kill off wellington

Working on a timeline in my head where part of it involves killing off Wellington during the Penninsular War. I've read somewhere that El Bodon was a good opportunity for the French. Are there any better options?

The idea is that killing off Wellington doesn't make Napoleon win, just delays a British victory for a few more years.
 
I don't think It would change anything. British victory in the peninsular war was mainly the result of Napoleon's catastropic russian campaign and of the necessity for France to withdraw most of its troops from Spain in order to face the 1813 campaign in Germany.
 
Wellington was quite the general though. I assume it would have to have some effect. I agree, Napoleon was doomed, but I don't think he was doomed to fail by a specific date regardless of his opposition.
 
Without Wellington, the Allied cause would be dealt a serious blow. He managed the allied nations and their resources quite well, managing to build the British and Portuguese armies into a formidable force as well as putting the guerrilla forces to great use. Without him, you see a British force less confident and making slower progress across Spain as the battles fought would lack his skill. Uxbridge might have been the man to take over in the event of Wellington's death if I remember right.

There was a point, just before Talavera I believe, when Wellington almost clashed with French scouts. If he had died there, it could have gone a lot worse for the allies.
 
The french anyway could not control Spain. The best they could do there was maintaining a state of chaos. And once they were forced to withdraw to face the 6th coalition in central Europe, any good general would have finished victoriously the peninsular campaign.
 
The french anyway could not control Spain. The best they could do there was maintaining a state of chaos. And once they were forced to withdraw to face the 6th coalition in central Europe, any good general would have finished victoriously the peninsular campaign.

Not many could have gotten the victories that Wellington did though, or have managed the campaign so well. Vittoria would have been a very different beast, if it had happened at all. Without Wellington, and a potential loss at Talavera, you might have seen British forces abandon Spain completely anyhow. You had many disparate elements in the Peninsular War, Wellington did great work in bringing them together to turn things around.
 
Not many could have gotten the victories that Wellington did though, or have managed the campaign so well. Vittoria would have been a very different beast, if it had happened at all. Without Wellington, and a potential loss at Talavera, you might have seen British forces abandon Spain completely anyhow. You had many disparate elements in the Peninsular War, Wellington did great work in bringing them together to turn things around.

the fact that Wellington administered his army as well as he fought it would make his death even a worse blow. Not many generals understood logistics the way he did in this era.

While Napoleon would probably eventually go down because the British would still be providing massive amounts of money to help the other allies the ability of the British to keep an army on the continent becomes highly questionable and Waterloo was indeed an allied effort (just to discuss the end game) that benefits the British massively in terms of prestige and thus diplomatic clout. As did the Spanish campaign.

Certainly the Spanish would have paid even a stiffer price without the Anglo-Portuguese field army to assist.
 
Without wellington, it is possible that Portugal is conquered by the French.

If that happens, then the guerilla war is very different, as the french main field army can either concentrate in hunting guerillas or be available for use in other theaters) - or likely both. This could have huge consequences (esp if if means a Napoleon victory at Leipzig.
 
Killing Arthur Wellesley at any point helps the French but

Working on a timeline in my head where part of it involves killing off Wellington during the Peninsular War. I've read somewhere that El Bodon was a good opportunity for the French. Are there any better options?

The idea is that killing off Wellington doesn't make Napoleon win, just delays a British victory for a few more years.


El Bodon in September 1811 is too late, even if all you are hoping is a few more months for Napoleon.

By that time Wellington has cleared Portugal, defeating the French on decisively three separate occasions and holding them in two more major battles, besides many minor engagements .
In addition he arranged for the Portuguese army to be trained to a point where they were better than most of the French in Spain.

At that point the British would not simply abandon Portugal and there was no way that French could simply bull through the Lines of Torres Vedras to Lisbon.

Remember Napoleon had already dispersed his forces trying to hold the whole Spain. This left them vulnerable to the spanish partisans and to defeat in detail (See the Battle of Barossa in Spring 1811)

In Europe as a whole, the continental powers knew that Napoleon was fallible & everyone (including the French) were completely ignoring Napoleons orders not to trade with Britain. Though Austria and Prussia were still cowed, Russia had simply stopped doing what Napoleon demanded.

By September 1811, whatever was happening in Spain, Napoleon had no choice but to take one of the "Many Roads to Moscow" in 1812 ... and everyone of those was a road to ruin.

Now if Arthur were to die in India, say when his horse was piked at Assaye, that might be different....
 
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Uxbridge never served under Wellington in the Peninsular

Uxbridge might have been the man to take over in the event of Wellington's death if I remember right.

because of his illegal affair with Wellingtons sister in law, abandoning his wife and 8 children.

As Lord Paget he had done well as a cavalry commander under Sir John Moore in 1808, winning skirmishes in the advance and covering the retreat bravely but he failed disastrously with an infantry Division at Walcheren in 1809.

He was not employed again until 1815... as cavalry commander again. Even this was against Wellingtons request who preferred someone he had worked with before (perhaps Cotton)

Unfortunately his seniority made him notionally Wellington's successor but the Duke pretty much ignored that.
 
because of his illegal affair with Wellingtons sister in law, abandoning his wife and 8 children.

As Lord Paget he had done well as a cavalry commander under Sir John Moore in 1808, winning skirmishes in the advance and covering the retreat bravely but he failed disastrously with an infantry Division at Walcheren in 1809.

He was not employed again until 1815... as cavalry commander again. Even this was against Wellingtons request who preferred someone he had worked with before (perhaps Cotton)

Unfortunately his seniority made him notionally Wellington's successor but the Duke pretty much ignored that.

Ah, knew I was getting mixed up on some point. Beresford might be a likely sort, depending on when the death happens.
 
I don't think It would change anything. British victory in the peninsular war was mainly the result of Napoleon's catastropic russian campaign and of the necessity for France to withdraw most of its troops from Spain in order to face the 1813 campaign in Germany.

It was more a Spanish guerilla victory than a British victory in the Pennisular War. Wellington was sent there in support of the Spanish guerillas, not the other way around. His tactics were hit-and-run; he harassed the French at vulnerable points while they tried to deal with the guerrillas.

These quotes by Basil Liddell Hart and Gates respectively, says it all. The French almost lost as many men in single battles such as Borodino and Wagram as they lost to Wellington's army in five years. Without Wellington, the French would have stayed in Spain longer but they would have been defeated eventually by attrition.

[FONT=BOOK ANTIQUA,CALISTO MT,ARIAL,HELVETICA]"Wellington's battles were materially the least effective part of the operations. By them he [Wellington] inflicted a total loss of some 45,000 men only - counting killed, wounded and prisoners - on the French during the 5 years' campaign... whereas Marbot reckoned that the number of French deaths alone during this period averaged 100 a day. Hence it is a clear deduction that the overwhelming majority of the losses which drained the French strength, and their morale still more, was due to the operations of the guerillas...""

[/FONT]
[FONT=BOOK ANTIQUA,CALISTO MT,ARIAL,HELVETICA]"... the Spanish 'nation in arms' ... may have lacked the polished professionalism of the British Light Division but, in the long run, they probably inflicted considerably more damage on the French forces than all of Wellington's pitched battles combined. The sieges of Gerona alone cost the Imperial armies over 20,000 casualties and, exclusively from sickness and guerilla raids, the French forces in the Peninsula lost approx. 100 men per day for over 4 years, a total of some 164,000 casualties. It is, therefore, easy to see how the war in Spain bled the French army white ..." (- Gates) [/FONT]
 
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