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Schematic plan · War of the First Coalition

Battle of Wattignies

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A schematic plan, generated from the statistics of the CAA Database of Battles: the armies' size and width, the hours of fighting, the plan of attack and the outcome are as recorded; the ground and the positions are not.
Rolling, Mixed groundCentreLeft wingRight wingReserveCentreLeft wingRight wingReserve05 km10 kmN

France (French Army of the North, 44,000 men under Jourdan) attacked Austria (Austrian Army, 23,000 men under Saxe-Coburg) in Austrian Netherlands. The CAA Database of Battles records 24 hours of fighting on a front of 16 km, a frontal attack, double envelopment against prepared defense, and that France won. Losses: France 4,500 (10%), Austria 3,000 (13%).

This plan is generated from those figures. It shows the shape of the battle the database describes: the size and width of the armies, the plan of attack and the outcome. It does not show where the units actually stood.

The armies

France

Jourdan

UnitArmMen
France left wingInfantry10,560
France centreInfantry14,080
France right wingInfantry10,560
France reserveInfantry8,800
JourdanCommander—
In this plan44,000

Austria

Saxe-Coburg

UnitArmMen
Austria left wingInfantry5,520
Austria centreInfantry7,360
Austria right wingInfantry5,520
Austria reserveInfantry4,600
Saxe-CoburgCommander—
In this plan23,000

What the sources report

FranceAustria
Strength, this plan44,00023,000
Losses, this plan4,5003,000

In the CAA Database of Battles

CDB90 no. 100, “Wattignies”, compiled for the US Army to study what decides battles. These are the figures a what-if engine can be calibrated against.

Fighting
24 hours
Winner
the attacker
Terrain
Rolling, Mixed
Weather
Dry, Sunny, Temperate, Autumn, Temperate
Defender’s posture
Prepared defense
Front width
16 km (attacker), 16 km (defender)
ForceStrengthLossesHorseGunsPlan and outcome
Franceattacker44,0004,500——Frontal attack; Double envelopment; Penetration
Austriadefender23,0003,000——Defensive plan; Withdrew

Attacker’s advantages morale +1 · momentum +1 · initiative +1 · surprise +1

CDB90 (US Army Concepts Analysis Agency, 1990), tidy edition by Jeffrey B. Arnold; data under ODC-BY 1.0.

Notes

On this reconstruction

Generated automatically from the statistics in CDB90. Frontages, depths, distances, the order of events and the terrain are schematic: they follow the recorded strengths, front widths, hours of fighting, tactical plan and outcome, not maps or accounts of the battle. The sources give no hours; the timing is conjectural.

Sources

Facts gathered from Wikidata (CC0), Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0) and Wikimedia Commons (licence per file); the plan and its text are timeastra’s own.