Laselle: Thoughts on a Prussian Army

Hey Folks,

Pooch has lent me the Laselle book, and that along with Craig and Kent's excellent blogs and progress has tipped me over the edge into playing Laselle...

I am thinking Prussians. Lintmans awesome Prussians are really quite inspiring and after I have done some research they really sound like my sort of army.  Or it could be that I am a "Germanocentric" wargamer, as I will now have Ancient Germans, Thirty Years War Germans, Napoleonic Germans and World War II Germans...

So, this is pretty cool:

I have decided to do the Prussian IV Army Corps at Waterloo and the first storming of Plancenoit.  This was an epic battle that saw the town change hands five times...here is some info on it from the Battlefield-Tour.com

The Battle of Waterloo - Plancenoit



The first Prussians to arrive in the vicinity of the Waterloo battlefield was General Friedrich Wilhelm Freiherr von Bülow's Prussian IV Army Corps. Their objective was Plancenoit that they were to secure in order for Field Marshal Blücher to launch an attack into the French right rear. It was Blücher's intention to secure his left upon Frichermont using the Bois de Paris road. It had been agreed between Blücher and Wellington that if the Anglo-Dutch centre was under attack the Prussians would advance on Frichermont.


On learning of the Prussians approach Napoleon sent Lieutenant General Lobau's French VI Army Corps to oppose them. The Prussian 15th Brigade of von Losthin attacked the French deployed in Frichermont with a detemined bayonet charge and pushed them out. They pushed on to attack the French cavalry and artillery on the heights. The Prussian 16th Brigade of von Hiller pushed forward to take possession of Plancenoit at 16:30 hrs pushing Lieutenant General Lobau's Frenchmen out. With General von Bülow's men in Plancenoit their 15th Brigade linked up with the Nassau Brigade which was on Wellington's extreme left.


Lieutenant General Lobau's French VI Army Corps counterattacked at Plancenoit in an effort to dislodge the Prussians. Napoleon on learning that Plancenoit had been taken sent his 10 Battalions of the Young Guard to reinforce the French VI Army Corps and beat the Prussians back. After some very fierce fighting the Young Guard managed to recapture Plancenoit only to be counterattacked and driven out. Napoleon sent 2 battalions of his Old Guard to stabilise the situation. They attacked with their bayonet and after a ferocious fight when they did not fire a single shot the Old Guard recaptured the village.


The Prussians were still not to be beaten however, and a combined grouping of approximately 30,000 troops under General von Bülow and General Pirch I attacked Plancenoit again. 20,000 Frenchmen were in and around the village. The Old Guard and other supporting troops were able to hold on for about one hour before a massive Prussian counterattack evicted them after some ferocious and bloody street fighting. The last to leave was the Old Guard who defended the church and cemetery. The French casualties were horrific; for example the 1st Tirailleurs of the Young Guard suffered from 92% losses.

So it was Savage.

Using this Order of Battle I have broken down what units I will be doing;

In the Laselle Army Builder list this is the Infantry Brigade + Organic (starts on table) Cavalry Abeitlung choice.  This is because from what I understand, why wouldn't you take the organic Cav? (unless you don't want to paint 40+ horse!)
Each "block' of foot/ horse will be one Laselle Unit.

The Silesian Landwher Cavalry wore Polish lancers' "chapkas", so I will be on the hunt for Polish Lancer models for them.

I am thinking the Perry Prussian Line Infantry plastic box set will be the bulk of the "Line" and "Reserve" units (which at this stage of the "Hundred Days" are rated the same as the Line units anyway) while I might get a box of Warlord plastic Landwher to bulk out the three units I will need.

At some point when I can amass the funds I will be doing a Calpe Miniatures order to get all the Cavalry, Horse and extra Command Figures I will need.  This will be ruinously expensive, but Calpe miniatures are really second to none.

So that's my next project planned out :)

I should REALLY assemble and paint the Thirty Years War/ ECW army I have on the sprue at home first though...

Cheers
Jason