June 16, 1815: Quatre-Bras

[MengJiao]

Well, I was attempting to have a small Quatre-Bras, certainly a battle I've seen plenty of times -- but this
time in the Eagles system.  There's a scenario where Wellington attacks at 2pm with
everything he has, though his aim is to get formations through Paradis on the Nivelles road to join Bluecher at Ligny -- sort of a reverse Waterloo.  I started bringing in optional forces and the battle seems to be expanding.
Davout is on hand with the Guard Heavy Cavalry and I Cav Corps and Mouton's VI Corps and D'Erlon's I Corps and III Cav Corps are with Ney. 

[nelmsm]

Looks interesting. 

[MengJiao]

Looks interesting. 

 Could be.  Wellington is throwing in everything except the Royalist French and the half-trained reserves while
Ney has everything he had historically plus I Corps.  Davout (who was in Paris historically) has turned up with Mouton's VI Corps, Pajol's Cavalry Corps (Ic) and the heavy cavalry of the Imperial Guard to block Wellington from Joining Bluecher.  Could turn out to be dull, but you never know.

[MengJiao]

Could turn out to be dull, but you never know.

Not all guns and Uhlans -- the Brunswickers come up the Paradis road.  The Belgian heavy cavalry has just repulsed an attack by the II Corps light cavalry.  One thing in the dynamics of the Waterloo campaign was probably the fact that both sides probably had enough trained horses after years of rather low levels of available trained horses.  Except briefly at Dresden in 1813, wars after the vast slaughter in Russia were low on effective cavalry.

[MengJiao]

  Had to drop in Grouchy since II Corps has to do some pretty wild moves to leave Ney's command and slide over into the Ligny-Davout-Napoleon side of the battle:

[MengJiao]

Had to drop in Grouchy since II Corps has to do some pretty wild moves to leave Ney's command and slide over into the Ligny-Davout-Napoleon side of the battle:

 By 5pm it was clear that Wellington was not going to get through with substantial forces.  On the other hand, the Imperial Guard Cavalry, two other Cavalry Corps and two infantry Corps were not going to be at Ligny, since most of those didn't turn up at Ligny anyway, maybe its a win for Napoleon.

  Things really began to go wrong for Wellington when Kellerman's cavalry smashed three Coalition brigades (Anthing, Perponcher and the British Guards).  The routing was vast and the casualties quite heavy.

Checking on the Actual battle, Kellerman's Corps did about that much damage even historically.