The Battle of Oravais 14 September 1808 - Russian Invasion of Finland 1808-1809.

This is my adaptation of one of the scenarios from the excellent Scenarios for Wargaming the Swedish-Russian War 1808-1809, volume 2, entitled ‘1808 Turning the Tide’. The main limitations I faced were not enough terrain and not quite the right Swedish units from my 28mm RSW 1808 collection. The terrain issue was fudged easily enough by liberally dotting the landscape with trees, and the clearings marked with the things I normally place my trees on to define the boundary of any woodland. As for the discrepancies in the order of battle (no Swedish Horseguards and technically not enough Swedish cannon) I just used what I have, which was more than enough. Anyone wishing to read more on the battle can read a good account at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Oravais. 

Paul, Jim and John took the Swedes and Conrad, Shaun and Dave were the Russians. The Swedes were required to hold the Russians up and prevent them from reaching the far end of the table. (See the map). The Russians had to drive the Swedes off and get half their army within striking distance of the road leaving the table on the Swedish baseline. We used Valour and Fortitude again.

The yellow marks show the Swedish positions at the start. The green arrows show the Russian starting positions and axes of attack.

The photos have undergone the usual Google Blogger Randomiser nonsense but I think they’re now in more or less the correct order.

The Russians advanced blindly (they had to ‘spring’ the tripwire that was the Swedish vanguard). A bold (?) attempt by the Russian hussars to take the bridge failed miserably. They overran a gun defending the bridge but were then cut down and routed by musketry from both flanks.

The Russian hussars on the road before their fateful charge

Dave deployed his guns and infantry intent on driving the Swedish off before launching an assault. The Russians were actually loosing out in the firefight against Finnish jäger and infantry across the river from them. It all seemed a little pointless as this stretch of the river was impassable except by the bridge. 

The Russians edged to their right, giving a perfect target for the Swedish infantry who poured volley after volley into the flanks of passing Russian infantry columns.

Meanwhile far to the rear Swedish reinforcements were arriving.

Paul deployed his best infantry (of the Savolax Brigade) along the stream where they remained for the entire battle.

A casualty of war….

The Russians then pushed their Cossacks over the river to attempt a flank attack on the Swedes. 

Meanwhile, John’s Swedish brigade had raced up the table to support Jim’s exposed brigade, and they were just in time. 

Shaun’s Russians had made very slow progress through the woods, failing to even activate on several occasions, which meant that they were not in a position to support Dave’s frontal attack by the ridge. Worse still, the rear battalion of grenadiers was charged in the flank by a couple of squadrons of Swedish dragoons and destroyed. The Swedish dragoons then turned and dispersed the Cossacks.

A lone piece of pizza the only survivor of a very nice and unhealthy lunch.  Jim’s daughter had made us a Victoria sponge which hadn’t survived until lunchtime!

Gradually the Russian numbers were growing, as Conrad’s reserve was now in position to support an all out assault.

The firefight across the river continued while the Russians sorted themselves out ready to attack.

With their blood up the Swedish dragoons caught the Russians in the river and smashed another battalion before falling back to regroup.

Finally, the main Russian assault began, with four battalions launched across the river towards Jim’s thin line.

More Russians crossing the river upstream from the fight around the bridge.

The Russians are now across the river in some strength.

Meanwhile, Dave’s assault ground to a halt in the face of determined Swedish musketry. The Russians failed to break the Swedish line and the melee continued.

The Swedes in melee then withdrew from combat, meaning that the Russians would be forced to make another assault on their now reformed line.

The second Russian assault fared no better than the first.

By now we had played 14 turns (I lost count after 12) out of a possible 15. The Russians were nowhere near achieving their objectives so, with night falling and only one turn remaining,  a Swedish victory was announced.

It will come over all critical if I were to unpick this game but I need to a little. For example, Dave’s brigade should have been tasked with pinning Jim while Shaun and Conrad outflanked him. Instead, Dave was pinning and outflanking all by himself. That might have been the plan but some unfortunate activation dice put paid to that idea somewhat. The Russian artillery was also badly deployed as it blocked the road and access to the bridge, and several battalions of jäger were wasted as despite being perfectly capable of doing so, none were deployed to skirmish with the Swedes and protect their infantry columns.

Anyway, everyone agreed it was a very challenging scenario and an enjoyable game so what more could be asked? The Russians were victorious in the real battle so with a Swedish victory on the tabletop, honours are even.

The rules worked really well. They’re quite brutal but make for a good game. Dave and Shaun had not played V&F before but they picked them up easily enough, and the rest of us are warming to them nicely. Mind you, when GdA2 come out we might have to try them out. I could also do with finishing off a couple of Swedish units still in the box of doom,  not necessarily to give more for the table but to give some variety. 

Tiffin Vignette

I came across these two in the box of doom so I knocked up a quick vignette for my Crimean collection.

Not sure about the shell burst but the cannonball wrecking the tea cloth and tiffin pots looks ok, if you know what it is!

Roll Call: Prussian Army 1806 on Parade.

One of my favourite armies is my 1806 Prussians, 28mm of course. Here they are in all their glory. They’ve even won a couple of times! There are 21 musketeer battalions (including two Guard), three fusilier, one jäger and four grenadier battalions. There are also a few bases of schutzen playing at being skirmishers. 

Cavalry-wise we have three big regiments of cuirassiers two equally big ones of dragoons, two small hussars regiments and the Towarczy (?) uhlans. I’m a bit artillery lite but there are two foot batteries, a horse battery (each of four models) and an assortment of battalion guns. All are in 1806 uniforms with the exception of five infantry battalions in the 1792 silly hat that I picked up very cheaply. You can’t tell the difference on the tabletop.

