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Schematic plan · The Napoleonic Wars

Battle of Albuera

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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 wingCentreReserveLeft wingRight wingReserveHorseHorseHorseHorse01 km2 kmN

France (Fr Army, 23,000 men under Soult) attacked Great Britain (Br, Port & Sp Armies, 30,000 men under Beresford) in Spain. The CAA Database of Battles records 5.8 hours of fighting on a front of 4.8 km, a single envelopment, right flank against hasty defense, and that Great Britain held. Losses: France 8,000 (35%), Great Britain 7,500 (25%).

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

Soult

UnitArmMen
France left wingInfantry4,560
France centreInfantry6,080
France right wingInfantry4,560
France reserveInfantry3,800
France cavalry of the leftCavalry2,000
France cavalry of the rightCavalry2,000
SoultCommander—
In this plan23,000

Great Britain

Beresford

UnitArmMen
Great Britain left wingInfantry6,312
Great Britain centreInfantry8,416
Great Britain right wingInfantry6,312
Great Britain reserveInfantry5,260
Great Britain cavalry of the leftCavalry1,850
Great Britain cavalry of the rightCavalry1,850
BeresfordCommander—
In this plan30,000

What the sources report

FranceGreat Britain
Strength, this plan23,00030,000
Losses, this plan8,0007,500

In the CAA Database of Battles

CDB90 no. 131, “Albuera”, compiled for the US Army to study what decides battles. These are the figures a what-if engine can be calibrated against.

Fighting
5.8 hours
Winner
the defender
Terrain
Rolling, Mixed
Weather
Dry, Sunny, Temperate, Spring, Temperate
Defender’s posture
Hasty defense
Front width
4.8 km (attacker), 4.8 km (defender)
ForceStrengthLossesHorseGunsPlan and outcome
Franceattacker23,0008,0004,000—Single envelopment; Right flank; Penetration; Repulse; Withdrew
Great Britaindefender30,0007,5003,700—Defensive plan

Attacker’s advantages intelligence +1 · initiative +1 · surprise +2

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.