TOPIC: Scenario Development: The Second British Invasion of River Plate - 1807 |
Scenario Development: The Second British Invasion of River Plate - 1807 keithabarker 28th Aug 2016 07:18:58 Yes the Light Brigade were the only infantry trained as skirmishers. Craufurds Light Brigade should probably be... * 5 coys 1/95th Rifles Lieutenant-Colonel Cadogan (364 plus 52 officers, NCOs and buglers) Also you seem to have mixed up the divisional and brigade units in the British army. C-in-C Lieut-General John Whitelocke 1st Division (Leveson-Gower) 2nd Division (Whitelocke) In addition it looks like one of the British batteries was G Troop Royal Horse Artillery The 95th has its history well documented... 2nd Btn 95th Rifles, The Invasion of the South America and the Rio de la Plata Campaigns The history of the Rifle Brigade (the Prince Consort's Own) formerly the 95th... Another useful link showing casualties in South America RHA Organisation Hope this helps!
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Standard User Posts: 404 Glenn Pearce 28th Aug 2016 07:35:36 Hello FW! Starting to look very good, Keith is a very good researcher as is John and the others. The only thing that looks odd to me is the 17th Lt. Dragons at 959 men and the 9th Lt. Dragons at 0. The number 959 seems high for a British cavalry regiment. With some more research and or guess work you might discover that the number 959 covers both regiments. So unless something else turns up I would just divide that number by 2. Composing an order of battle is rarely 100% and often contains guess work, sometimes by you and sometimes by your source. Best regards, Glenn
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Scenario Development: The Second British Invasion of River Plate - 1807 keithabarker 28th Aug 2016 07:40:50
If your newly found Spanish souce is correct about the strength of the Light Brigade, then my estimate of 70 men per light company was a touch too high, 65 men per company would have been nearer the mark! However despite my very poor Spanish, I am not 100% certain about your newly found Spanish souce as being reliable for British units. It identifies a well know picture by Charles Hamilton Smith of the Regimental Colours of the 9th Foot as "Abanderado del 9° Reg. de Dragones" which it certainly isn't. |
Scenario Development: The Second British Invasion of River Plate - 1807 keithabarker 28th Aug 2016 08:55:11 I found the following from The Trial at Large of Lieut. Gen. Whitelocke. It gives strengths for all the British units when they departed for South America, with the exception of the Light Battalion of course.
The force which his Majesty has been pleased to place under your immediate command consists as follows: viz Rank & File Additional Instructions to Lieutenant-General WHITELOCKE …the corps under Brigadier-General Craufurd… 6th Dragoon Guards 294
9th dragoons 632 …the force under the command of Brigadier-General Craufurd… 6th Dragoon Guards 299
3 batteries of Field Artillery 18 pieces: 8x6-pdr, 5x4-pdr, 2x3-pdr & 3x5½-inch howitzers
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Standard User Posts: 404 Glenn Pearce 29th Aug 2016 02:17:09 Hello FW! Okay, I see that you don't want to have a low scale of 200 per base or 50 bases per side. That means that my rules would not be of any value to you. GdD seems to fit exactly what your looking for so there is no need to send me anything. John has a great deal of experience in converting o/bs to GdD so I'm sure he'll be along shortly to help you sort out the best alternative/scale to use per base. Best regards, Glenn |
Scenario Development: The Second British Invasion of River Plate - 1807 Whirlwind 29th Aug 2016 05:56:43 @Friedrich_Wilhelm, Okay, this is how I do orbats for GdD.Find the total infantry strength of both sides... ...and then divide by the number of infantry battalions on both sides (ignore detachments of 1-3 companies). This figure will give you the average unit strength - take this as the strength of an infantry base... ...then divide the total infantry strength of each army by this number and you have the number of infantry bases for each side ... ...then match them up as close as you can to the order of battle. Some bigger units will need two bases (imagine them operating as wings), some smaller units will need to be amalgamated (as composite battalions). Cavalry bases should be 3/8ths the strenngth of an infantry base. Amalgamate or divide into "wings" as appropriate. Artillery bases should average 6 guns if bases are c500 - 700 strong. Any less than that, make them 4, if bigger make them 8. If you care about such things, make 1BW = average infantry base strength/5m wide (so the ground scale can be a bit elastic). I hope that helps All the best John
