The Battle of Quatre Bras

Today I met up at Game Kastle Fremont again to play the Battle of Quatre Bras using General d'Armee. Along with the Battle of Ligny, Quatre Bras would be one of the battles that set up the conditions for the Battle of Waterloo, where Napoleon was defeated once and for all.

I took the Dutch and Belgian force on the right of the table, and I fought alongside 2 allies who controlled the Brunswickers in the center, and British on the left. Opposing us were 2 players who controlled the French.

The French objective would be to take the town of Quatre Bras within 10 turns, to do so they'd have to fight across a stream and through our Anglo/Allied Force. Exactly like the real battle, we had more infantry, but far less cavalry than the French. Our units were also, for the most part, of poorer quality than the French infantry, and consisted of mostly reservists and green troops.

 

 

 

Our armies were deployed pretty much exactly how units were deployed in reality, with most of us on one side of the river. I had 2 battalions on the opposite side of the river, one situated on a hill, and the other in Gemioncourt, but it was expected that these forces would not be there for long. I also had no ambitions of crossing the river to reinforce them, as that just seemed like a bad idea. Instead our team decided to perform a fighting retreat, to delay the French for as long as we could until reinforcements arrived.

 

 

 

The French moved a bulk of their forces in columns down the center of the map, intending to punch through our thin center line and reach Quatre Bras as quickly as possible. Luckily our Brunswick reinforcements arrived before they could exploit this weakness and was able to amass north of Quatre Bras.

 

The fight for the river was bloody. In the center of the table, both French players sent huge swarms of infantry and cavalry and were able to catch most of our units off guard. The Brunswickers attempted to form square to ward off a cavalry charge but the French gained the initiative and were able to hit them while they were unformed. The results were predictable. A few units of infantry were routed and a gap was formed in our line. As the French push down the center was led by cavalry, we rushed to form any remaining unit into square formation, but this left us vulnerable to musket and cannon fire.

 

 

On the right side of the table, the fighting involved only musket and cannon fire, but the French were able to shoot apart my reservists, although not without taking many casualties of their own. The French were eventually able to cross the river after I was forced to fall back. Because he had focused the bulk of his troops on the center of the map, I attempted to keep my opponent from reinforcing his march across the river by moving my troops out of the Bossu Woods in order to roll up his flank and threaten his artillery.

 

 

On the left side of the table, the French were able to slowly make their way across the river under cannon fire in order to charge the British. 

 

 

Back in the center of the table, French cavalry was causing havoc amongst our badly mauled and unformed infantry squares, routing many battalions. I sacrificed a battalion of light cavalry in order to stop their charge, hoping to buy time for our infantry to fall back to better positions. The results of the charge were predictable. One unit of Dutch reservist light cavalry against two units of elite French heavy cavalry was never going to end well for the Dutch and they were forced to retreat, however it did allow us to move our infantry into better positions.

 

 

 

 At this point we had been playing for 6 hours and we managed to hold Quatre Bras for the required 10 turns to win the battle, but it was a tough fight with significant losses to our center and who knows how the battle would've gone if we kept fighting it. In reality, the French were forced to retire from the battlefield so at least we can say that historical accuracy was upheld.

I had a lot of fun and I once again got to enjoy a game of GDA. I think they're fantastic rules, although some of the modifiers when it comes to combat resolution are still a bit confusing to me, but that's mostly just me being an airhead. Next month these guys will be running the First Battle of St Albans, the opening engagement of the War of the Roses, using rules written by one of our players, and I definitely plan on joining them. Until than, folks!