Borodino 1812-2012 - The MegaGame!

Lachlan explains how his Corps will win the day!

Well, we did it! After many months of preparation, of building, painting, practice games and developing rules amends,
agreeing victory conditions, and arranging teams and roles, 20 wargamers from NSW and South Australia met this weekend to mark the 200^th Anniversary in grand style.

So what did we achieve? We refought the Battle of Borodino, in a single day, like the original, using Battalion level rules, on a 1:20 figure scale, with every engaged Corps and Division represented. I calculated that we had well over 5,000 figures on the 240 sq feet playing area, with the French boasting 70 line battalions of Infantry, averaging 34 figures each, and the Russians 59 battalions of similar size. The French had the edge in Cavalry, and the Russians in Artillery.

We succeeded in getting in 10 rounds of hard fought action, so that the Victory conditions could be fairly assessed within the context of a completed game.

Many spectators joined us in the evening to look over the spectacular terrain and wish us well...Above, a facebook post from the French Commander's wife wishing everyone well...


Photo from HoH Gallery

All the major ingredients of the actual battle were recreated – the passion, the assaults, the counter attacks, strong points changing hands, break throughs and strategic redeployments...

The huge planning and preparation effort, the troop stats, rules amends and victory conditions, the practice games, can all be seen on earlier posts, suffice it to say that a real feeling of anticipation, a fitting sense of pre-battle tension, prevailed on the Saturday, the eve of battle...

Prince Eugene, aka Barry, give IV Corps an eve of battle speech that was later to hang on the Oval Office wall...

After the hard work of setting up the tables and models was completed, with the Russians deploying first, and then the French, reactively; we celebrated with a bottle, well, bottles, of local wines and a pig roast, prepared by Matt, who demonstrated that he had culinary skills as well as being a landscape artist of no small talent, as these photographs of the terrain will attest...

Prussian Uhlans (For my Prussophile mate von Peter!)

A few of us crashed out in the Hall of Heroes overnight, and I can confidently inform you that the trains start running through Campbelltown at 5.00am......Still, I was like a kid on Christmas morning, and spent the early morning gloating over the terrain....

Once the teams were in the briefing started. Now umpiring can be a boring job, but as each team captain revealed his plans, I could see that we would be in for a hard fought, and closely matched, battle, and that the outcome was going to be close.

The French Captain briefed his team, with minutes to spare before game start, that he was no longer interested in achieving the Victory Conditions, which had been months in preparation, and was now aiming for a battle of attrition....Deep breath time! I reflected that, actually, that might lead to a closer historical outcome - Borodino was hardly a battle of fine manoeuvre!

Photo from HoH Gallery

Troy’s plan, was to mask off the Raevsky Redoubt, and also only feint towards each flank; Borodino in the North and the Utitsa Kurgan in the South; and unleash the main effort at the Fleches, after a suitable period of bombardment to soften its defences, punching  through the Russian lines there to achieve a battle of annihilation.

Photo from HoH Gallery

The Russian team captain then briefed his plan, which had been emailed to me the week before and so was less of a shock...The cavalry would be concentrated to the North, to impede French movement on the flanks and support Borodino. The other flank to the South would also be strongly held, reinforced by a massive grand battery concentrating 2/3^rds of the Russian heavy guns. The central area would be less strongly held, with the hope of creating a ‘cauldron’ or killing zone, the shoulders of which would be formed by the Grand Battery to the South and the Guards to the North, who would be committed early. Once the French had been attrited in the cauldron, they would be eventually be mopped up by the Infantry reserves...

So both team captains were aiming  to bring on a battle of attrition in the South-Central sector, and the fighting around the flanks, and the Redoubt, would be half hearted...This was going to be very interesting...Surely no plan survives contact with the enemy!

Dogged defenders - The Russians, L-R, Motty, Greg, Dave, Bryan(C), James, Mick, John. Mark and John Snr inbound...

The opening Russian pre game bombardment from the 3 position batteries in the Raevsky Redoubt was limited in its effect, the French VIII corps opposite having deployed out of effective range, a single Battalion becoming disordered, but it was a taste of things to come...

Valiant stormers - The French, L-R, Blake, Matt, Lachlan, Gus, Philip, Troy  (C), Richard, John, Barry

In the French opening move, however, their Grand Battery concentrated their fire on the Fleches as planned, and highly effective fire soon reduced it to a mere heap of sand providing no benefit to its defenders...

Ney’s I Corps then promptly took full advantage, charging the Fleches, whilst in the North Prince Eugene followed orders to the letter, with a tentative feint followed by a prudent resort to squares as the massed Russian cavalry began to stir....

Similarly in the South the action was initially confined to light cavalry and Cossack skirmishes and a careful clearing of the large patch of scrubland by the light infantry of both V and III corps acting in unison to flush out and engage the concealed Russian Jaegers and Cossacks. So in the opening pair of moves both teams stuck rigidly to their plans!

The French Assault on the Fleches, as befitted the French main effort, slowly and painfully began to make headway, and I reflected that had they not concentrated all their artillery firepower on reducing its defensive value to zero it would have been nigh on unbeatable.

