How far could a Napoleonic era division march in an hour?

by frederick1740

I'm creating a Kriegsspiel inspired board game in which players can fight fictional Napoleonic battles. I need to know how far a division could march in an hour.

dandan_noodles

This would be an excellent candidate for the Short Answers to Simple Questions Thread, which is usually stickied on the front page.

That said, a division in road column typically took one hour to pass a given point, and could complete a march of 24 km in eight hours, so on average 3 km/h. A column of four divisions required twelve hours to complete a march of equivalent length, owing to the time needed for the rear division to cover the length of those ahead of it.

This pace could be increased, however, even with deployed divisions. During the Battle of Austerlitz, Soult informed Napoleon his two divisions could reach the top of the Pratzen heights in about 20 minutes. His starting position was roughly 2-3 km from the objective, so a division in two lines of battalion columns might cover 6 or so km in an hour if pushed by an energetic leader.