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Scenario Development: The Second British Invasion of River Plate - 1807 Whirlwind 30th Aug 2016 04:10:49 Hi, Not quite. Total infantry of both sides = 5902 + 7237 = 13139 Total number of battalions = 21 Average battalion size = 625.66.. no. of Spanish infantry bases = 5902/625 = 9.4 no. of British infantry bases = 7237/625 = 11.6 I'd normally round to the nearest while number, but because doing that would slightly disadvantage the Spanish given the small numbers of bases, I'd round both of these up to 10 and 12 respectively. Then try and get these bases to resemble individual division then brigade strength as closely as possible. I hope that helps
I hope that helps |
Scenario Development: The Second British Invasion of River Plate - 1807 keithabarker 30th Aug 2016 09:12:54 I agree with Whirlwind, except that I would choose to round down the number of infantry bases. This in order to make the number fit the British OOB better. Of the 28 pieces of artillery, only 18 were field artillery, which would give the British 3 batteries. The remaining guns would be part of the siege train; 24-pdrs are used to smash city walls. Of the dragoon regiments, only the 17th LD appear to have been mounted. This gives the following... Spanish: 9 Infantry, 6 Cavalry, 8 Batteries (if all the guns were field artillery which seems very unlikely?)
Lieutenant General John Whitelocke (CinC) 1 base - 95th Rifles (SK2),
1 base - 5th foot (SK0) 1 base - 36th Foot (SK0) 1 base - 40th Foot (SK0)
1 base - 17th Light Dragoons (Light Cavalry)
Spanish Army Viceroy Santiago de Liniers (CinC) División Derecha 3 bases - Infantry (SK0) División Izquierda 2 bases - Infantry (SK0), División Reserva 2 bases - Infantry (SK0)
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Scenario Development: The Second British Invasion of River Plate - 1807 keithabarker 31st Aug 2016 07:40:12 SK0... The problem with the Spanish light troops was that the lack of a proper tactical manual/doctrine concerning their use ensured that the few skirmishers that the Spanish could deploy would be ill-trained for fighting on a Napoleonic battlefield. This applied both to the light battalions and to the 8 skirmishers per company that the "heavy" regiments had. However the Spanish skirmishers seemed to excel when they were not on a Napoleonic battlefield, and fought well in all skirmishes and little wars. As GdD represents the Napoleonic battlefield I would class the Spanish as SK0 in the same way as I did the British line infantry (even though the British line infantry could deploy centre companies as skirmishers). If you were using another set of rules like Sharpe Practice, then I would consider giving them a better skirmish capability. 50 guns... I didn't doubt that the Spanish had gathered 50 guns for one engagement. It seems from your source that the Spanish had 50 guns in entrenchments. How many of these were field pieces? How many had the required horses to move a battery (i.e. not just the guns). |
Scenario Development: The Second British Invasion of River Plate - 1807 keithabarker 31st Aug 2016 07:02:53 Yes those are the Sharp Practice (SP) rules I meant. I have only tested SP1 One of my friends at the club uses SP2 to fight the 1808 Finnish war between Sweden and Russia. His blog... http://dalauppror.blogspot.se/search/label/Sharp%20Practice He also had an article on the same theme published in the current WSS (86). TwoFatLardies have done a great 4-part series on youtube that explains how SP2 works... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fwH6-2K9voc But while a skirmish with a handfull of models can be fun, I personally think that 6mm gives the right massed feeling when you want to reproduce the Napoleonic Battlefield. |