CSA ramping up to Fredericksburg ... advice?

[kokopeli]

*** Wall of Text Alert ***

Generals,

I completed the Battle of Sharpsburg with few casualties and a very fit army and now I must prepare to engage the Yankees at Fredericksburg. President Davis has been quite helpful in his support for my officers and men but I fear the enemy will arrive in great strength at this ominous battle. If you could please help with any intelligency concerning your own operations in Northern Virginia, it would be the most noble act of support for our cause and relief of the many able men that have stepped forward to put down the invasion of our sacred soil.

I am playing on BG level. I completed the Battle of Sharpsburg losing less than 6400 men. I have, at present, 11 Divisions including 43 Infantry brigades, 10 artillery batteries and 2 Cavalry regiments.

I have heard that I should field 4 full Corps at Fredericksburg. Assuming I jack up my Army Organization, I will field 6 brigades per Division and 4 Divisions per Corps. This requires 96 units and I have only 55 at this time. I have plenty of Brigadier Generals and up and I expect to include among them three Lieutenant Generals to lead three of the four Corps. My concern is getting the weapons and officers to fill out the units. I have over 38k men in the reserve pool to hire but I don't think I can even get hold of the weapons I need to fill out this many brigades. My estimate shows I would need 43,500 more infantrymen, 1,800 more artillerymen and 1,000 more cavalrymen after replacing losses of just under 6,400 from Sharpsburg. I have 38,473 in my pool so this is almost attainable if we neglect the weapons count. If I use every Farmer and Rebored Farmer I can barely equip this many infantry, if I can buy that many weapons because I'd also have to buy up everything up to the Enfields to have that many long guns. These numbers are all based upon filling these units out to 1500 strength. I would also have to buy many Napoleons, 8-24# howitzers and many 10# ordinance guns. At least I have loads of Sharps 1855s for my Cavalry.

So I presume 4 full Corps of 72-1500 man Infantry brigades, 16-12 gun artillery batteries and 4-500 man cavalry regiments might not be needed. What do you recommend?

On the preparation side, I can hire two Brigadiers, three Colonels and three Lt Colonels before dipping into the Majors. I would need to add 42 officers to my totals assuming I didn't have any KIA/WIA in the two minor battles, so we're looking at 34 Majors. I have two minor battles where I may deploy 15 and 12 brigades to gain experience before Fredericksburg so may of the Majors could become Lt Colonels before Fredericksburg, and of course six of the Majors will be assigned to new artillery brigades. Any advice on the prepatory battles given these goals?

Finally, is there a recommendation on deploying my Corps for the battle (Left - right, what emphasis artillery / cavalry / infantry, where to place the reserves and what type of units)?

With your help I'm sure these Southern States will remain and the Yankees will be forced to realize the futility of attempting to subjugate the defenders of freedom and our way of life.

[WG Propaganda Machine]

I think a four full corps is excessive, but if you want to field that go ahead. You can get away with as little as 2.2 corps.

From my perspective though the most important fighting will be at Marye's heights, and is where you really need a full strength corps for whatever army organziation you settle on. To reliably hold I've worked it out that you need a minimum four artillery brigades, and two disposable line infantry divisions. Yes you can put two stars or better into the stone wall and they will chew through the attackers, but the Union brings something like 120+ guns into that area alone and tens of thousands of infantry. So whatever brigades you put in there initially will get chewed up, and easily take 40% casualties in the first couple hours of that attack. So having some generic infantry to cycle in and out of the line is important. Only when the enemy attack begins to slacken you should place some of your better infantry in the line. The artillery brigades are there to provide that extra punch of canister and shell whenever the federals make their charge.

If you can detach a unit or two of skirmishers to watch the more swampy area to the North to keep a look out for any long marches around your flank, and then either engage them with some Whitworth skirmishers or force march a brigade up there into fortifications to hold them back.

Prospect hill will initially see some action too, and if you can hold their initial attack it becomes very doubtful that they'd be able to fight their way to the objective in time. Just be sure to cover Hamiltons crossing/your supply depot with detached skirmishers or Cavalry because the AI loves to swing a brigade of infantry or some cavalry through the eastern marshes.

Telegraph hill will come under limited enemy attack, in the final stages of the battle, the enemy reinforces this attack with troops from the North, and South. So at least having at one or two full strength brigades along with some understrength ones is enough to delay any attacks here. You can force march some troops from the Prospect Hill positions around their far left, and up through the heavily forested area, and it might be a good idea having one or two brigades setup for just that purpose in case its necessary.

The heaviest fighting will be at Maryes Heights, so put your strongest corps here. Prospect hill will also see some fighting, but you can probably skimp a little on this force, and Telegraph hill you can place your weakest corps there.

I wish you luck in this battle, and have every confidence that you'll pull through alright.

