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Schematic plan · War of 1812

Battle of the Thames

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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.
Flat, Heavily wooded groundCentreLeft wingRight wingReserveCentreLeft wingRight wingReserve0200 m400 mN

USA (US Army, 3,500 men under Harrison) attacked Great Britain (Br Army, 1,800 men under Proctor) in Canada. The CAA Database of Battles records 0.5 hours of fighting on a front of 0.2 km, a frontal attack against hasty defense, and that USA won. Losses: USA 29 (1%), Great Britain 668 (37%).

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

USA

Harrison

UnitArmMen
USA left wingInfantry840
USA centreInfantry1,120
USA right wingInfantry840
USA reserveInfantry700
HarrisonCommander—
In this plan3,500

Great Britain

Proctor

UnitArmMen
Great Britain left wingInfantry432
Great Britain centreInfantry576
Great Britain right wingInfantry432
Great Britain reserveInfantry360
ProctorCommander—
In this plan1,800

What the sources report

USAGreat Britain
Strength, this plan3,5001,800
Losses, this plan29668

In the CAA Database of Battles

CDB90 no. 146, “The Thames”, compiled for the US Army to study what decides battles. These are the figures a what-if engine can be calibrated against.

Fighting
0.2 hours
Winner
the attacker
Terrain
Flat, Heavily wooded
Weather
Dry, Sunny, Temperate, Autumn, Temperate
Defender’s posture
Hasty defense
Front width
0.2 km (attacker), 0.2 km (defender)
ForceStrengthLossesHorseGunsPlan and outcome
USAattacker3,50029——Frontal attack; Penetration; Pursued
Great Britaindefender1,800668——Defensive plan; Withdrew with heavy losses

Attacker’s advantages leadership +1 · initiative +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.