Rich Masse and David Doty presented the battle of Zorndorf for 19 historical gamers on Friday evening at "Origins." The game was run in 25mm at 30 to 1 troop scale with approx. 75% of all the actual units being represented on the table. The rules for this engagement were Mitre, Musket & Moustache.

The behavior of the Prussians on this occasion was bewildering to say the least. Almost totally unagressive until it was too late, they tried to save the forlorn hope consisting of 5 btns. of grenadiers and 2 btns. of line musketeers. The center moved forward a little bit and stopped as they encountered some opposition from Russian infantry. The far right flank just stood around looking Prussian but not doing anything in particular. The Prussian cavalry wandered about being lost and collecting cannon balls from the Russian artillery.

The Russian commander, Count Fermor, after getting over being "lost" on the battlefield (well, he doesn't speak any Russian) became uncharacteristically aggressive. The Russian line infantry on the right flank surged forward to engage and destroy the Prussian grenadiers in front of them. Fermor even sacrificed a regiment of horse grenadiers to remove the last effective battalion of grenadiers which, except for the cavalry of Seydlitz, left the entire Prussian left flank exposed to 4 intact btns. of grenadiers and 6 btns. of line infantry.

The center of the Russian line moved in their ponderous Russian manner to meet the advance of the Prussian brigades of the center division. They became hotly engaged with the "blue meanies" for the rest of the night, neither side willing to yield. (Miracle roles on several morale checks). The Corps d'Observation got the night off. The Prussian right flank declined to cross over and engage them at all. The cavalry on the Russian left flank was brilliantly handled as the Hussars dazzled the Bayreuth Dragoons out of position and made them ineffective for the entire engagement. The remainder of the Prussian cavalry on this flank was removed by a conveniently placed 12 pounder.

At the end, in a desperate attempt to snatch victory away from the stalwart Green Coats, Seydlitz hurled his remaining cavalry (1 cuirassier regiment and 2 hussar regiments) into the unbroken lines of Russian infantry. Tonight, Russian infantry is clearly unimpressed by anything Germanic and all Seydlitz did was provide the Russian army with fresh meat to go with their potatoes and cabbage.

It ended with a resounding Russian victory. Frederick could escape with the remnants of his army as the only intact formation available to the Russians was the Corps d'Observation which couldn't pass a morale check to advance. This result is clearly very non-historical. The actual battle was a hard won victory for Frederick, which taught him that the Russian army would be a tough adversary in the future. For a detailed account of the battle as it really happened, I refer you to "The Army of Frederick the Great" by Prof. Christopher Duffy.

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