Sahagun

The rather magnificent Terence Alexander, playing Lord Uxbridge,

accompanied by the equally splendid Christopher Plummer, playing the Duke

The more astute reader will have noticed that both men are riding apple crates. It was this care and attention to the welfare of their horses (who are out of shot, putting their hooves up) that made them renowned military leaders guaranteed to give Frenchy a damn good thrashing in any weather. Curiously, Plummer - the Canadian is playing that most famous of Englishmen, who was actually Irish. Alexander who is playing Uxbridge, a cavalry officer who famously lost his leg at Waterloo, damn near lost his own leg while serving with the 27th lancers in Italy and walked with a limp for the rest of his life.

But, it is not Lord Uxbridge or Waterloo that concerns us at present - but Sahagun and plain old Henry Paget* as he was at the time. Sahagun is an interesting little action that took place during the retreat to Corunna. Sir John Moore was of the opinion that no good would be served by allowing Britain's only field army to be smashed by overwhelming numbers, but did not wish to retreat without striking some sort of a blow. With that object in mind, Paget was sent against Soult on a reconnaissance and led a cavalry brigade against the French occupied town of Sahagun. The plan was that a two pronged assault would result in the French being driven onto a blocking force. Sadly, the night march went wrong, as night marches so often do and the blocking force led by General Slade, described by Paget as "...that damned stupid fellow", was not in place in time and took no part in the action.

A brilliant charge by the 15th Hussars overthrew the French completely, taking 300 prisoners, but the lack of a blocking force prevented the whole French force being put in the bag.

The action is atmospherically described in Rumours of War, the sixth Mathew Hervey novel, byAllan Mallinson.

A picture of a possible setup (since abandoned),

taken for note taking purposes

I had been thinking about writing a Sahagun scenario for a while, mainly because I think its interesting and secondly, as I had been wondering whether C&C: Napoleonics could handle an all cavalry engagement. My first thought was for numbers, most C&C: Napoleonics scenarios involve about a dozen units a side, but I can't field that much cavalry. It would also led to a rather packed battlefield. Both sides fielded about eight hundred men, though half the British force (under that damned fool Slade) didn't make it to the field in time to help decide the matter.

I decided to field equal forces, as the French units are larger (four blocks to the British three) which would keep the disparity in numbers while ensuring the both sides had a sufficient number of manoeuvre units to keep things interesting. Also since, CCN classes dragoons as heavies the French will enjoy a superiority of weight, which translates to an additional die in melee.

I added three special rules for flavour

- firstly, the British player may negate any French played "First Strike" card by yelling "Emsdorf and Victory" before the French player rolls dice. The attack is canceled and the card replaced.

-secondly, the French player may negate a British played "Short of Supplies" card by saying "That damn fool Slade", before the British player has touched figures. The effect is canceled and the card replaced.

-thirdly, all infantry/artillery specific cards, Bombard, Fire and Hold, etc - may be played as Rally cards.

The first two rules are present because I love gimmicks, though they do reflect (in a manner of speaking) two incidents from the actual battle. The last is an attempt to model the swirling, chaotic nature of cavalry combat where momentum and address are vitally important, horsemen are scattered more easily than their infantry fellows and motivated officers can rally them to charge once again.

On the face of it, it seems pretty hopeless for the British - facing superior numbers, half of whom hit harder than they do. I may have to set up the scenario at the point of the charge to level the playing field, but I don't want to completely hamstring the French player either. There is of course, always the chance that Slade might show up - which could result in things becoming very sticky for the French.

I have tested this and various board layouts by playing around with the boxed game. This has the advantage of ensuring I don't use more pieces than the game allows, which would substantially limit outside playtesting possibilities. Thus far I haven't managed to produce anything other than a crushing victory for the French, even giving them a hand size of three compared the British five. Perhaps starting the battle from the point of the British approach might be more fruitful with the French player struggling to get his troops out of the town so as to bring his superior numbers to bear.

That said I haven't attempted a blind playtest yet - which is always the real test of a scenario. Putting two players who operate with none of the authors assumptions in front of a game is always an interesting experience. I might manage a playtest this week.

More thoughts on this when I have them dear readers.

*Nasty or impolite people might point out that he was a Lord at the time, but that unpleasant fact drives a coach and horses through my nicely composed sentence and may be ignored for the time being.

The Battle of Corunna - Part III

The Death of Sir John Moore 1761-1809 17th January 1809
After William Heath

My apologies for the unbecoming maudle of yesterday.

On returning to the battle of Corunna, there are some other points of interest.

