did their bit in taking ot the Raesharn lead platoon, and (fortuitously) knocking out an Anti-tank gun as well.
Victory at last for the Raesharn armour (helped by an AT gun to their flank until it was taken out by an artillery stonk). They wiped out the Kiivar Squadron for the loss of just one of their own tanks. Exposed as they are, the assault engineers (in red beanies) exchanged a brief fire with enemy support infantry, then make off behind the forest.
Raesharn armour, advancing to exploit their success, outrun their infantry and are about to come under a AT Rifle and gun crossfire. Meanwhile, remanants of Kiivar's Nr2 Platoon scatter into the woods.
Airstrike! The earlier strike was an abject failure, but now Raesharn aircraft find a new target - the Kiivar artillery...

They fly off, with the Kiivar artillery reduced by half.
Engaged by AT Rifles (the AT gun not yet ready to fire) Raesharn armour responds in kind, knocking out two gunners, but losing a tank. The survivor enters the dense wood - a rather dangerous place without infantry support. About here, the Raesharn abandon its counterattack, and evacuate the village.

Having agreed to end the battle at this point we did a tot up of losses. Raesharn lost 2 tanks, as assault gun, AT gun and an infantry gun; Kiivar all 3 of its own tanks and its heavy artillery piece. But infantry losses much favoured the Kiivar. It was agreed that it was a Kiivar tactical success.
The battered remains of the Raesharn garrison abandoned Dohremi overnight, and pulled back a few miles into a new position. The village was occupied rather apprehensively by 47th Battalion, with little in the way of heavy equipment to support thenm in the event of a counterattack.

Comments...

'What do you mean, Marshal, by this comment "Here be dragons"?'
For some reason, I seem unable to post comments on several blogspots, including this one. There are a few upon which I can. I don't know what I'm doing wrong.

I thought I'd reply to the comments in my last post, and enlarge upon one particular point.

Thanks to Doug for the information. Clearly I my memory, suppositions or assumptions were mistaken. Can't think why. At any rate, those Warrior figures are nice little miniatures - 'cute' is the word that comes to mind - and they make a fine Advance Guard for my Austrian army.

For the others, 'Rodger' (Rodger Wood) and 'Jacko' (Paul Jackson) were the other two players in a three player Napoleonic campaign way back in 1991-92. This was a limited affair, using small forces (what we had available) in a Northern France theatre bounded by St Dizier in the east, Valenciennes in the north, and Paris in the southwest. The premise was that Napoleon had been rescued from St Helena late in 1815, and landed on the shores of France on 1st January 1816. Military operations opened a month later.

At the time, Rodger's French army comprised 348 figures, which he organised into 3 Army Corps, plus cavalry and some Guard units. Paul could field 280, mostly British, but with a small Russian contingent of 2 Line infantry, one jager and an Uhlan unit. Under the nom-de-guerre Archduke Charles, I fielded a very modest Corps of 190figures, the Austrians eked out by 2 18-figure Brunswick battalions. Actually, I could have fielded two Grenadier battalions, but figured that to be too over-representative.

My Austrian army has grown considerably since then:
400 Infantry in 18 units (4 Grenadier, 12 Fusilier and 2 Jager);
72 Cavalry in 6 regiments (1 Cuirassiers, 2 Dragoon, 1 Chevau-legers, 1 Uhlan, 1 Hussar);
32 Gunners (2x12, 4x6pr, 2x3pr pieces - the 3pr were taken from the Revell 7YW Austrian artilley set; and the 12 pr scratchbuilt).

504 figures in total, not counting generals, staffs and aides.

I'm also in the process of creating a small independent Corps of Brunswickers, beginning with the 2 small 18-figure battalions, a half-battalion of Jager (10 figures), a squadron each of Uhlans (4) and Hussars (4) and a field piece (4 crew).
One of those little 60-figure detachments sent out to guard some bridge or road against a possible flanking movement.

