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Schematic plan · American Civil War

Battle of Perryville

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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 wingReserve02 km4 kmN

USA (US Army of the Ohio, 36,940 men under Buell) attacked Confederacy (Cs Army of Tennessee (-), 16,000 men under Bragg) in Kentucky. The CAA Database of Battles records 4 hours of fighting on a front of 7.2 km, a frontal attack against hasty defense, and that neither side won. Losses: USA 4,211 (11%), Confederacy 3,396 (21%).

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

Buell

UnitArmMen
USA left wingInfantry8,866
USA centreInfantry11,821
USA right wingInfantry8,866
USA reserveInfantry7,388
BuellCommander—
In this plan36,941

Confederacy

Bragg

UnitArmMen
Confederacy left wingInfantry3,840
Confederacy centreInfantry5,120
Confederacy right wingInfantry3,840
Confederacy reserveInfantry3,200
BraggCommander—
In this plan16,000

What the sources report

USAConfederacy
Strength, this plan36,94016,000
Losses, this plan4,2113,396

In the CAA Database of Battles

CDB90 no. 193, “Perryville”, compiled for the US Army to study what decides battles. These are the figures a what-if engine can be calibrated against.

Fighting
4 hours
Winner
the draw
Terrain
Rolling, Mixed
Weather
Dry, Sunny, Temperate, Autumn, Temperate
Defender’s posture
Hasty defense
Front width
7.2 km (attacker), 9.6 km (defender)
ForceStrengthLossesHorseGunsPlan and outcome
USAattacker36,9404,211——Frontal attack; Repulse
Confederacydefender16,0003,396——Defensive/offensive plan; Frontal attack; Single envelopment; Penetration; 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

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.