15. Battle of Murcia - 9th October 1808

I counseled against attacking.  But Sean ordered the attack, so attack we did.

I led 3rd Division (2,424 inf, 8 guns) and the southern wing of the corps.  Steve had the 5th Division (3,959 inf, 8 guns) with Macloud commanding one of his brigades.  Josh had the Cavalry Division (1,644 cav, 12 guns).

We set off north right away.  I was quite surprised when I came up on the Spanish so quickly.  I thought that we were facing the right division of the three Spanish Divisions holding the town.  I thought if I could press this section of the line hard, Sean and Digby could force the river quickly and get a hold of the town.  We had some intelligence regarding the Army of Valencia's possible arrival in support, 20,000 strong, but we hoped they would arrive after we had defeated the three defending divisions and set up a defense of the town.

The Spanish were set up in a perfect defensive position.  They were simply facing the wrong direction.  Steve and Macloud were a little behind me, but I didn't have time to wait.  If I didn't neutralize the two batteries to my front, we would have been massacred by canister.  So I sent both my infantry brigades hard for a line of breastworks and ordered the guns to come up on the edge of the woods and open fire on the Spanish infantry.  I sent one battalion to the right and they captured an entire Spanish battery.  At the breastwork line, we poured a hellish fire into the other battery and the Spanish battalions rushing to their support.

I ordered Josh to hit the enemy's right flank with our cavalry.  We had to try to destroy this line quickly if we were to make it to the town before the Spanish relief force showed up.

About the time Josh got the cavalry up, I noticed at least a brigade or two of new Spanish infantry forming to the right of the line I was attacking.  Steve and Macloud were getting into the fight and I wasn't feeling too bad.  My boys were fighting hard and I hoped the reinforcements showing up were drawn from the town, thus making it even more likely Sean and Digby's river crossing would be successful.

I sent Josh an order to ignore the right of the line and send his cavalry straight up the middle where I was attacking.  None of those battalions were in square and I hoped we could smash them.  Then Josh unplugged his computer.  And since I only had command of my division, not a corps, I couldn't control the cavalry.  I sent the division commander orders, but I don't think he listened.

Any chance of success faded.  So I ordered a retreat to the southeast.  Along the way, I spotted some of Digby's troops to the north.  So I ordered Steve to make his way north and link up with the rest of the corps in the town.  I followed.

We made it to the town a lot easier than I thought we would.  I guess the Spanish we were fighting were too beat up to pursue.  I couldn't see the reinforcements that had come up and thought they must have turned back to town to try and stop Sean and Digby.

Moving along the river's edge was a complete nightmare.  Battalions kept marching into the river and the guns took crazy paths.  It was basically impossible to get to the bridge because of bad pathing.

After reading the posts here, I now know we were facing the Army of Valencia right from the start.  My attack was completely in vain, as it gave no relief whatsoever to Sean and Digby's attack.

Martin wrote: I've decided to go with Digby on grounds of cost.

I have to concur with this decision. Economizing, (note correct spelling), is a very important factor today.

is there a place to find the replay ???

The French 1st division was a meat-mincer, who was the commander?

Thank you Matt. That's a truly encouraging report. Very pleased that you had fun despite the long delay getting started and the sheer horrors and frustrations of 1st person black-powder era street fighting.

I have wanted to do a big fight in a town for a long time just to get people's responses. We never do it and we know the limited spaces expose the weak points of the AI's pathing routines but I really wanted to see how it panned out in a big battle with a big town. I know it was frustrating for many but personally I had a very fun time in the street fighting section of the game where I thought our better quality French and Italian infantry got the upper hand on the raw Spanish boys.

Just to illustrate two events of this: I saw a cannon from our 3rd Div get captured in a street and wheeled away by its new owners. This infuriated me so I ordered a battalion I had in reserve to double-time up the street in column. I rode with it, preparing to order the charge when it got close enough. The cannon was wheeled out of sight behind a house and then I heard yelling and shouting to my left. Looking that way, to my horror a battalion of Spanish had appeared along a side street and were charging my battalion in the flank. My fellows autocharged and a violent bayonet fight ensued. We won it but by then the captured gun was long gone...