Sir John Moore was a distinguished soldier and is widely credited for having introduced the light infantry creed into the British army during his time as a brigadier at the camp of instruction at Schorncliffe. This appears, at least according to "The British Light Infantry Arm", an extremely engaging volume by David Gates, who later went on to write "The Spanish Ulcer", to be an overstatement. Moore was certainly friendly to the idea of light infantry, but it appears that junior officers (whose names I can't swear to, as my copy is already packed) provided most of the inspiration on this count.

What did mark out Moore was his humanity and his belief that men were better led than driven There is an episode in Christopher Hibberts history of the Corunna Campaign where he describes Moore mortgaging the lives of two men who were due to be hanged. He stayed the sentence of execution conditional on the good conduct of the rest of their regiment. This appears to have worked, but I doubt it was a man management style that would have found much favour with the peer.

Moore has also been featured in Bernard Cornwell's latest work, The Fort, set during the American War of Independance, where he fights dastardly Continentals for the King with a very satisfactory outcome*. My old friend GA Henty has also given Moore the full treatment in his "With Moore at Corunna", a Henty I haven't read but that I shall have to make time for.

However, if Moore's fame is remembered in the 21st century, it shall be because of the poetry of the Reverend Charles Wolfe. Wolfe was an Irish poet, who was widely believed to have been the real father of nationalist leader, Teobald Wolfe Tone. He wrote his poem shortly after the battle of Waterloo, though it did not achieve real success until ten years later when it was championed by Lord Byron, who was presumably taking time away from other persuits.

The poem itself, "Burial of Sir John Moore after Corunna" is a little gem and I have always had a great affection for the last line. The ryhme scheme and cadence is well matched the subject matter, the slow beat reminiscent of a funeral march.

Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note,

As his corse to the rampart we hurried;

Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot

O'er the grave where our hero we buried.

You can find the rest here.

And finally, just to drag this back to wargaming - a clever Johnny over at http://www.ccnapoleonics.net has come up with a new variation on the published scenario covering the battle. What's interesting about his version is that it uses the Breakthrough format from Memoir '44 and the specialised card deck from Memoir '44 - Winter Wars. I haven't had a chance to play it yet, but I'm looking forward to it - my previous games of Breakthrough have been very satisfying.

It just goes to show that young Cordery is not the only chap who can't leave well enough alone.

You can find Michael Dippel's new Corunna scenario here.


*Though being a Bernard Cornwell novel, it turns out it was those wascally Chwistians awl awong.

The Battle of Corunna - Part II

The French counter-attack
the British advance at Piedralonga

On re-reading my post of yesterday, I realised that I hadn't included half the things I wished to and had just produced a somewhat lacklustre potted history of the battle.

For those of you who would like to know more, I recommend Christopher Hibbert's brief volume on the battle. This is classic Hibbert stuff, merging a well written and clear narrative with an admirable eye for personal stories, nor does he flinch from describing the appalling breakdown in discipline and control that occured on the retreat. Recommended.

Of course, for them as like to lift a heavier weight of paper, there is Volume One of Sir Charles Oman's History of the Peninsular War. It is an excellent book, but be warned - I have never met anyone who was able to buy just one volume of this work.

But returning to the game...

We played this several times and I believe the honours were about even. I remember two battles clearly - the first resulted in a messy scrap around Elvina which both sides simply trading blows until someone broke. Both players were new to the game and this precipitated an infantry bloodbath with virtually no involvement by the other arms. I think the issue there is that new players, particularly if they are Command & Colours veterans, rarely grasp the effect of casualties reducing firepower until they've played the game.

I found it interesting that both players were aware of this intellectually and had had it highlighted to them prior to the game, but didn't really seem to take it onboard until they had tried their old tactics and failed. A life lesson there perhaps.

The second battle saw a repeat of the abortive French assault on the centre, which was followed by a British assault on the left which was spectacularly successful, mainly I believe because the British player grasped that reducing the overall strength of the force infront of him was more advantageous then trying to pick of individual units.

The French then tried to press the British right with a cavalry charge that lost some of its punch through sloppy execution. The British formed square and as the French were unable to bring guns or infantry to bear on the squares, the French cavalry were seen off.

The situation after the
French counterattack at Piedralonga

(blogger seemingly will not allow me to un-italicise this text)

The second battle saw a repeat of the abortive French assault on the centre, which was followed by a British assault on the left which was spectacularly successful, mainly I believe because the British player grasped that reducing the overall strength of the force infront of him was more advantageous then trying to pick of individual units.

