"How many supply wagons would a French BN/Bde have?" Topic

Say in 1809? I'm currently doing up a ton of lkmbers and wagons for my 3mm project, and Im curious how many of these there would be clogging up the roads.

According to John Moore, "Mobility and Strategy in the Civil War", Military Affairs, Vol. 24, No. 3 (1960), pp. 68-76, "Napoleon's recommendation of 480 wagons for all purposes for a corps of forty thousand was quoted with approval by Quartermaster-General Montgomery C. Meigs in his report for 1861-62".

That would give a ratio of 12 wagon for every 1000 men.

Good answer!
That definitely gives me a starting point…
Boy, there are going to be a lot of wagons in this army. Thankfully each wagon only has two horses pulling it….

In 1806 Napoleon stated that each infantry regiment would have two 4-horse caissons for bread, one for shoes, and one for officers' baggage along with a 4-horse caisson for medical supplies and equipment. There would also be 'several' 2-horse carts for the vivandieres.

In 1809 Napoleon added one caisson for infantry ammunition and one ration wagon.

The artillery companies assigned to infantry divisions also had four extra caissons for infantry ammunition.

It's amazing how big your logistics tail gets, isn't it?

Granted, I've been doing most of my planning for later colonial gaming, but it still ends up being dozens of wagons and/or hundreds of mules!

I would think the French were 'light' on transport compared to say, the Austrians. Or Prussians.

FOAL: I agree with that. In fact, it's oe of the things I'd like to model, although it might be a bit tricky. I'd imagine that the average battalion and brigade of the other armies in particular would have more baggage than the French line units did.

LITS: It definitely can get big, which I want to show. I think it'll look cool on the table top. Fortunately you can get 15 covered wagons from Pico Armor for $4.50 USD…

Brechtel- Good info! Looks like 7-12 or so carts in 1809 per regiment. Which probably set up far to the rear I would imagine, and maybe off the table top, depending on board size and what you're trying to show. It'll take some research maybe to find out just how far back the baggage train would be. Since I'm dealing with a very fine tactical scale here there's every chance that it might pop up on the board.

The regimental wagon master would be in charge of the regiments trains. The trains wouldn't be that far back especially the ammunition and medical supplies.

When the regular supply train battalions were activated in 1807, each one was capable of supporting a corps.