Battle of Gorodetchma: August 12, 1812

Battle of Gorodetchma:
August 12, 1812

A Napoleon's Battles Scenario

by Mark Serafin

Historical Notes

The Battle of Gorodetchna (or Prujany) was a consequence of the attack one week earlier by the Russian 3rd West Army on the Saxon position at Kobrin. During this affair, a brigade of Saxon infantry was surrounded and captured. The desire to avenge this slight, the importance of The town of Kobrin, and the panic caused in Poland by the Russian advance motivated the Saxons and Austrians to coneentrate against the 3rd West Army.

The battle began late on August 11th, when the Austrian advance guard drove the leading Russian Ullits back onto the main Russian position. This was posted on hills behind a stream that was surrounded by swamp. Reynier and Sehwartzenberg agreed that it would be unwise to attack the Russians across such ground and agreed on an attempt to flank the Russians out of their positions.

The Saxons, already being well-advanced on the road to Poddubny, formed the flanking column although Schwartzenberg sent Austrian units (eventually more than half the corps) to assist This maneuver surprised Tormassov whose discomfiture was made worse by the ability of the Allies to cross the swamp which he had not considered possible.

He was forced to change front to meet this sudden threat to his line of supply (i e.. the road to Kobrin). This he succeeded in doing and a lively action arose on the hills between Poddubny and Zavniee. This action continued until about 5 pm when exhaustion ended the fighting.

At about this time, those Austrians who were still holding their original positions began attacking across the swamp against the weakened Russian right but were deterred by the arrival of fresh Russian forces.

Scenario

Scenario Map for battle of Gorodecthna

Allied Army: Schwartzenberg 8"A(10) 0 [1OM]

Austrian Hilfskorps (AH):

Schwartzenberg [6F]

Advance Guard (AG): Trautenberg 4"G(6)+1

1st Div. (1/AH): Bianchi 3"A(7) 0

2nd Div. (1/AH): Siegenthal 3" A (6) 0

Cavalry Div. (C/AH): Frimont 3"G(8) 0

Corps Artillery (AH): 2 x As12#

VII Corps (VII):

Reynier 8"A(6) +1

21st Div. (21/VII): Le Coq 3"A(6) 0

22nd Div. (22/VII): Funck 3"A(5) 0

Cavalry Div. (C/VII): Baglez 3"G(6) 0

1B/C/VII: 20 SxLC (1OD)

Corps Artillery (VII): 2 x Sx12#

3rd West Army (3W):

Tormassov 1O"A(10) 0 [7M until arrival of 19/M, then 9M until arrival of R/K, then 1OM]

Corps Kamenski (K):

Kamenski 8"(5)A () [2F until arrival of R/K, then 3F]

18th Div. (18/K): Tchervatov 3"(5)A 0

Reserve Div. (R/K): Chowanski 4"(A)6 0

Corps Markov (M):

Markov 7"(6)A 0 [2F until arrival of 19/M, then 4F]

9th Div. (9/M): Udom 3"(6)A 0

19th Div. (19/M): Nasimov 4"(G)A +l

Cavalry Corps (CC): Lambert 6"(6)G +l

Victory Conditions

See map for objectives and their victory point values. Because the Allies are attempting to turn the Russians out of their positions, objectives worth victory points are those points that threaten the Russian line of communication. Similarly, since the road end at A1 leads to the Allied rear areas, it is also worth victory points (if the Russians take it, they are in a position to resume their offensive into Poland).

Designer's Notes

As is to be expected in the case of a battle as obscure as this one, sources are few and far between. I based this scenario almost entirely on Nafziger's Napoleon's Invasion of Russia. His account seems to be based mainly on Austrian and Saxon sources, since there is more detail provided about these forces. Both sides apparently changed units around between divisions at will, which does little to help the scenario designer.

The Allied order of battle is drawn mainly from the August 1 order of battle provided in the book and the Gorodetchna order of battle from the Nafziger collection of OOBs on disk. I have assumed that the detachment of Austrians under Mohr mentioned on page 158 of the book is still absent from the Austrian corps.

Of course, the composition of the Austrian corps that went into Russia is rather nebulous, with the OOB for October showing regiments not listed in August and vice-versa. One thing that is certain is that they took a lot of cavalry with them. The Saxons are as shown in the OOB for Gorodetchna. Le Coq's division had lost a brigade the week previously at Kobrin, which is why it is so small. I have taken liberties with the elite infantry. Both Saxon infantry divisions included a brigade consisting of two grenadier battalions and two light infantry battalions. I have simply combed like types, instead of trying to come up with ratings for mixed brigades of elite battalions.

The Russian order of battle was more difficult, and involved more guessing. I based it on the 3rd West Army order of battle at the beginning of the campaign. However, an OOB for Kobrin shows that the initial organization had been thrown to the wind by the end of July. The Nafziger collection OOB for Gorodetchna is basically a re-statement of that given for the beginning of the campaign.

To make things worse, the description of the battle indicates that while some divisions were intact, others were not. For example, Markov initially commanded about a division, including a brigade and a regiment from the 15th division, a regiment from the 9th division, and some cavalry from the 5th cavalry division. The text further indicates that the Russians started the battle with 18,000 men and were awaiting a further 13,000 reinforcements. These apparently showed up eventually, but no mention is made of their arrival time, where they came from, or who they were. So, I guessed, trying to balance their arrival times so as to make the game interesting. Feel free to change them as you see fit.

The orders of battle I have show large numbers of Russian and Austrian horse that are not mentioned in the description of the battle. I have left these out of the scenario assuming that these bodies of cavalry were watching each other across the swamps somewhere off-board.

I usually change some unit ratings to reflect my own biases. I increase the reaction number of Russian line to 5, because I think that the given rating of 4 negates all the supposed advantages of Russian infantry. I also used different ratings for Russian converged Grenadiers, giving them a disorder number of 3.

I also improve the ratings for Saxon infantry, giving them a response number of 5, a rout number of 4, a column combat modifier of I and a line modifier of +2. This is because the Saxons infantry probably reached a peak of efficiency (for them) in 1812, since they had been in field camps throughout the previous year. This allowed them time for drills that at times involved the entire army (see Riehn's 1812: Napoleon's Russian Campaign). Since such training is always mentioned as one of the reasons for the efficiency of the Grand Army of 1805 (remember the camps at Boulogne), I figured such practice would have improved the Saxons also. I have increased Reynier's initiative to a 6 partly because I do not think he was all that bad, but mostly because without it the Saxons never get anywhere.

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