I notice after fighting some angry peasants that the "Hunt enemies" option under Orders pops up. However, every time I've attempted it my men just wander back without meeting any resistance. Is this by design? I mean ostensibly they can just go blend in with the population but apparently they're regrouping and rallying in their disgusting pubs and hovels and what-have-ye for another round of getting their rotting teeth kicked in by an actual military.
Seems like you should be able to hunt peasants.
I've found hunting to be very unreliable. Quite often, entire armies will report back that no one was able to find anyone. There's probably a very large random component, which is influenced by the number of retreated units. There *could* be something involving peasant hordes, though.
It does kind of seem like at some point hunting became largely worthless. I remember years ago always hunting after battle, and very rarely not meeting resistance.