The Battle of Spichern 6th August 1870
Introduction
I had yet to play the Age of Valour variant of Bill Grey’s Age of eagles. Matthew had read a lot about the period and was keen to wargame it, and he liked Age of Eagles so there was a clear community of interest. I suggested a game with my Franco-Prussian war 15mm armies, and after some thought decided on this battle to be played at Entoyment.
The Battle
I bought, many years ago, a Pallas Armata reprint of Von Schell’s “The Operations of the 1st Army to the capitulation of Metz”. It was first published in English in 1873. It provides an excellent summary of the battle of Spichern from the Prussian perspective. An online account which is a good read is at https://battlefieldanomalies.com/the-battle-of-spicheren/
The salient points of the encounter battle at Spichern are that it appeared to the Prussian Advance Guard Commander Lt Gen Von Kameke commanding 14th Division of the 7th Corps that the French were withdrawing. He seized the initiative and launched an attack against the French. The French who were not withdrawing, decided to hold their ground on what was a strong defensive position. The sounds of battle drew forward several different Prussian units from the 1st and 2nd Army throughout the day, while no French units from the nearby French Corps marched to the sound of the guns.
The battlefield is an incredibly string position if the French had seized it earlier enough in the battle and defended it. The position is based around a very steeply and wooded escarpment that faces North to Saarbrucken and West and East. At the top of the escarpment id effectively and open plateau with high ground to the South. In the middle of this plateau is the village of Spichern on a spur that runs West to east to the Saar River valley. The west flank of the battle is heavily wooded, and with high ground. The escarpment is steep and by some British commentators of the period was steeper and more difficult that the Alma in the Crimea.
To portray the battlefield, I decided to make some terrain in relief. The following picture shows what it is like in a trial assembly on my dining room table.
The underlying contour maps for the battlefield were obtained from German army 1:25000 maps of the area that were captured from the French in 1940 and then preserved for posterity by North American Universities. As any military man knows, battles are always fought on the join of four maps – this is no different!
Scenario Design
In designing the scenario for Age of Valour I based the unit strengths on the scenarios in the Age of Valour expansion pack from Bill Gray. In other words, the French forces were deployed as Brigades to represent the difficulty in mobilising the French forces for the war. While the Prussians are modelled as Regiments.
I also decided to bring in two special rules. One to account for the difficulty in crossing the escarpment, the second was to bring in the “Plunging Fire” rule from the 2nd Edition of Fire and Fury. The latter worked very well and is a good addendum to any Age of Valour or later game.
Additionally for the Prussian reinforcements, shown below, their time of arrival is per the actual battle. However, I decided that at that at that time there was a 50% chance of them arriving (4 or greater on a 6 sided dice that number would decrease each turn by 1). Hence bringing that forward in time there would be a 1 in 6 chance that they could arrive an hour earlier! In the game the Prussian’s certainly needed this element of luck in the early arrival of their reinforcements!
Matthew and I want to conduct further games of this period and instead base the French as small Regiments as well. We both felt that largish French Brigades don’t suffer the same degree of degradation in performance and ability to hold their positions in the battle that the French encountered in the war.
Prussian Forces
French Forces
The Game
The initial deployment, and on balance we might have been better to place more constraints on the French deployment as they were in reality much closer to the centre of a 48” deep table.
Looking towards the Prussian Advance Guard’s initial objective from the Galgenburg.
By 1330 the Prussian Advance Guard was a spent force, and the coup de main had failed. The 39IR had suffered 5 casualties in the first hour of battle and would eventually fall back to Saarbrucken to regroup and take no further part in the Battle. The 59IR which arrived at 1200 was moving to the right to protect the right flank. Meanwhile the rest of the 14th Division had arrived and was advancing on the escarpment. Fortunately for the Prussians, on the French left flank were extremely reticent to move, and the 12th Chasseurs would prove particularly difficult to control and motivate; until it really mattered. Meanwhile the rest of Frossard’s Corps were more than willing to close up nicely to the escarpment. (The red markers indicate damaged batterys, in other words batterys that had been reduced to half strength through fire casualties.)
At 1400 the 74IR charged the 3rd Chasseurs to the right of the gun line, and drove them back out of the wood, the 74Ir then exploited the breakthrough and clashed with the 10th Chasseurs who in turn threw the Prussians back. The 77IR held the flank pouring fire into the artillery causing significant damage and silencing a battery. Later the Prussians would reflect on the missed opportunity that this failure to break the 10th Chasseurs would represent. If they had broken through there would have been little to stop them rolling up the French Line.
By 1430 the French had extricated their artillery and brought forward an Infantry Brigade to the front lie. They remained vulnerable on their right flank and it would all depend on whether the Chasseurs could hold. The Prussians regrouped at the foot of the escarpment and launched another attack against the Chasseurs and though they were locked in battle the Chasseurs would eventually prevail and force the Prussians to the foot of the hill. Meanwhile elsewhere on the Prussian right the arrival of 40IR of 16th Division proved invaluable and held the line in the face of a determined French attack beating back two French brigades. The remainder of the 14th Division’s advanced guard have left to regroup in Saarbrucken.
By 1630 the remaining infantry regiment of the 14th Division lacks the combat power to force a result and it drives instead to move to the East to provide flank support to the 5th Division which is arriving.
The 5th Division’s commanding General has sent the first two infantry regiments to support the right as the one remaining regiment there is significantly outnumbered, and the enemy are now threatening the gun line.
At 1700hrs the first of the final two regiments and batterys from 5th Division arrive. On the right the outcome could depend on how well the attack goes. Although the French managed to withdraw two infantry brigades, the Chasseurs refused the order to withdraw, and instead they decided to fight their ground. They successfully beat of an attack from the 48IR, and then continued their withdrawal.
By 1730 the firepower of the Prussian artillery was in danger of causing the French significant harm, and the commander decided to withdraw from their previous positions where they were exposed to fire.
By 1930 (game turn 16) the French are making an ordered and controlled withdrawal. The Prussians lack the combat power to exploit taking the escarpment and to push forward. They would regroup on the objective.
Outcome
We called this a minor French tactical victory in that they were able to withdraw to the South and West in good order. What is interesting is that the total casualties suffered in this battle of around 5000 men per side was comparable to the actual battle. Both Matthew and I enjoyed the game and we felt that the rules credited themselves well. Neither of us were phased by the results of a 10 side dice, and in the end the overall result was acceptable despite some wild swings in favour, and indeed disfavour, of the Chasseurs.
Further games are needed to try out the suggestion of reducing the French side to weaker regiments.
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