These were painted by Mark Allen and pretty much given away to me pre-Covid, possibly when he was running out of food. Happy Birthday for next Saturday Mark! The lady on the left of the Cuirassier officer in yellow is Queen Louise, ‘the only man in Prussia’.

Most of the infantry are from the now defunct FzMiniz who were based in Paris. They had a closing down sale years ago now with foot figures coming in at under 50p each. A no brainer! The other infantry are from Foundry, a very few Elite, or Emperor Toad. The cavalry are from Elite, Foundry and a few FzMiniz. Guns and crews are Foundry or Elite.

With the exception of a dozen more hussars and a couple more battalion guns this lot is well and truly done, although I did treat myself to the two new command packs from the Perrys, as I clearly have too few generals!

I shall leave these out, well most of them, for a game with John the Red on Thursday for another Valour and Fortitude extravaganza.

The Battle of Ostrolenka, 16 February 1807

I wanted to run another game using Valour and  Fortitude using my Russians and French collections so yesterday John, Conrad and Nigel joined me to have a go at refighting the little known battle of Ostrolenka which took place shortly after Eylau, info Here. I used the scenario in the Battles for Empire book.

The Russians have launched an attack on the French V Corps, temporarily under the command of General de Division Savary assisted by Reille along both banks of the Narew River. They were planning to attack the isolated French around Ostrolenka before they could be reinforced, while the French had to hang on until their reinforcements arrived before counter attacking. Sadly, the southern attack (due to arrive at point (A) never materialised as the division allocated to the task was diverted elsewhere, with predictable results for the outcome of the battle. In this scenario the southern part of the attack will go ahead but will be delayed, at least giving the Russians a chance of victory, subject to when and where it arrives.

The Russians under Conrad hold the high ground while Reille’s (Nigel’s) French are deployed around the village of Ostrolenka.

The Russian infantry line swung round to face the advancing French, and they began to take casualties from the French artillery..

French reinforcements under Savary (John) arrived at point A just as the first of the late, lost and redirected Russian reinforcements arrived at B on the map.

Russian reinforcements turn to face the French emerging from the woods across the river. These troops are actually the remainder of the division already engaged rather than the ‘missing’ southern pincer of the attack.

I had command of these Russians and quickly started to loose out in the firefight with the French in the woods. Attempts to close and drive the enemy out of the woods never got started and when John got his artillery into action it became very difficult, and reinforcing Conrad would mean running the gauntlet of French artillery batteries on my flank!

An initial cavalry clash ended in favour of the Russians. However, Oudinot’s division, or at least part of it, arrived at C to reinforce Nigel in the village.

The missing division then arrived, in the wrong place, and floundered across the river covered by some ineffective Russian jäger.

I was getting nowhere fast, a speed not normally attributed to anything the Russians did. John drove off my skirmish screen and was busy outflanking me with his dragoons just off to the left, forcing the Fangoria Grenadiers into squares. I had also sent two battalions and some guns to reinforce Conrad who’s troops were hanging on despite heavy losses. 

Nigel quickly launched his division and Oudinot’s grenadiers towards the Russians. The fight was in the balance for a couple of turns.

Then, with Conrad’s cavalry taking on the French Chasseurs a cheval the Russian infantry line began to crumble, among the ‘crumblers’ the artillery battery pictured.

The opposing cavalry locked in combat on the extreme flank. The French got the upper hand this time and. The Russians had to pull back shattered.

The end of the Russian right as both remaining battalions seen here were about to break.

There was now an absence of Russian infantry on our right. 

The Russian right had been crushed and their left was totally tangled up trying to avoid a combined attack from French infantry and dragoons well supported by artillery. We conceded defeat and retreated bloodied and bruised. 

I quite enjoyed the game and the scenario was quite well balanced. Everything that could do went wrong for the Russians despite some superb dice rolling from Conrad. The result went the way of history so everything seemed to have hung together to produce a challenging game. Valour and Fortitude are not a bad set of rules, but boy are they unforgiving and brutal. We’re still learning, which for a four page rule set suggests that either we are getting too old to remember stuff or there’s actually more to them than they at first suggest. Good fun despite another Russian defeat. 

Russian Napoleonic Army on Parade.

The Russians were out to play again yesterday so before I put them away I thought I should hold a bit of a parade as it’s been just over a year (15 months) since I started this project. If ever there was evidence of going totally over the top again then this is a perfect example.

Five regiments of cavalry and a load of Cossacks.

Three batteries of artillery.

On a knoll, some of the Russian generals.

Behind the guns and command stands are seven jäger battalions, plus out of shot the equivalent of a couple more in skirmish order.

I think there are five grenadier and 13 of musketeers.

As an example of uncontrolled buying over the past three, no four now, annual Foundry Christmas sales and finding some lovely 3D printed minis as well), I actually and guiltily have the following in the painting queue aka the box of doom:

Cuirassier regt x 1 (@30)

Dragoon regt x 1 (@30)

Uhlan regt x 1 (@30)

Cossacks  regt x 2 (@ 24 ea.) one will be a couple of sotnias of the Lifeguard Cossacks as they fought in Finland in 1808-1809.

Artillery x 1 foot and 1 horse battery (6 guns each) 

Limbers x 12 (the result of several years of trawling eBay for Russian Crimean limbers to use for both Russian collections. These are a priority.

Jäger x 3 btn (@32 each)  - One will be the Guard Jäger as they were deployed in Finland against the Swedes, and they are in production 

Grenadiers x 2 btn (@3 each) plus one in production

Guard Infanty x 3 (@32 each)

Musketeer btns x 3 (@32 each) including one in production 

YES! I HAVE FAR TOO MANY! I may well make a sensible decision and eBay the surplus……once I’ve worked out what is surplus and what is vital to the project. Doh!