The Fight for St Amand La Haye: The French

So, the other half of our scenario, of course, is the French army contingent. The French attack on St Amand commenced around 2.30 pm on the 16th with an assault by Vandamme's III Corps, augmented by Girard's division from II Corps. The scenario suggests that Girard alone occupied the focus of the Prussian I Korps, but this description is not borne out by any of the accounts I've read (Hofschroer, Uffindell, Nofi, Schom, Siborne, or Alain Arcq's account in Ligny: 16 juin 1815). Those authors agree that Girard's was one of four divisions that took part in the attack on the St Amand "cluster"; it may even have been the last to move into combat, after III Corps proper was engaged. Perhaps it is for simplicity's sake and as an introductory scenario that only Girard is included here. (In fact, reading through several of the above authors' accounts, the scenario as presented seems to be bear only a sketchy connection to the historical events.)

In any event, General de Division Count Girard's aim is to capture St Amand La Haye (or at least more than half of it) by the end of the scenario. He has two light infantry and two line infantry regiments, totalling nine battalions, at his disposal, as well as one battery of artillery. Given that the French are disallowed from attacking St Amand Le Chateau and that it's filled with Prussians who aren't allowed to move but would be more than happy to shoot at passing Frenchmen, there's plenty of reason to give Le Chateau a wide berth in moving toward La Haye. St Amand Le Hameau also flanks the target, but it is held only by a small force, and the scenario does not immunize them from the French, so they might be an early target, just to clear the way, so to speak.

Girard can begin anywhere within ten hexes of Ferme l'Alouette, which means essentially as far as the westernmost crossroads on the Mellet-to-St Amand Le Chateau road, south of the Chapelle St Bernard. 

The French have eleven turns (the beginning of the 2.40 turn to the end of the 6.00 turn) to take and hold five of the eight village/town/special structure hexes of St Amand La Haye. That seems on the face of it more than enough time. Once the French capture five of those hexes, the Prussian I Korps, 2nd Brigade--being held in reserve--is released to reinforce the troops in St Amand. So my first instinct, in a gamey sense, is to slow-roll the attack. Why fight more Prussians than you need to sooner than you have to? But that assumes that the French player knows the Prussian decision points, and while they could probably guess that reinforcements would be sent to hold or retake a strongpoint on the army's flank, I think the first impulse ought to be to take the town as fast as possible and worry about holding it after.

So Girard's men are going to be arrayed to take Le Hameau swiftly, then move on to seize La Haye and "hold until relieved". But what formation(s) to use? It will take about half an hour to march from their start point to the St Amands, so I don't seen any need to start any of the infantry in road column to get there faster. 

If the French are going to attack Le Hameau first, let's try shooting up its defenders and see if we can drive them off that way. The French have two regiments of legere (light infantry), all of whom can skirmish. Skirmishers can fire better than columns, so let's use skirmishers to start with. Troops in line can fire even better, but they are more vulnerable to return fire than skirmishers, and they move more slowly too. Troops in column move speedily, but they generate minimal firepower, so let's not use columns. There are jaegers out skirmishing on the outskirts of Le Hameau, but it's one small unit; the legere can overwhelm them with numbers.

So let's start one of the light infantry regiments in front skirmishing and the rest of the infantry behind them in columns for a quick follow-up.

So there is Girard, with one regiment of legere out in front, skirmishing, accompanied by the divisional guns, which will be looking for a good position to set up for supporting fire on the assaults. Behind the front line are three regiments, two battalions in each, in columns ready to move forward behind the skirmish screen. Girard will advance to the northeast, sweep through the hamlet, and move on to the main course.

What does Girard have to work with? Here's a snapshot of his command, displayed as broken down into battalions.

First is Girard himself, the 0-10. The 0 shows that he and his staff officers, while they represent a locus of command, have no combat strength. The 10 shows his ability to move during a turn. As a division commander he has a third, unprinted rating of 3--the distance he and his immediate staff can reach out and command troops. Any troops more than 3 hexes from him will be out of command, so he needs to stay close to the action. The II on his counter shows he is part of the French II Corps; the 7 below that shows he commands the 7th Division. His counter, like all those in La Bataille games, is a representation of his uniform: a blue coat with gold lace, white breeches, a particoloured sash, and on his left breast is the ribbon and star of the Legion of Honour.

