Nordhausen Campaign – Day One

2 September 1813 – Nordhausen Campaign - Day 1

French defend Nordhausen/Halle border
4 French army – defend Halberstadt
5 French army – defend Sangerhausen
6 French army – defend Heldrungen

Russian attack Halberstadt
1 Russian army – attack Halberstadt
2 Russian army – observe Sangerhausen
3 Russian army – observe Heldrungen

Battle of Halberstadt – table at start of battle

Both armies are deployed on the table at the start of the game, with 2 foot between them
This is a surprise attack by the Russian army.
The defending French army cannot move until the start of move 2

The three objectives are in the centre of the table.
The farm on the left, the woods in the centre and the hill on the right
The army which occupies at least two at the end of the battle is the winner

The defending army is not in position on the three objectives
Therefore the Russian army arrives at all three objectives a little earlier than the French

On the right three Russian infantry brigades are sent to take the hill
Their cavalry, artillery and one infantry brigade are deployed to the right of the hill
The French duplicate this deployment, also sending three infantry brigades to take the hill
The resulting infantry skirmish and melee decides the outcome
The French win the skirmish battle, but the Russians win the melee and occupy the hill

In the centre the Russians send three infantry brigades to take the woods.
Their cavalry, artillery and one infantry brigade hold the area between the woods and the hill
The French cavalry advance and force the Russian artillery into a nearby square
They are charged by the Russian cavalry, who win the melee and rout them
The Russian infantry hold the woods, despite a series of French counter attacks

On the left Russian infantry enter the farm, but come under fire from French artillery
The Cossack brigade are routed by the French cavalry, who in turn are routed by artillery fire
The French infantry attack the farm and after prolonged fighting rout the Russian defenders

At the end of just 6 moves both sides have suffered only light casualties
But both have a lot of brigades in rout, 11 French and 5 Russian
The French are too weak to launch another attack and the Russians win the battle

Comments
Normally the defending army are deployed on the three game objectives at the start of the game.
But for this campaign I have decided to deploy both armies at either end of the table
The three 2 foot squares containing the objectives are between them
Both armies have to advance to occupy them, resulting in an encounter style wargame

The normal sequence of a 12 move game was in three parts.
During the first four moves the attacking side moved onto the table and deployed out of range
For the next four moves the artillery and cavalry would try to gain an advantage
During the last four moves the attacking infantry would engage the defending infantry

This type of game relied on the attacker gaining an initial advantage for his cavalry or artillery.
He would then hope to break the weakened defending army with an infantry attack
Normally the first round of skirmish or melee would decide the outcome of the game
Because there would not be time to rally routed brigades and launch a counter attack
It was hoped that with this new deployment the fighting would start sooner
This would allow time for routed brigades to rally and counter attack.


This happened to a degree in this wargame, but it was not decisive
For some reason there was an unusually high number of routed brigades
And this despite the fact that casualties were not particularly high on either side
Obviously the reason was low dice at a critical time, and this applied to both sides.

In this game it happened more for morale tests than combat tests
This may be just a “one off”, and I will need to play a few more games to confirm
If so it may be necessary to change the morale rules.
This is something I have been considering for some time.

The change in deployment certainly resulted in a much more exciting wargame
Both armies were in contact at all three objectives much sooner than previously
But because of routs the expected counter attacks did not materialise.