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KK – Battle of Campo Santo, February 1743.

Posted on November 9, 2022

Background

The Battle of Campo Santo was fought in Campo Santo, Italy on 8 February 1743 between Spain and Austria, as part of the War of the Austrian Succession. The Spaniards and their Neapolitan allies under General De Gages were fought to a standstill by the Austrians and their Sardinian allies under Field Marshal Traun on the Panaro. The Spanish sustained heavy casualties, but as darkness fell, Traun ordered a general retreat; de Gages, rather than pursue, himself drew back over the river.

On the morning of the battle, De Gages drew up his army on the outskirts of the village in the traditional fashion with his infantry in the centre and the cavalry on the wings. Traun also drew up his army in the same way, but being slightly outnumbered, he chose to gamble with an un-orthodox strategy. Instead of aligning himself directly opposite the Spaniards, he shifted his troops to the northwest, which meant that the centre of Traun’s infantry was directly opposite the gap between Gages’ infantry and the right wing of cavalry. Although this meant that Traun would have a greater superiority of numbers on this wing and that he could also deliver a flank attack on the Spanish right, his own right flank would, however, be vulnerable to a Spanish flank attack. It seems that the Marshall was relying on the troops of that wing to delay the Spanish long enough for the action on his other wing to be decisive.

Matters were helped when De Gages chose 4:00 in the afternoon to launch the attack, which left very few hours of daylight for a battle. The Spanish were initially successful on both wings, where their cavalry drove off the Austro-Piedmontese cavalry, wounding Count Aspremont in the process and leaving the Austrian infantry vulnerable. However instead of reforming to attack the infantry, the Spanish chased them off the field. Traun stabilised his left flank, and led his infantry into the attack against the Spanish. Meanwhile, Count Schulenberg regrouped the Austrian cavalry on the Austrian right, and launched a counterattack against the Spanish cavalry. On the other flank, General Leutrum (Aspremont’s replacement) led his wing forward as well, smashing the Spanish right wing. At this time due to the darkness for both of the armies it was necessary to withdraw the field; the Spanish back across the Panaro towards Bologna. Due to the smoke and the darkness, many units lost their way. The 1st Guadalaxara marched in the direction of the advancing austro-sardian infantry columns, and it had to surrender after a short defence inside the walls of a farm.

Casualties in the battle were 1,755 dead, 1,307 wounded and 824 prisoners for the Spanish, while the Austro-Piedmontese lost 397 dead and 1,153 wounded or prisoners. Traun himself had two horses shot from under him during the battle.

The Game

We normally play horse and musket on the first Tuesday of each month. However, I am heading out of town, so I decided that I would run a scenario a week early. I wanted to get in another game and give my rules another run while everything was fresh.

I did not expect a large attendance, so needed to do a smaller battle. We had not done anything in Italy in a very long time, so I figured it was a time to try a WAS battle in Italy. I opted to go with Campo Santo, as it would allow us to try some different armies. Unfortunately, I do not own any Spanish or Piedmontese troops (yet), so I reached out to TJ and he was able to get the forces together.

The next problem I had was finding enough information on the battle to set up a game. I found a blog that had the forces and better map and just pulled that information and converted it to my rules. The site is can be found at nigbilpainter.blogspot.com. With that information, I was all set.

Game day arrived and I went to my FLGS and set up the terrain and we got the troops out. A quick review of the rules and we started the game.

Both sides stated on defend orders. The Spanish player decided to sit down on their defenses, while the Austro-Sardinians opted for an all out attack. Their plan was to march to the Spanish left and roll up their positions (Leuthen in Italy!). The planned to use some of their light troops on the Spanish right to pin forces in place. The Austrians got their orders off and started their march.

Due to the large number of ditches on the actual field, I had set it so each road had ditches on each side. This was to try to give the same movement challenges that Traun had to deal with in his attack. This seemed to work well, as the Austrian attack took a while to get into engagement range (two hours in game time). The Spanish saw the Austrian movements and decided to shift their second line command to their left to reinforce the flank.

The fighting started with Grenzers firing long range skirmish fire at the Spanish guard holding the flank, much to the annoyance of the Spanish! The march and terrain caused the Austrians to bunch up, which took them a little while to sort out. While this maneuvering was going on, the artillery on both sides we brought into range and a counter battery duel ensued. The Spanish had two light batteries and the Austro-Sardinians had a light, medium and heavy battery. The numbers and weight where against the Spanish, but their gunners did not realize it. After a few hours of shooting, the Spanish managed to achieve fire supremacy for quite some time.

While this was going on, the Austrians started to engage the Spanish left in earnest. However, they were getting the short end of the stick (dice are a pesky thing). However, the Austrians had the numbers and it was starting to show. At this point, the Sardinians started their attack into the Spanish center.

The grind on the flank kept going, with the Spanish finally loosing their second line brigades. At this point, the Sardinian Infantry and the heavy cavalry engaged the Spanish cavalry in the center. The Spanish cavalry could not hold up and the Spanish infantry and artillery finally gave way. With the losses piling up, the Spanish army broke and quit the field. So, at about 19:30, General Gates called for the withdrawal of his army. The Austrians had the field and could claim victory!

While the fighting in the game was very different than the historical account, the timing of engagement and battle end was quite similar! We managed to get in twelve turns in a period of four hours and have a decisive end to the game. All in all, I think it worked out well. Now I just have to decide what battle we will try when I get back in town. Maybe Madonna del Olmo…..

  • Manteuffel

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