I had some voltigeurs skirmishing against a Spanish line up the street. Behind my skirmish screen I had a battalion in division columns resting in reserve. Suddenly some Spanish cavalry burst through their line and charged. My skirmishers auto-evaded and ran back directly on their supporting battalion (sometimes the AI by chance cooks up some very neat looking moves). I ordered the battalion forwards and as the skirmishers bolted past ordered square. The Spanish horsemen dashed themselves uselessly against my line of bayonets while my voltigeurs scampered away around some houses at the riverbank.

These kinds of events really felt right in the street fighting area.

On to a summary of the battle. It was all a horrible, unnecessary mistake! Napoleon had just assumed overall command of French forces in Spain and had written letters of instruction to every corps commander. Unfortunately for Saint-Cyr, who had only days previously arrived to take command of VII Corps from Reille, he chose to make a bold attack as soon as he was able to move south from Rosas which the French had just captured. The letter from Napoleon commanded him NOT to attack at Gerona but to hold position. The Emperor's order arrived two days after the battle. Such are the fates and whims of the gods of war. Saint-Cyr now has a very awkward letter to write to Napoleon!


The blue dot is the approx location of the battle and Gerona is the fortress-city the French were attempting to open a route to by defeating the Spanish army defending the river.

Saint-Cyr had more and better cavalry and advancing south from Rosas he approached the River Ter north of the city of Gerona. He knew the Army of Cataluna was there and it's strength of about 15,000 because elements of his corps, when it was previously under Reille's and Duhesme's command, had been in contact with these Spanish all the way from Ordal Cross in July, 90 miles to the south. What he had no idea of knowing was that Gen Llamas' Army of Valencia had joined Vives' army over the last few days. These timings are on the campaign map BTW, and are the result of players orders and distances, I really don't make this stuff up! Llamas truly arrived, U.S. cavalry style in the nick of time.

Saint-Cyr did have hints given to him that both armies might be present - newspaper reports had for many weeks been openly asking where Llamas' army was since it retreated from its defeat at Atalayuclas in June and its whereabouts were hinted at in reports of a strong force moving up the Mediterranean coast throughout September.

However Saint-Cyr went ahead with his attack, possibly thinking he was facing only one enemy army and striking now would gain him the river crossing before support could arrive. The dry summer had lowered the water levels of the Ter, and several miles downstream French light cavalry patrols found an exposed mudbank in the shallows that was completely unguarded by the enemy. The cavalry division and 3rd and 5th divisions were sent across this impromptu ford only for an autumn storm over the Pyrenees many miles north-west to cause the river levels to rapidly rise overnight and cut the three divisions off from the main body.

Saint-Cyr's plan was to attack across the bridge and secure the town then await the flanking force to strike the unsuspecting Spanish in the right flank. Had he been only facing the Army of Cataluna I have few doubts he would have spectacularly succeeded and destroyed Vives' command. As it was the expected 15,000 Spanish he faced with his 19,000 French-Italian corps was swollen by another 20,000 Valencians, one division of which (Saint March's) quite by chance had been placed in support of Vives' right; directly in the path of the French flank attack.

A bloody and most sanguine battle resulted with French 3rd and 5th Divs striking the rear of Saint March and Castro ahead of him (1st Div Army of Cataluna) while Hubert's French cavalry bumped into Quesada's 1st Spanish division (Valencia). It went horribly and violently for all concerned as the above battle reports testify.

I played General de Division Chabot commanding French 1st Div on the north bank of the river. I was due to move last across the bridge following Lechi's 2nd Div and Col Nunizante's cavalry brigade. When setting up the scenario I had written about an 'unplayed' pre-battle skirmish that involved the much stronger French artillery forcing the Spanish back from their initial river bank positions to the rear of town. I made up this story for a couple of reasons - playtesting the game I found that one of the two bridges over the river is fake and doesn't have a path across it the units can use so we were down to just one bridge and I didn't want the game to play out like those silly bridge crossing battles in Total War! Therefore I made up a piece of fiction as to why the Spanish could not defend the far bank. I planted the two heaviest French batteries of 8 pounders on a mid-river island and from here they appear to have had quite an effect on Castro's exposed troops in the beginning of the battle. I moved one of them across the river later to support my infantry but left one there all game and I think it acted as quite a deterrent to the Spanish, both when they attempted to turn the left flank of my attack south of town mid-game and at the end when Reille and Pino's divisions made it along the river bank to the town.

