Vittoria 1813

 

For this week's Horse 'n Musket themed meeting of the Wollongong Wargamers, Vittoria was requested. Described as the 'Waterloo of the Peninsula', this could be quite a big game for an evening, even using Valour and Fortitude rules!

Fortunately, the battle breaks down quite easily around each of the four Allied thrusts, and the more interesting and isolated is Graham's attempt to cut off the French retreat to France. This is a self contained action pitting his Corps against that of Reille:

The terrain is fairly easy to do too - there was undulating ground north of the river but it had no impact on the fighting. Essentially we have a series of Defended Terrain Features:

For the gallant Portuguese brigades we used Daniel's Dutch Belgians; in this scale, blue jackets and 1812 false front shakoes all look the same to me! Sadly, on this occasion we weren't able to feature the two Spanish formations, the ones who actually broke through! However given their 1812 uniform profile I'm sure these could also be improvised from the British sprue. 

We rolled to see who would take each side: Daniel swapped his familiar redcoat for the Emperor's service and I was equally unfamiliar with impersonating Old Boney - this may account for some of our more rash decisions during the evening! I did know I was expected to attack in line though:

And Daniel deployed in a distinctly columnar fashion defending the line of the river Zadorra and the key villages on the northern bank. Rather threateningly, his four Dragoon regiments were all also in column well forward on the Vittoria road...

I just bashed on regardless!

Suffering unwarranted casualties from the musketry fire of the French infantry columns - that's not right! 

At least I could count on steady, reliable, well-disciplined British Heavy Cavalry!

And the heavies did well initially - but then got carried away with the Headstrong trait charging deep into the French lines! Still, it took the pressure off the infantry...

Who by this point had ejected the Marie-Louises from Gamorra Menor - the first Victory Point!

The French were holding much more steady at Abechuco though, and were better supported by their Light Cavalry, who completed the rout of my heavies...

But by this point my cunning plan to throw everything at taking Durana and cutting the high road seemed to be paying off - the French reserve brigade was marching and counter marching all over the park!

Protracted musketry fire-fights all along the line resulted in carnage, with us both losing several battalions. But for the ensuing multiple brigade Fortitude tests the dice Gods smiled on me: 3 more victory points!

By turn 5 my left wing was across the Zadorra and setting up for an assault on Durana, but we called it there, a minor British victory, although in truth there was still a lot to play for.

An interesting and enjoyable game which mixed up our usual roles. Perhaps one day we will do the whole battle!