A.) Infantry

The Prussian infantry at its basic speed of 75 paces per minute (Young & Lawford, page 12; Duffy-P, page 120; Davis, etc.) and 4/5 yard per pace, covers 60 yards per minute or 240 yards equal to 1.5 battalion-widths per 4 minutes or very slightly more than 2 miles per hour.

The French infantry at its ordinary speed of 60 paces per minute (Nosworthy, pages 204, 262), and 2/3 yard per pace, covers 40 yards per minute or 160 yards equal to 1 battalion-width per 4 minutes, or 1.33 miles per hour. The "double" of 120 paces per minute would cover 2.67 miles per hour.

Maddeningly, not even the otherwise very detailed Duffy-A specifies the Austrian basic march speed in paces per minute, although it states the pace length to have been 2 feet, or the same as the French, and opines that "when rated against foreign infantry the mobility of the Austrian foot soldiers now ranked between that of the Prussians and that of the Russians" (page 249). However, Duffy-A does describe a "double march," used by one-battalion-wide Austrian assault columns, at which 4 minutes would pass "between coming into effective [musket] range and closing with the enemy" (page 404), which, given even a most generous outer limit of 320 yards for said range, implies a rate of not more than 80 yards or 120 Austrian paces per minute, which in lure suggests that the basic speed was 60 paces per minute, equal to the French.

For the Russians we have nothing beyond the impressions of observers that they maneuvered slowly (Duffy-R, page 63; Osprey #297, page 38) and had lower mobility in general than the Austrians (above).

As for the Anglo-Hanoverian marching pace, I have no information at all. We are told that the Hessian army imitated the Prussian (SYWA.I Vol. VII, No. 3, page 40 etc.), but not whether this mimicry extended beyond similarities of' clothing to encompass matters relevant to combat capability, like marching and firing.

Knowing that the Prussian basic march speed of 1.5 battalion-widths per 4 minutes equals 22.5 battalion-widths or 3600 yards per hour, or just slightly more than the 3520 yards that would equal 2 miles per hour, we can express in other given miles-per-hour speeds in terms of battalion-widths per 4 minutes, thus:

Miles per hour	Description	Battalion-widths per 4 minutes
2.67	120 paces-per-minute Franca-Austrian "double pace" assault march	2
3.33	Route march / march by lines	2.5
4	Cavalry walk / Chasseur jog	3
8	Cavalry quick trot	6
10.67-12	Cavalry gallop	8-9
16	Cavalry "field gallop"	12

It is not clear whether the Prussians had in their repertoire any sustained marching pace, say 100 paces per minute, that would equal the 2.67 mph of the Franco-Austrian "double." Duffy (-P, page 120) states: "A quick step of up to 120 paces to the minute was employed in wheeling or in deploying from column into line. Otherwise the troops settled hack into their usual 70 to 75." One might suppose that having later in the war adopted the Austrian assault column tactic, they would likewise have adopted an accelerated march speed appropriate thereto, but I have found no textual confirmation of this.

If the circumference of a circle equals the radius thereof times two times pi [pi = about 3.1416], then the battalion [quarter-] wheel described by Nosworthy (pages 252-253) and Duffy (-P, page 124) would require the battalion's outer tip to travel pi/2 [or slightly more than 1.5] battalion-widths in the 2 minutes specified for this "difficult maneuver" - double the Prussians' basic march speed, amounting practically to a 4 mph jog. Duffy (-A, page 405) states that for the Austrians, the battalion wheel required the outer tip to move "at a rate between the double and an all-out run."

As a sanity check for the route march and higher footspeeds shown on the above table, it may be illuminating [on the theory that the capabilities of the average human body don't change much from century to century] to consult the handbooks on foreign armies produced by the British War Office immediately prior to World War One, which specify the following rates of marching:

Italian	"Ordinary"	"Special"
Infantry:	2.5 miles/50 min. [= 3 mph]	3.5 miles/50 min. [= 4.2 mph]
Bersaglieri (" Bersaglieri" being an elite light infantry):	3.125 miles/50 min.[= 3.75 mph]	4.375 miles/50 min. [= 5.25 mph]
Russian infantry: 2.67 miles per hour "The marching pace of the Russian infantry is slow, but it must be remembered that the roads in Russia are usually very bad." (page 138)
French	Paces per Minute
Infantry	"Quick Time" 120 x 30 inches [= 3.33 mph]	"Double Time" 180 x 36 inches [= 6 mph!]

But, "the normal rate of march for mixed columns is limited by the pace of the infantry, viz., 2.5 miles per hour. This rate includes the 'halte horaire' -- an hourly halt of 10 minutes after every 50 minutes of marching" (page 403), which translates into a rate while actually moving of 3 mph, during which, interestingly, the men "seldom keep step except when singing or passing through a town" (page 404).

It would, therefore, appear that speeds of 3.33 and even 4 mph, at least for short sprints, or for longer times over good roads, are not unreasonable.

B.) Cavalry

The mph speeds shown for cavalry in the above table are taken from Young & Lawford (page 12) and The Russian Army Handbook for 1914 (page 132), one of the British War Office publications referenced in the prior section with respect to infantry route marching.

For the sake of continuity, we here address cavalry charging as well as cavalry maneuver speeds, even though a cavalry charge's tactical function is more nearly akin to that of an artillery shoot than an infantry advance. Like the artillery, the cavalry maneuvers into a position from which it may he "fired" upon the enemy. Its effective charging distance is analogous to the effectivc range of the cannon. Its projectile is itself; but once fired it can no more hold the ground into which it struck than can a spent cannon ball; it must find some quiet place, usually back where it started, to rally, that is, to be re-loaded for another charge. The analogy isn't perfect: the cannon ball's smashing power is never greater than at the cannon mouth, whereas the cavalry charge must build momentum over some distance, but it is close.

Most cavalries conducted a charge at the trot, the better to maintain compact formation over the course thereof The Prussian cavalry, through intensive training, achieved the capacity to keep formation while charging at the gallop, thereby magnifying its force of impact, should impact there be.

Not every analyst concedes this to have been an advantage. Observing that such impacts rarely occur, as a result of either charger or chargee flinching therefrom, Du Picq (pages 179-204) denigrates the utility of the gallop, other than as a way to distract the nervous cavalryman from his fear during the very last seconds before the impact-that- doesn't-happen. "The formula of the cavalry is R (Resolution) and R, and always R, and R is greater than all the MV squared in the world."

Nolan, quoted by Young & Lawford (page 24), noting the gallop's tiring effect upon the horses, warns: "If you meet the enemy's charge with blown horses you are pretty sure of being thrown." But to exalt moral resolve over physics is merely to beg the question, "Whence cometh morale, if not from consciousness of material advantage?" As for horse stamina, may it not be improved through training?

The 10.67 - 12 mph ordinary gallop speed would equate to a distance of 1280 - 1440 yards in 4 minutes. But could such an average speed actually be maintained for that long? Consider the charging distances practiced by the Prussian cavalry in training exercises (Nosworthy, page 170): "In 1748 Frederick demanded that they charge 700 yards (trot: 300; gallop: 400). In 1750 this was increased to a total of 1200 yards (trot: 300; gallop: 400; and full speed: 500). This was increased to an incredible 1800 yards [just over a mile!] in 1755, with the last 600 yards at full speed." One wonders whether this final standard was fully implemented before the outbreak of war the following year.

More Notes Relevant to the Simulation of Seven Years War Scenarios

I. Introduction
II. Tactical Unit Dimensions
III. Marching Distances Per Unit Time: Infantry and Cavalry
IV. Weapons Ranges, Rates of Fire, Endurance and Lethality

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