Nearly Waterloo

French win Waterloo

After some delay we have at last completed the Nearly Waterloo wargame, and it has been posted on the Nearly Napoleonic Battles blog

It made an interesting change to fight a one off wargame, rather than one of our usual 1813 campaign battles.

I gave the French an advantage of 16 infantry brigades against the British 12 brigades.   This may have proved too big an advantage. 

We followed the outline of the historical battle.   It opened with a French corps attacking Hougoumont, La Haye Sainte and Papelotte.   All three were forward of the British battle line, and difficult to support.   The overwhelming French numbers allowed them to swamp the garrisons.

Hougoumont fell quite quickly, but surprisingly La Haye Sainte held out.   This despite the French having more artillery in support than at Hougoumont.   The garrison held because they rolled very good dice for morale as their casualties increased.

The French won, and that result was never really in doubt

We enjoyed the game and will certainly continue with this occasional series of one off games based on historical battles.

You can read the battle report here

https://nearlynapbattles.blogspot.com/

I have also done a video slide show of this game so that there will be easy access to subsequent games in the series, rather than have to find them on the blog.  You will find the slide show here

https://youtu.be/VdYHubd40q0

Nearly Waterloo Planning

Waterloo wargame table

I have decided to attempt a game based on Waterloo to trial whether the whole project will work or not.   It is perhaps a little strange to game the last, and one of the largest, of the Napoleonic battles, as the first of the series.

There are two main reasons why I have done so.

First I know the battle so well that there is very little research required.  

Second if I can make it work for this one the rest should be quite easy.

The table is very basic and does not attempt to recreate the historical battlefield.  

The roads are correct and the main buildings and villages more or less so.  I have used buildings from our collection, so they do not look like the originals.   I have however put Wellington’s tree on the cross roads!

Wellington has a ridge, of sorts, to help his deployment.   The one on the left has the Nivelles road running behind it.  The one on the right has the Wavre road running behind it.  This is correct, but does not play a significant part in the wargame as it did in the actual battle.

Table at start of wargame

I have not made any attempt to follow the historical order of battle.   Wellington’s army is the standard one I use for the British/Portuguese in my 1813 campaign.   I have reduced each corps from four to three infantry brigades.   And the Portuguese brigade in each corps becomes a Dutch/Belgian brigade.   This gives me 96 infantry, 16 cavalry and 16 gunners with 4 guns.

Napoleon commands the same army as he does in the 1813 campaign, with one exception.   The Polish corps which forms part of his First French Army in the campaign, has been replaced by the 2^nd French corps.  This is because I wanted all of the French army to be French brigades.   The four corps are full strength.   There are 128 infantry, 16 cavalry, 16 gunners and 4 guns.

So the French 32 more infantry than the British.

Unlike my campaign games I have collected the four cavalry brigades on each side into two corps and given each a commander.   I have also created a very small “Grand Battery” for Napoleon by taking the artillery from the Guard and 4^th corps and putting it under the command of an ADC.

I have used the names of commanders from both sides.   This was easier for the French, because they had corps during the battle.   More difficult for the British, because they had divisions.  

I wanted Reille to command the attack on Hougoumont, Lobau on La Haye Sainte and D’Erlon on what Jac Weller calls PHLS and I call Papelotte.   I also wanted Cooke to command the right flank and Picton just east of the cross roads.   I also wanted Ponsonby to command the British heavy cavalry, even though I must be the only wargamer who does not have Scots Greys.

This is all for colour, and to help me recognise the game as similar to Waterloo.   In fact I am quite pleased with the visual look of the table.

The real test will come when we play the wargame.

You will find more information here

https://nearlynapbattles.blogspot.com/