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I’d love to see a full blown match of the battle of Wagram 1809. Austria strikes to put themselves back in the political sphere over Napoleon. This is due to meddling in the court sending Austria to defeat, and yet again humbling itself under Napoleon once more, effectively ending the Hapsburg Dynasty.
But all was not well for the Grand Armee, with victory came great price and savage fighting. Austrians fought like lions taking with them a large part of the French Officers with them during the melees. These losses weren’t recognized at the time as significant; however 3 short years later they felt the bitter bite of what they had lost as the Grand Armee no longer had the previous command and control seeing it march as a lumbering force without it’s deadly grace.
There are scholars who regard the war of the 5th coalition and the battle of Wagram as Napoleons Stalingrad, as it was here he lost the essence of what made the Grand Armee…. GRAND.
You make a good case for Wagram! It could make an interesting game, and I can’t remember ever seeing that battle portrayed in another game before.
There are no other games centered on this battle or period for whatever reason. I think in all honesty that since the majority of the tabletop genre centers around the Brits and French etc that it has become a misrepresentation of what the Napoleonic wars were and whom it affected the most. Without doubt the Austrians carried a great majority of the fighting along with the russians, prussians, and other minor states. The British for the most part financed the wars for their allied powers. This was part of what caused the failure of the 5th coalition as the fellow knows as Stadium (spelling?) oversold his influence to the Austrian king promising that England was going to cough up way more gold than discussed including all these other european powers were going to declare war and march on France ending this nonsense of people governing themselves etc, and returning to the rightful states of kings. Austrian King really didn’t want to go ahead with his idea because he correctly believed it would be their end.
Of course the King of Austria should have perhaps asked where these supposed high ranking talks were being held (seems to be mostly liquered up low ranking officials in bars attempting to run up their corporate ladders). Hand shake and a beer is great for exchanging a lawn mower, but i’d think you’d want a bit more solid evidence of intent for national matters.
At any rate, that’s the short of a very long story as told by the “Thunder on the Danube” trilogy.
I’m very interested in this period and perhaps one of my favorites. I’ve done extensive research into it as a HOBBIEST. I in no way portend to lend any credibility that i may be an expert in the matter, i simply just know a small bit more than someone whos never read a book.
At any rate, i’ve many charts, complete OOB’s for all sides and if you so desire to do this i’d be more than happy to assist any way i can be of use. I’m currently finishing painting the ENTIRE VI Korp as represented in historical detail (as much as possible) and have purchased the entire Provisional Korp for the french and will start painting them one day soon. Both of these are for the battle of Abensburg leading up to the battle of Wagram.
I’ll include a shameless plug for my favorite miniature caster because all his minis are metal provided by newline designs in England by the owner Sean. He started out like you and i hope you gain his success over the years.
You certainly seem to know your history on this! Certainly agree with you that central and eastern Europe bore the brunt of Napoleon’s armies. I’ll be sure to call on you if I make a game about this.
If you would like to share some images here of your work in your painting then that would be great! I get a kick out of stuff like that! I recently went to a wargames show called Colours in Newbury. Fantastic to see all those wargames laid out!
Thank you for your kind words! 🙂
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