At this point the Russian team debated pulling out of the Fleches to allow the supporting Grand Battery full scope to play on the French in the ‘Cauldron’, but decided instead to commit the Guard Infantry forward to be ready on the flanks of any French breakthrough...

With its initial task achieved in Grand style, the French Grand Battery limbered and attempted to move north to assist VIII Corps, which you will recall was tasked with screening off the Raevsky redoubt. 




Cunning use of the dead ground in the balkas and creeks had allowed it to approach the redoubt without too many losses,

but earlier events had demonstrated that more firepower would be needed to allow any closer engagement.

Unfortunately a series of unlucky dice throws, including a visit to the infamous ‘blunder’ table, slowed down the Grand Battery’s redeployment....Meanwhile the Fleches finally fell to the French after a passionate and hard fought struggle.

The first Victory point went to the French! The Russian team had anticipated this loss, and set in train their Infantry reserves on their strategic march south to deal with any French strategic breakthrough.

 I was glad to see a strategic movement on a game of this size. Its not often you see a game where 2 Infantry Corps only form a part of the reserve, much less engage on a long flanking march, which of course Black Powder allows you to do...

The footprint of Borodino represented by its Orthodox Church, scratch built by Blake. Our expert on Eastern Theology, James, assured us that it was named 'The Church of the Fallen Madonna'...

The French brought on their Guards Heavy Cavalry in the Northern sector to engage the masses of Russian Heavy cavalry which had been holding Eugene’s Corps in square. The village of Borodino, despite receiving regular and well coordinated attacks, was still holding out, although of course its gallant defenders were not to know that these were merely feint attacks!

At this stage I detected a change of emphasis in the French plans. Their troops inside the captured Fleches were receiving the concentrated attentions of the main Russian grand battery, with, as one French player put it, entire battalions disappearing in a pink mist! But having, with commendable foresight, retasked their Grand Battery against the Raevsky redoubt, where by now it had reduced its defensive value by 50%, VIII Corps was either ordered to take it, or their commander got carried away.... Either way, wave assaults were launched against its defenders....

The Russians attempted to relieve the pressure by committing the Guards Heavy Cavalry, but once again the astute use of our local ‘Cavalry Overwatch’ order meant that the Saxon Heavy Cavalry brigade were able to intervene.

This was a real challenge to my impartiality as umpire, as these are my little darlings, and it gives me great pleasure to report that after several rounds of swirling heavy Cavalry melee,

 the Russian Garde was pushed back, and the French infantry assaults on the redoubt continued unchecked by anything so boring as having to form square...

James' Perry Artillery in the Grand Redoubt - 3 Heavy Batteries!

As the game was drawing to its last moves, the intensity and passion of play somehow increased.

To the North, the opposing massed cavalry formations continued their might clash, but the Russians were being herded back to their rear, and IV Corps lost no time in forming back into columns from the squares which they had been in so long, and sweeping forward.

However, the Borodino Garrison, though shaken, disordered, battered and bruised, somehow continued to hold on to the smoking ruins of the village. Overall, however, the Russian defences, particularly the firepower of the massed batteries in the Central South sector, seemed impregnable...

The tension and excitement continued to rise however, as Matt fought his Corps like a demon to break through to the Russian batteries which had been tormenting his troops so long. At the same time, VIII Corps managed to break into the Raevsky redoubt.

Would the French snatch victory from the stalemate at the eleventh hour? At this point, with 1 move each to go, the victory points were even – The French had gained one for the Fleches, and had committed less of their reserves than the Russians, who had thrown everything in to hold the line, so gaining another VP for a total of 2.

Corps cards as used by the French team to aid with force marshalling prior to the game - the Russians simply scalpeled the excel spreadsheet Orbat into strips - simple but effective - rather in character! VIII Corps was the smallest French Corps, but seemed to be in all the action...

 The Russians were holding the Utitsa Kurgan, and Borodino was still holding out, albeit by a thread.... gaining a VP each. The Raevsky redoubt was still a broiling mass of hand to hand fighting, so could not be claimed by anyone at this stage...

 In their final desperate charge through the Russian rear to get to the guns, Matt had led 4 Battalions onto the Russian rear table. According to the victory conditions, he was entitled to a VP for each unshaken Infantry Bde of 4 Bns, so if they all survived the last Russian move in good order, it would be a French victory...

However, perhaps fittingly, the Russian Artillery, the Red God of War as it is known in Russian military doctrine, spoke loud and clear – when the smoke cleared, and the race was run, 3 of the 4 battalions had indeed been shaken by the sheer firepower of the Grand Battery...

So despite the intensity of the fighting, or perhaps because of it, our game resulted in a similar stalemate to the original...However this does not reflect on the strategy and planning of the team captains who both, as I hope I have recounted, stuck broadly to their plans, and reacted intelligently to the enemy's movements. It was pleasing to see that they both managed to remain aloof from the scrimmage and keep cool heads to observe the action and act strategically. An opportunity given to few wargamers in a mega game of this scale and they both responded to the challenge magnificently, as did the teams they led so ably. Bryan remarked to me afterwards: 'I think I had a grin on my face all day'! So it wasn't just me who had the wargame of a lifetime!

For more eye candy, please check out the Hall of Heroes website:

http://www.thehallofheroes.com.au/gallery

Huzzah!