Schematic plan · Latin American Wars of Independence

Battle of Bombona

7 April 1822
Quito
Victory for Independentalists

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.

Independentalists (Patriot Army, 1,800 men under Bolivar) attacked Spain (Sp Army, 2,200 men under Garcia) in Quito. The CAA Database of Battles records 12 hours of fighting on a front of 7.5 km, a frontal attack against hasty defense, and that Independentalists won. Losses: Independentalists 531 (30%), Spain 250 (11%).

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

Independentalists

Bolivar

Unit	Arm	Men
Independentalists left wing	Infantry	432
Independentalists centre	Infantry	576
Independentalists right wing	Infantry	432
Independentalists reserve	Infantry	360
Bolivar	Commander	—
In this plan		1,800

Spain

Garcia

Unit	Arm	Men
Spain left wing	Infantry	521
Spain centre	Infantry	694
Spain right wing	Infantry	521
Spain reserve	Infantry	434
Spain artillery (2 guns)	Artillery	30
Garcia	Commander	—
In this plan		2,200

What the sources report

	Independentalists	Spain
Strength, this plan	1,800	2,200
Losses, this plan	531	250

In the CAA Database of Battles

CDB90 no. 152, “Bombona”, compiled for the US Army to study what decides battles. These are the figures a what-if engine can be calibrated against.

Fighting: 12 hours
Winner: the attacker
Terrain: Rugged, Mixed
Weather: Dry, Sunny, Temperate, Autumn, Temperate
Defender’s posture: Hasty defense
Front width: 7.5 km (attacker), 7.5 km (defender)

Force	Strength	Losses	Horse	Guns	Plan and outcome
Independentalistsattacker	1,800	531	—	0	Frontal attack; Penetration
Spaindefender	2,200	250	—	2	Defensive plan; Withdrew

Attacker’s advantages 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

US Army Concepts Analysis Agency; tidy edition by Jeffrey B. Arnold, CAA Database of Battles (CDB90), no. 152 · ODC-BY-1.0Strengths, losses, front widths, hours of fighting, tactics and outcome.

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.