Stadtlohn 1623 - Twilight of Divine Right

Next in this series of refights of the battles of the Thirty Years' War comes the 1623 Battle of Stadtlohn. This battle was the last of the initial 'German Protestant Revolt' phase of the war - which should give you some idea of who won in real life, without reading linked Wikipedia entry...anyway, a Protestant Army under Christian of Brunswick was being pursued by the Imperial Army under Count Tilly. This battle is somewhat unusual, as being a game of two parts but on the same board - the Protestant rearguard's battle, and later the main body's battle, as the army's baggage is evacuated.

As usual for these battles, I am using the Twilight of Divine Right rules and the scenario from the accompanying volume, Europe's Tragedy.

The Set-Up:

The Protestant Army deployed, with the rear guard to the right and the main body based on the high ground to the left

The main body

Another view; the baggage to the left

And the rear guard defending the village and crossing over the stream

Another view

The Battle:

Tilly's troops arrive

And go straight into the attack - the Protestant infantry defend vigorously, causing serious casualties as the Imperialist's try to splosh forward through the stream

The Protestant Cavalry fight just as fiercely, routing the leading Imperialist Cuirassier regiment!

Getting his troops back in hand, Tilly launches another attack - this time it takes the village, and gets a foothold on the stream below it (bottom-right)

The Protestant Rear-guard brings up its reserves to re-occupy the briefly vacated village

More Imperialist troops arrive, to add fresh impetus and ferocity to the assault

The reinforcing Imperial cavalry tip the balance in the fighting above the village (top)...

The infantry fight around and in the village re-intensifies...

Numbers tell, and the battered but victorious Imperial infantry (foreground) hold on to their foothold on this bank...

As their Protestant opponents run and disperse

And then the village is cleared too, with the rearguard destroyed or in disarray...but they have done their job, delaying and inflicting casualties on the Imperialist advance guard

The Interlude:

The Imperial forces get moving down the road and around the village...

The Protestants are managing to get some of their baggage away...

...like so...

The Battle (second part)

The Imperial troops have now formed up ready for their assault on the main position; the Protestants have by now been able to evacuate about half their baggage

Another angle

The Imperials being their mass assault

There are clashes all along the line

The Protestant right flank under pressure, as the big Imperial tercios push through the opposing cavalry

Elsewhere on the hill though, the Protestant troops are holding their own

The Protestant reserve cavalry gets ready to charge to try and restore the situation

There is a lot of fierce fighting on the hill - an Imperial Cuirassier regiment is broken in the hail of fire

So far so good, but note the heavy casualties in the ranks of the Protestant infantry regiment in the foreground

The Imperials make another heave forward...and are stopped again on the Protestant Right (foreground)

But the Imperialists seem to have broken through in the centre!

The charge of the Protestant Horse goes in on the Protestant Right...

...but is swatted away!

The Protestant Left is assailed again, coming under immense presure

However, once again the Protestant infantry holds on magnificently, and the leading Imperialist tercio is cut down! However, on the near side, one of the Protestant infantry regiments has broken

The Protestant gunners have abandoned their pieces, but the Protestant infantry is still fighting very hard

And a decent portion of the baggage has been evacauted! Can the Protestants hold on just a bit longer?

The fighting on the hill continues with undiminshed ferocity, but it is clear that the Protestants are slowly losing ground - the counter-attack on the far-side has failed!

The Protestant Cavalry by the stream is holding off the tercios' advance here

The Imperialists push on, although yet another cavalry regiment has been routed at the far edge of the hill

And another large tercio is eliminated on the other flank! Plus the right-hand edge of the hill has been re-secured...can the Protestants do this?

The Protestant Horse goes in again (foreground)

But is beaten back

One last heave by the Imperialists on the hill...and two Protestant regiments break, unable to stand it any longer!

The last Protestant Foot clings on to the hill by their fingernails..

And then, it is all over - the remaining Protestant troops flee for the bridges

Tilly is left master of the field, and his troops are glad of the remaining Protestant baggage to plunder!

 

Game Notes:

A game that ended up closer than I thought it might: the Protestant infantry on the hill did fight very hard, but in the end, numbers told and eventually the break-throughs did come. The Protestants have to hold on for quite a well to win the 'moral' victory of the baggage evacuation, never mind the full victory conditions of holding off the Imperialists. I think the main thing that might have been done better was a more economical use of troops on the far (i.e. Protestant Left) flank, which might have freed up a couple more Horse regiments for more gainful employment. But it would probably not have made that much difference.

The scenario is structured in quite an unusual way, with the rear guard action and then the main action. Because these troops do not move fast, then it might be quite dull in a two-player game to play through the full movement of the Imperialists from the right to the left of the board. Now, it does give the Protestant player the option I suppose of fighting a more open battle, but if that doesn't happen, then the Protestant player isn't going to be doing very much for a while, except hoping to roll well to see if another baggage element can escape. As a solo player, this didn't matter (I could work out what was going to happen using VLB prinicples) but it might matter somewhat in a club game.

As for the action itself, it mostly seemed reasonable and plausible. There do appear to be some routes to optimizing one's formations, i.e. to get the right combination of attacking in depth (to get all those nice support modifiers) but not allowing troops to appear on one's immediate flank (to avoid all those nasty units to the flank and rear penalties). Plus there are some hidden things in cavalry combat, about when exactly to move into 'charge range', so to speak. But in any case, all good fun, and if there is somewhat limited scope for genius tactics (but not no scope, far from it), then that seems a fair reflection of the period's constraints.

Figures as ever by Baccus 6mm.