When I got my division across I moved to the south-west corner of the town, anchoring my left on the river and placing my brigades behind a small stream in some woods that gave me plenty of cover. I had no idea however where Lechi's division and Nunizante's cavalry had gone - the huge town had swallowed them up! I rode out of town a small distance to an unoccupied ridge to see Castro's Spanish all marching away south. Other Spanish were hastily marching south from the west side of town as well. Following Saint-Cyr's orders I therefore sent both brigades south in an attack across two small ridges, placing my guns on the one nearest the town. I made good initial progress, crunching through several Spanish battalions which went streaming away before my left was stopped by a brigade of Spanish hussars who lurked down by the river bank. I put my left hand battalion (of Swiss) in square but that prevented me going further south. I was then hit in my right flank by a simply huge force of fresh Spanish who came from somewhere west of town. My Italian brigade was on my right and two battalions fled quickly although I managed to form several squares and very slowly retire, sending my guns back over the river again. I really felt nervous about losing those.

I had caught sight of French flags just over the main ridge so I knew Reille was there, nearby, fighting bravely... I just could not quite get to him! So frustrating!

Nunizante's cavalry arrived just in time to smash the enemy Hussars to my left front and the rest of my division withdrew back into the SW town suburbs where a long and intense street fight developed. I noticed here that the Spanish troops were handled boldly by their generals but they were just not up to the task of taking on French and Italian infantry in one-on-one firefights and melees. I threw back numerous attacks with my dwindling forces, sending my last 3 Italian battalions north to sit at the bridge end and form a final backstop. My French brigade was slowly but surely whittled away and at the end I probably had only 3 or 4 battalions of my division left. We just managed to scramble these across the bridge. To the south I saw the remnants of 3rd and 5th Divisions swimming to safety towards "Eight-Pounder Island".

In the north I think the Spanish successfully reached the river bank and contested the bridge. The fighting there was as intense as anywhere. I saw Nunizante's cavalry often, blocking access down streets.


The battle was a clear Spanish victory. Early on the French plan changed from "Smash the enemy right flank and roll him up" to "Let's get the flanking force back to the bridge and safety". In that second objective the French were largely successful but as an attack intended to take the river line and open the road to Gerona, the battle was a failure. The French had three artillery batteries captured - 20 guns. The Spanish lost 10 guns. Two destroyed by counter-battery fire that I saw and 8 captured in fighting. At the end of the day Saint-Cyr had to withdraw his battered corps across the river. He has now fallen all the way back to Rosas. The Spanish hold the field and are succouring the wounded. The cavalry of the Army of Cataluna took heavy losses but a couple of brigades are in condition to go across the river and watch the French retreat.

Losses:

French VII Corps (32.6%)

Killed: 1,400
Wounded: 5,600
Missing: 1,200
Lost: 20 guns

Spanish Overall Loss (13.7%)

Killed: 1,600
Wounded: 6,500
Missing: 1,400
Lost: 10 guns

Breaking down as:

Spanish Army of Cataluna (12.1%)

Killed: 650
Wounded: 2,600
Missing: 570
Lost: 2 guns

Spanish Army of Valencia (16.8%)

Killed: 1,000
Wounded: 3,900
Missing: 850
Lost: 8 guns

Start Position:


Moves (I'm not sure of many Spanish moves!):

The French 1st division was a meat-mincer, who was the commander?

That was me and I was shocked on watching the replay to see my score racking up. I think it was partly those two 8-pounder batteries on the island which had completely emptied their limbers of ammo by the end of the battle, plus I seemed to have extraordinary luck in this game in forming squares just as Spanish cavalry charged me. I counted at least 5 such incidents with my troops in square each time - just! Apart from that I did a lot of standing around, walking and staring at house walls!

Replay file is here:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/81as4fxpej0gnv6/Battle%20of%20Murcia%20replay.rar?dl=0

It is most interesting to note, that as a cavalry commander (besides being hopelessly unable to get my brigade to traverse the bridge, even using the road command) I was able, I think to do my job. I scouted the Northern area of the Spanish positions with my brigade and came back with a remarkably accurate head count: two brigades of infantry, two batteries of artillery, and unknown cavalry (at least 3 squadrons). It was a totally new experience for me to spend 5 minutes of game time trying to access what the hell was in front of me, and moving my brigade around to try and find observation points.

Secondly, I was ordered to once again navigate the hell of the town and take my brigade to the southeast and support the attempted breakout of our three trapped divisions. I arrived and deployed my brigade behind a reverse slope and was able to surprise a shot up brigade of Spanish cavalry. Alas, if I had arrived earlier and with rested men I have no doubt we could have taken that last ridge.