The French then tried to press the British right with a cavalry charge that lost some of its punch through sloppy execution. The British formed square and as the French were unable to bring guns or infantry to bear on the squares, the French cavalry were seen off.

The lessons that have been learned

- unsupported infantry advanced are a decidedly chancy business and generally lead to bloodbaths decided by dice rather than skill.

- cavalry charges should be supported by foot or guns in order to exploit infantry squares, also the timing of attacks (with regard to cavalry overrun) needs to be carefully considered.

The Battle of Corunna

The Battle of Corunna
Command & Colours: Napoleonics style

Much like the Battle of Maida, I've always had a soft spot for the Battle of Corunna. It formed the climax of my Napoleonic roleplaying campaign, called "The Halberdiers".

The players were all subalterns in the 46th Regiment of Foot, "The Kings Royal Corps of Halberdiers" who arrived with their regiment in the aftermath of the Treaty of Cintra and formed part of the advance into Spain. There was much skullduggery, intrigue, heroism and climbing of the greasy pole - and great fun it was too. I look forward to returning to it once we've moved house.

The Strategic Picture

The French had been beaten hollow at Rolica and Vimeiro in the previous year, but had been allowed to evacuate Portugal under the shameful terms of the treaty of Cintra. The British army kicked its heel in Portugal for quite some time, while the Spaniards set about the French in a jovial throat cutting sort of manner. The Spaniards had a notable victory at Bailen and London was all afire to help the gallant Dons kick the French in the seat of the pants.

Sir John Moore was dispatched to effect this seat kicking at the head of the British army. After advancing into Spain to support the Spaniards, he discovered that the first thing the Spaniards had organised after victory at Bailen was "the split"*. The Spanish command was hopelessly fragmented, mutually antagonistic and vastly overconfident - meanwhile Napoleon, who despite his many faults could never be accused of taking things lying down was about to cross the Pyrenees at the head of 200,000 men.

You will notice that at the beginning of the previous paragraph, I said, "the British army". While this is perhaps not strictly true, Britain had other troops mostly engaged in colonial security operations and home defence, what was certain was that Moore commanded the only field army Britain could deploy at the time. This inescapable fact informed his every decision. He could not afford to spend men with the prodigality of his opponent.

Moore advanced into Spain and had reached Salamanca before discovering that his new Spanish chums had been thoroughly whipped. He advanced further in the hope of distracting Napoleon's forces and giving the Spanish some time to regroup, eventually turning tail and making for the sea when the French began to pursue in earnest.

Moore's army marched through freezing conditions to the sea port of Corunna, losing nearly two thousand effectives to hunger, straggling and hypothermia. It was during this retreat that he lost the services of one Richard Sharpe...


When called upon to fight, the army did well, but with the exception of the rear-guard who were constantly harrassed by the French van, discipline was not good and collapsed completely on several occasions. Once Napoleon realised that he would not be able to cut Moore off, he withdrew, leaving matters in the hands of General Soult, known amongst my circle as "The Duck of Damnation".

Moore and the army made it to Corunna, but the transport ships had yet to arrive. When the French arrived a day later, Moore turned at bay and began preparations both to evacuate and to fight. Steps were taken to blow up the powder magazines and slaughter the army's horses. This episode forms part of Allan Mallinson's excellent Rumours of War.


The Tactical Picture

The two armies were posted on heights facing each other. Running in the valley between the two armies were streams which flowed to the sea. The heights of San Christobal anchored the British right, with the village of Elvina in the centre and Piedralonga on the left. When the French did not attack immediately, Moore thought that they might not attack at all and began the embarkation. However, French piquets drove in their British counterparts and an attempt was made to outflank the British leftl.

Meanwhile Soult established his batteries (he enjoyed a superiority in guns of two to one) on the heights overlooking Elvina. What followed was a prolonged shin kicking contest as the French drove out the British and were then driven out in turn, who were then counterattacked and so on. I imagine the impetus provided by charging downhill into the village helped feed this particular fight. Moore was attempting to rally the survivors of one of these counter-attacks when he was hit by a cannon ball. This hampered the defence, but the brigade commanders managed to fend off of the further French attacks, including an attack by the French horse on San Christobal, until Soult gave it up as a bad job.

By night fall, both armies were in much the same position as before, with losses of 1,500 men on the French side and 900 on the British. The British slipped away in the night, embarking on their transports while Spanish troops held the citadel to cover their escape.


*I imagine this taking place, Brendan Behan like, in a shadowy bodega where the wine and hot words were flowing.