First published in Great Britain in 2014 by
Pen & Sword Military
An imprint of
Pen & Sword Books Ltd
47 Church Street
Barnsley
South Yorkshire
S70 2AS
Copyright Jon Sutherland and Diane Canwell, 2014
ISBN: 978 1 84415 947 5
PDF ISBN: 978 1 47383 950 2
EPUB ISBN: 978 1 47383 879 6
PRC ISBN: 978 1 47384 021 8
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Contents
Introduction
In 2008 the Spanish and the Portuguese celebrated the bicentenary of the beginning of the Peninsular War. The war was a six-year struggle to overthrow a French regime imposed on Spain. The war would cost the protagonists over a million lives.
For wargamers the Peninsular War offers the very best of Napoleonic wargaming. There are set-piece battles, innumerable skirmishes, the use of deception tactics and sieges.
Throughout the war many of the most famous British and French regiments saw action in the peninsula. Battle honours, such as Salamanca, Corunna and Vitoria still adorn the regimental flags of British regiments. Whether the wargamer is an Anglophile or a Francophile, the Peninsular War represents a microcosm of the Napoleonic conflict. It was a sprawling world war and the peninsula became a battle ground where great generals, such as Wellington and Soult, would lead their men in the great struggle between the two implacable enemies: Britain and France.
Many wargamers will have been attracted to the Peninsular War as a theatre to play Napoleonic wargames by the Sharpe novels and television series. Many of the Sharpe novels are based loosely on the historical events that took place between 1808 and 1814. In fact the Peninsular War has far more to offer than set-piece battles and it can be played in any scale and at any level, from skirmish to mass pitched-engagements.
This book aims to offer the wargamer a brief but comprehensive history of the Peninsular War. The narrative of the war is punctuated with twenty examples of battles that can be refought using the Grand Battery Napoleonic wargame rules published by Pen & Sword. Each of the battles is first described for historical detail, and then orders of battle, along with a description of the abilities of the troops, are given. Each key objective is outlined and victory conditions suggested. In order to aid the setting up of a particular battle, each of the engagements has a basic map, which assumes an 8 x 5 foot playing surface. All key terrain features are included, as well as the opening positions of each of the divisions or brigades.
Wargamers will find the background information on each of the battles and each of the twenty scenarios invaluable in helping them prepare to replay the engagement. In choosing twenty likely battles over a six-year period it is inevitable that we may well have missed out your favourite engagement. We have concentrated on trying to offer battles that give wargamers the opportunity to use the same formations as often as possible and to build up typical armies, which could fight in the widest variety of different engagements. You will discover that we have chosen battles that range from engagements that are little more than skirmishes to huge pitched battles that could require several hundred figures. We have largely avoided focusing on sieges, although it is important to remember that siege warfare played a big role in the Peninsular War. Often, a force moving to relieve a besieged position brought about a field engagement when the besiegers sought to prevent the raising of a siege.
The battles are broadly broken down into four sections. The first section covers the opening engagements through to the battle of Corunna. The second section covers a wider period, from the spring of 1809 through to 1811; in other words, from Talavera through to Saguntum in October 1811. The third section just features one battle, albeit a significant one: Salamanca in July 1812. The final batch of battles runs from Vitoria in June 1813 through to Tarbes in March 1814.
Obviously many wargamers will want to fight the Peninsular War as a campaign, with casualties, replacements and reinforcements all being applied to armies from battle to battle. With a theatre as large as the peninsula it is not always possible to necessarily achieve this, as the size and nature of the armies fluctuated enormously over the six years and, in some cases, battles were fought either by the British, the Portuguese or the Spanish without any allied support. We have included a chapter War in the Peninsula, which offers a generic set of army lists and background in order to begin fighting a Peninsular War campaign.
Pen & Sword will have online resources and new scenarios, as well as rule clarifications, at www.penandswordbooks.co.uk . You will also find downloadable cards, templates and ready reference sheets. Have fun and good wargaming.
Jon Sutherland and Diane Canwell
Peninsular War 1807-14
Using the Scenarios
The orders of battle for each of the engagements are designed so that wargamers can choose to refight the battle on a grand scale, representing all of the key units. It is not always practical to assemble such large forces, particularly for some of the bigger engagements. For small-scale, but still representative, battles, each of the army lists shows in italics the necessary units to refight the cut-down version of the battle. Effectively, this is to enable a battle to be fought with fewer units and with the prospect of being able to complete the game in an evening. Players may wish to represent divisions or brigades with other units drawn from the full order of battle.
Chapter 1
The Coming of the Peninsular War
In July 1807 Napoleons France dominated Europe. He had led his troops to stunning victories against Austria, Prussia and Russia. With a secure eastern front and peace with Russia, along with dominance in central Europe, Napoleons eyes fell on Spain and Portugal.
To nullify Britain, Napoleon had instituted the Continental System. It aimed to boycott British goods and deny them markets in Europe. Spain and Portugal at this time were major holes in this strategy. Napoleon had failed to sustain a significant challenge to Britains naval supremacy. The Danish fleet had been destroyed at Copenhagen in 1801 and the French had been humiliated at Trafalgar in 1805. Napoleon was therefore forced to attempt a different strategy to compel Britain to come to terms. Trade barriers closed Austrian and Russian ports to British shipping. The British responded by setting up a counter-blockade, aiming to prevent neutral merchant shipping from trading with any part of the French Empire.