Finally, I dispersed my tired troopers throughout the town guarding the main approaches. We had successfully captured some Spanish wagons and guns when I spotted the rear of a shaky Spanish Battalion. Grabbing the eagle of the Italian Dragons I personally led them to advance! On y va! As we neared the backs of that ill-fated Spanish regiment a volley erupted from a bisecting street, where a seemingly fresh Spanish battalion had been lying in wait.

Fade to black.

I spent the remainder of the battle trying to ride back to town-it was a 10 minute real time ride.

Excellent summary, Martin -- makes it all clear. And easy to see there was a method to the (French) madness. Given the actual circumstances, I think the French commanders could hardly have wished for a better result.

From where I stood, the situation was horribly confused. Commanding the Valencian 3rd Division, I responded first to MTG's alert of enemy couriers running about our rear and then Pepe's order to move to Saint-Marche's relief. Upon arrival the scene that met my eyes was one of indescribable madness. Martin's boys were still holding but in obvious distress so, following Pepe's direction, I led the 3rd in an immediate counterattack. I assumed my division would see immediate success (French fatigue had to be substantial), but the first battalion was rudely sent off. Following battalions fared better, but the French were very difficult to dislodge. Ultimately we were able to send them back across the creek, but it's difficult to tell if the French retrograde movement was due to my division's efforts or the fact that MTG's division was now on the other side and taking them in the flank. It didn't really matter -- we were just happy to have the line restored.

I spent the rest of my time in game repositioning my troops and trying to recover fatigue (nearly all my units were in various shades of exhaustion from the melees & quick-timing.) Pepe suggested a counter-attack at that moment, but I had to demur: In that condition my troops would have been chopped to pieces by any French in the area in anything approaching serviceable condition.

And that's about where I had to leave. My apologies for that, but an important commitment had to be met, and I'd never imagined the game would be raging 4 hours after the scheduled start.

Digby, my sincere compliments for the scenario design. It had more twists, spills and chills than a dime novel. In the future may I suggest advertising ahead of time a battle's planned duration? It would be helpful for players to plan the time they'll need to set aside to fight these epics. Also, whatever can be done to get the games going nearer the advertised start would be great. Things come up that are beyond anyone's control for sure, but perhaps we could give some thought about how to structure the pre-game to iron out as many issues as possible early on. This becomes even more important as the battles get larger.

Ron wrote:Things come up that are beyond anyone's control for sure, but perhaps we could give some thought about how to structure the pre-game to iron out as many issues as possible early on. This becomes even more important as the battles get larger.

Yesterday was particularly ugly in that regard. We had a large number of players that were either new or hadn't played in a while and had to update a mod. I suggest we ask all players that are in that situation to show up on TS 30-45 minutes early so they can test with someone that played in the previous week or two. I don't anticipate any new changes to the mods for sometime to come so any "regular" can do this. If new players sign up on doodle beforehand, (I think most did this time), I'll try to be there for testing.

Unfortunately there are always some players who show up a few minutes early (or late!) and then don't have their mods updated, or working right. I know this because we've asked people to come early and prepared before and it didn't have any effect then!

The issue is we can't enforce start times because we don't have the luxury of being able to turn people away, and I wouldn't want to either.

The idea of asking people to be ready is a sound one though and only reasonable, so as a call to every player - do please, PLEASE:

1) Try your level best to be there early (30mins being a MINIMUM), and
2) Have your mods updated and ready AT LEAST the day before.

Thanks to everyone in advance for these efforts.

As to scenario time having once or twice been deep into a tough tactical game and had the end timer ring on us (which can be frustrating to say the least) I now no longer write scenario times to fit how long I think the battle will take to resolve but write the time to be much more than we should need. This means pretty much all my scenarios are written to be 180 minutes long with the result that the battle can be called when one side is beaten rather than when an artificial referees whistle blows. I think this is a preferable system, so from now on everyone should assume all campaign scenarios are set to 180 minutes long unless I say otherwise. As to reaching a conclusion we usually can do this in 120 minutes of game time or thereabouts, and lag may add +25% to any MP session so please plan for these kinds of game lengths.

Thanks.