Below him are four lines of counters, slightly more stylised in their design. The legere (light infantry) wear their blue coats and trousers; below them the ligne (line) regiments have blue coats and white trousers. The center of the counter shows the facings of the regiment (again, blue or white) with white crossbelts (which also mimic the X symbol of traditional NATO imagery for "infantry"). In the top left corner, all of them show the 7 of Girard's division; below that a 1 or 2 to show their brigade in the division (there are no separate brigade commanders shown in the French OB--they were there, but they play no role in the game's mechanics). At the top of the counter are two red dots; an adaptation of traditional NATO symbology to indicate the unit depicted is a battalion. Below the unit's crossbelts is a brass badge like that worn on the regiment's shako (hat), showing the regimental number; to the right of the counter is the number of the battalion (regimental component) that counter represents. So, the first brigade of Girard's 7th Division consists of the 1st and 2nd battalions of the 11th Legere and the 1st and 2nd battalions of the 82nd Ligne. For some reason, the artist has given the 1/11th Legere an imperial bee (Napoleon's personal badge) on their counter; I'm not sure why.

Each unit also has two more numbers: its strength and movement potential. Strength (the lefthand number) represents roughly how many hundred men it consists of. Movement is how many hexes of open terrain it can cross in twenty minutes. That's planned, intentional movement; troops may move more than that in a turn if they become disordered or broken and seek to fall back or flee. Note that the light troops move just a little faster then the line (and are marked with a hunting horn, the symbol of hunters, scouts, and--curiously--postal carriers in European symbology). Did they truly move that little bit faster? Or does it represent the little bit more initiative usually attributed to light troops, or a little longer reach of their inherent skirmishers? Who knows? It may just be a designer's grace note.

The division's second brigade is similar; its legere regiment has three battalions rather then two, thought he third, only about two hundred men, is very small.

Bringing up the tail of the column is the division's artillery company. Note the single red dot to show a company-sized unit. It is the 3rd Company of the 2nd Regiment of Foot Artillery, though in this period artillery was rarely deployed as anything but companies--regiments were more an administrative element than an operational one. The cannon ball on the crossbelts is a small touch to denote artillery. With its guns and limbers, the artillery does not move as fast as the infantry. Were these horse artillery we would see a faster movement potential, as those units included riding horses for all the crew, not just enough to move the gun limbers and ammunition caissons.

And here's a glimpse of the all-important back of the counters (I moved the artillery up to show it as well).

Girard's counter shows his name and command role. It shows four numbers that represent his ability to influence his troops. On the left, the bonuses he gives for infantry (upper) and cavalry (lower) combat. No surprise, he gives a bonus to his infantrymen but none for cavalry, of whom he commands nine. To the right, his bonuses for artillery (upper) and morale (lower) for all arms. Girard's ratings are good, if not stunning. He was a brave leader who led by example; in the battle for St Amand, he was mortally wounded leading his men in combat. His counter bears the imperial badge of the wreathed N to show he is an officer.

The four infantry units are largely the same. Their unit designation (division/brigade/regiment/battalion) across the top. Below it on the left their fire value (top), melee value (middle), and morale value (bottom). These are exceptionally good troops; these are strong values. Note that the legere units also bear their light infantry hunting horn badges and a 2 on the right side. This shows they can fire out to a range of two hexes rather than the default of 1, because they are trained as skirmishers. This represents the main body sending out bodies of troops in open order to fire at the enemy from close range. These skirmishers have supports to fall back on, should the enemy advance, and can fall back on the main body of the battalion if pressed hard enough. This additional range can only be used when the unit is operating in skirmish order, as denoted by flipping over the counter in play to show this reverse side.

The artillery unit also starts with its designation. On the left side are three fire factors, for close, medium, and long range. Close range is always 2 hexes, medium 3 to 5, long range 6 to the battery's maximum. The top number on the right side of the counter is that maximum (so long range for this battery is 6 to 8 hexes). The middle number on the right is the unit's morale; the bottom number its melee value. The better the morale of units, the *lower* the number (so the infantry at 14 or 16 have better morale than these artillerists at 21). The better the melee value, the *higher* the number--so these gunners (3 versus the infantry 11 to 15) had better be doing their fighting from long range!

Next time: The Prussians.