[kokopeli]

Thanks a bunch. I believe that advice will be sufficient sine I have already fought that battle in historic mode back in April. Alot of things have changed since then, but I respect that Maryes Heights will still be the toughest and bloodiest part. Thanks for the advice about "throw away" brigades. I was thinking to have my strongest Division at the Heights with one throw away division, as you call it. Sounds like it will be even worse than I thought. I have three artillery batteries of 10# Ordinance guns (12), three batteries of 24# Howitzers (8) and six batteries of 12# Napoleons (12). The Ordinance guns have my best crews for counter battery fire. Should I place the 24# Howitzers at the Heights, use the 10# at the Heights for counter battery fire, or send the 12# Napoleons since the Federals will be coming to me?

At the other end of the battle I wanted to place three regiments (500) of Skirmisher Cav armed with Sharps '55s and one regiment (500) of Shock Cav armed with Colt '55 & sabre. I also intend to place a good Infantry division over on that flank and hit the Federals hard in their flank once they have worn themselves out on my main line. I seem to recall driving the federal army off the field nicely with that before in the historical version.

Thanks again.

[WG Propaganda Machine]

I lean towards using the Napoleon #12s, as its just a matter of course that your batteries in their breastworks will take random bullets every now and destroying a gun or two. And frankly Napoleons are a lot less expensive and more replaceable even though the #24s would utterly devastate the attackers whenever they make their charges. You have a massive abundance of artillery (big kudos), so you honestly have the pick of the litter here lol. Personally I would be using the 10# rifles on prospect hill. You could maybe justify a battery or two at the ford between telegraph hill, and Maryes heights but thats honestly a luxury. I don't think you'll get too much utility out of the 10# rifles in a counter-battery role in the North but I could very well be wrong about that. I've never imagined that the federal artillery positions was exposed enough to make that feasible.

Yeah Maryes is awesome, but the grim reality is that veterans die just as easily as normal line infantry, so while its super tempting to put your best into the line and really put the hurt on the federals they'll get hurt back just by sheer volume of fire from artillery, and federal infantry. I might be overly cautious with two disposable infantry divisions to cycle in, and out of the line. But in my experience its almost never worth it to initially commit your best troops to holding the line as you're putting them in when the enemy is still at their most dangerous.

I think you could meet with great success with that cavalry force, in general there is a lot more open terrain to work with once you get past the marshes so you can really put the hurt on the attackers down their once their attack peters out.

No probs man, I wish you great success with your campaign!

[kokopeli]

So we met the Federals at Fredericksburg and it was a massacre. I did raise my AO to bring 6 brigades per Division but I learned that at the Heights and at Telegraph Road this had no impact on the battle. My forces at Telegraph Road were not engaged but I sent a group off the flank the enemy at the Heights from the south. At the Heights, my 'reserve' Corps arrived as the battle started so the extra four brigades in the starting corps could have been allocated to the reserve corps and still been fully effective in the battle. At Prospect Hill it did help to have an extra four brigades because every unit I brought participated in the fight.

Leaving Sharpsburg I had 55 units; 43 Infantry brigades, 10 Artillery batteries & 2 Cavalry Regiments, in three Corps.

Arriving at Fredericksburg I had 74 units; 57 Infantry brigades, 13 Artillery batteries & 4 Cavalry regiments, in Four Corps.

I used every Major and above from the Barracks List without hiring beyond that limit (even though you may) and after filling most of my units back up to 1500 strong with veterans and raising my supply levels another $24k (selling a few cannon to get there) I had only a little under $7k money unspent. There were essentially no weapons to allocate at that point without purchasing, and I had purchased plenty too. There were no weapons better than Palmettos in any quantity needed to arm another brigade.

I had two infantry brigades armed with CS Richmonds, seven with Harpers Ferrys, three more with Springfield 1855s, a big slew of them armed with Pattern Enfield 1853s, three with Lorenz, two with Palmettos, about five with Mississippis and the rest with Springfield 1842s. I had five batteries with (12) 10# Ordinance guns, two with (12) 24# Howitzers and the rest with (12) 12# Napoleons.

The after action summary indicated this:
Union:
Initial strength - 50,837 infantry, 2,755 cavalry, 3,711 artillerymen, 159 artillery pieces

Enemy losses - 39,251 Infantry, 1668 cavalry, 2,602 artillerymen, 105 artillery pieces, 1,461 missing

Confederates:
Initial strength - 85,943 infantry, 2,000 cavalry, 4,200 artillerymen, 168 artillery pieces

Confederate losses - 6,276 infantry, 289 cavalry, 298 artillerymen, 10 artillery pieces
One Brigadier General WIA and one Colonel KIA.

Among the weapons dropped by the enemy were mostly Palmettos if I recall correctly. Palmettos ... really? There were a number of Springfield 1855s and Harpers Ferry 1855s, but not quite enough to outfit a brigade each.

Now I guess I prepare for Chancellorsville. I'll write a new message about that later this afternoon.