Getting players in early to test seems important. I think it's also important to continue emphasizing the use of Doodle as a tool. The thing to avoid IMO is holding up the start for a dozen+ players for long periods trying to sort out a single player's unique situation. This isn't as likely to happen if new players or anyone who hasn't played for some time gets in early to test. Saturday's game was a bit extreme in that it represented the first KS HITS game for a few who joined quite late (and therefore had not registered on Doodle). For about 30 minutes before the battle was set to start I was working with 3 new or semi-new GCM players with their setups over on that TS channel, so that helped, but there were obviously a few others, including some non-GCM'ers who arrived late at KS TS. That will always happen to some extent, but hopefully will not be as pronounced as we saw this weekend. I'm concerned that extended delays in getting the battles going may discourage or frustrate some who would otherwise be delighted with the format.

I have concerns about advertising KS HITS games on Garniers GCM site because, well, its a bit unethical to be seen as 'poaching'. I could place the doodle link there but am reluctant to for the above reason. If a GCM person could politely ask GCM players to use the doodle that would help a lot.

The point is really that anyone interested in KS HITS games should register on this forum and pop in once a day to check posts - that way they'd all see the doodle links.

Then again we have some seasoned KS players who don't use the doodle which can be very frustrating.

Don't even worry about that, Digby. It's not a competition. Garnier will not mind one bit. There are at least 2 or 3 GCM games every day, sometimes more.

I'll post the doodle links on the GCM forum. Most of those 100+ yards-from-the-saddle heathens don't even know how to read a post on a forum, much less join one.

Well, I have no pride and will gladly post Doodles and reminders over there (as we've already done several times), if it helps get games going faster. Maybe it's just me, but I don't think of it as "poaching" at all because 1) it's not a zero-sum game -- players can play and enjoy both formats and 2) even if it isn't and they can't, no lost royalties are involved.

As for the lack of ethicss, I can get away with it because no one expects lawyers to have them anyway. It's the beauty of low expectations.

Thanks for a great game, Mr D

As General Castro I was in the front line defending the SE of the city and was briefed to pull back my command away from French artillery on the island. This I did not do quickly enough because I underestimated the effect the guns were having on me from such extreme range. I guess I expected similar poor results to that which were dished out to me by the Austrian 6lbrs a couple of weeks ago. I had not accounted for the better training and higher calibre of the French 8lb batteries. I lost at least 14 gunners and 2 cannon, plus 30+ men from my inf. Lesson learned

After pulling back somewhat, I soon received a message from Pepe to quickly about turn and assist Martin repulse the French to our rear. A lively fight had developed here and I sent an inf brigade+cav brigade to cover the eastern flank and had just ordered another brigade in columns to support Martins centre when I happened to look back at the town....

Pooring out of the town I saw masses of French/Neopolitan battalions heading in my direction. Inhaling sharply, and an 'ecstacy of fumbling' with my mouse and keyboard, I ran back and attempted to judge just where and when they would hit me. Fortunately, there was a small stream in between (which I only learned of later), that slowed Digby's columns down enough to let me turn around my brigades. Still, I only managed to face them with one inf brigade, 2-3 guns and my Hussars.

Whilst I waited for my second brigade, I sent off a couple of pleas for help and then took my cav on a mission to outflank the enemy and cause as much delay as possible. It was a close call but I managed to get round the flank and sit them in a threatening area to their rear before leaving them. Returning to my command on the hill, things were not looking good but my second brigade had arrived and the enemy had been delayed just enough. A message from Pepe said something like 'don't worry, Morsey has been ordered to hit them in their flank/rear', music to my ears!

I saw more friendly units enter the fight but I still felt I needed to distract my assailants again, as many of my units were panicked or falling back. I ran again to the flank and sent orders to my Hussars (which were quite far off) to charge the cannon, which had been brought up and were now supporting their attack. They charged in splendidly Captured some guns, I think and managed to contribute to some of the mayhem that had started to befall the French as more Spanish arrived. I saw the guns recaptured.

Digby fought an admirable retreat to the town. I was just happy to sit there and rest my exhausted troops. I was also surprised to see that my Hussars had remained intact after what was, essentially, a fire-and-forget mission.

I witnessed the French column marching along the river but my men needed rest. I also thought they were fresh troops.

Well played everyone. Special mention of Pepe who, from my perspective, did a great job.

What a weekend. Worked a 12hr shift, long scarey battle 3-4 beers, bed at 2am, up at 6.30 12hr shift. Knackered!!

Mike