Back to the campaign: after a series of skirmishes and battles, the Allies drove the French gradually to the gates of Paris, where, on 1 March 1816 the two contingents combined to bring Napoleon to bay near the villages of Doumartin and Louvres. Unfortunately, their ill-cordinated attacks (The Archduke, not realising that the bulk of Wellington's troops had still to come up, launched his attack before his Allies were ready) failed to drive the French altogether out of their positions. Though they came desperately close, at the end of the day, both sides remained pretty much where they began it.

Casualties were very heavy, however. I had enacted a rule at the outset that any contingent that had been reduced (after post-battle adjustments and returns) to less than half their original strength, they were out of the campaign and had to retreat to their respective bases. A count confirmed that the Austrians were indeed no longer capable of continuing the campaign, but as it transpired nor were Wellington or Napoleon! Clearly, the Allies had failed to depose Napoleon for the third time, but the latter had equally failed to drive the invaders completely out of France.

An indecisive result, but an eminently satisfying one, from my point of view...

Napoleonic Austrians...

In a recent exchange on the Old School Wargamers' Yahoo group, under the thread title 'Appearance', I mentioned a bunch of Napoleonic figures I bought at a bring-n-buy four or five years ago. Several of them had the legend HOTSPUR stamped on the underside of the bases; there were other figures in the buy that were obviously crude homecasts that I managed to make something of.

One of the correspondents queried the HOTSPUR connexion, that outfit never (apparently) having produced Austrians - indeed its Napoleonics range I understand was never all that extensive. I did have some HOTSPUR French horse (Chasseurs and Dragoons) that I bought in about 1991 from an Auckland importer who sold Front Rank (I think it was), as well. I preferred the HOTSPUR cavalry as being close to the size of the Minifigs that I already had; the Front Rank figures being overweight ex-basketballers mounted on Clydesdales by comparison.

At any rate, I thought I'd show the figures here, with others in my Austrian Army.

To begin with: the alleged HOTSPUR figures:
13th Infantry Regiment. These are some of the HOTSPUR figures. Although I favoured helmets, I wasn't going to turn these down. I did consider doing them as Grenze - a serious want in my army - but didn't have the heart in the end.

43rd Infantry in helmets. As in the 13th, there were insufficient figures for the full 24-figure unit, this one comprising just 18.
The 10th Grenadier Battalion, comprising companies from 13th and 43rd Infantry Regiments

The following picture is of somebody's homecast figures - Bavarians he told me - that seemed possibly to be Hinton Hunt knock-offs. They did have some sort of 'HH' identifier stamped or etched onto the bases. They were truly horrible castings, but a fair bit of knife work got them to at least a half-way presentable state.
23rd and 12th Infantry Regiments march past. Bavarians they might have been intended to be, but they don't look too out of place in Austrian uniform.

HOTSPUR again: the 10th Grenadiers and 13th and 43rd Infantry storming a village. The general officer figure, by the way, is an Italeri command figure.
The following figures were also bought as a job lot. The light infantry are Minifigs 'Tyrolean Jager' painted up in the dark grey and red of a Freikorps Jager unit; the command group also Minifigs. But the Grenadiers and Line Infantry I can not identify. The Grenadiers might be Hinchliffe (or might not); but the others leave me at a loss.
Infantry Regiments 2 and 33 advance alongside the 2nd Grenadier Battalion...
Hungarian Grenadiers
Closer view of the Hungarian line. As they were wearing shakos, and one unit was painted up as Hungarians ibn any case, I thought I'd do the whole brigade as Hungarian. Looks as though some will need reissuing their regulation light blue pants!


Finally: some Minifigs. Tyrolean Jager, in their characteristic light grey with green facings, leading an attack upon a defended village.
Minifigs infantry (1st Grenadier Bn and 7th Infantry) and artillery attacking in columns headed by skirmishing Jager.

One thing this exercise has shown: this army could stand a bit of tidying up!