I am writing to the Seven Years War Association Journal at the suggestion of Dr. Christopher Duffy of RMA Sandhurst to request your assistance in some research relative to certain regiments of the Saxon Army during the SYW. Dr. Duffy's books have been essentially all the resources available to me on the Prussian, Austrian and Saxon armies of the period.

The background for my enquiry is summarized in the following paragraphs. As a point of reference, the names Breland and Breeler were used interchangeably by the early Brelands in the Carolina colonies in 1755 - 1800 with Breland becoming universal after 1800. Both forms are derived from the German root Bruhl ; a few American records used "u" and "oo" reflecting that the scribe heard more of the "u" sound in the German "umlaut u".

An old familiy legend passed down by word of mouth for two centuries relates that at least one of our ancestors was a member of a Prussian "Brelander (Bruhlander)" regiment at the battle of Leuthen, and was killed in a "charge that saved the day" for the Prussians. There is nothing particularly remarkable about such a legend except for its persistence in the backward rural areas of South Carolina where education was very poor and knowledge of Leuthen would have been rare to non-existent in the general population.

I have been able to determine that there was no Prussian or Austrian regiment likely to have been called Brelanders. There was, however, a Saxon regiment whose Chef was Bruhl, and which might have been called "Bruhlers" or "Bruhlanders". It was likely that this Bruhl was Graf Heinrich von Bruhl, chief minister to the Elector of Saxony, a man of great wealth with widespread estates, and in total control of military affairs of Saxony. Saxon regiment IR Bruhl became Prussian IR51 Wylich after the Saxon defeat at Pima, but was disbanded within a year. It did not participate as a unit at Leuthen, but remnants still referring to themselves as "Bruhlanders" might have been parceled out among the other Prussian regiments.

The "charge which saved the day" at Leuthen was the cavalry attack by Driesen's forces. If the legend is to be consistent with historical fact, any "Bruhlanders" would have to have been in one of the mounted regiments. After Pima, the Saxon troopers were parceled out among the Prussian mounted regiments, but I have not been able to discover any unit designations for the Saxon regiments. In fact the only reference I have been able to uncover on Saxon cavalry at Pima is in Duffy's hook. Because of von Bruhl's influence and his several estates, a cavalry regiment might also have been called "Bruhlers" or "Bruhlanders" , either as a result of their chief or their base location near a von Bruhl estate.

Dr. Duffy was only able to provide information on the Prussian dragoon regiment DR 12 of Wurttemburg which received as a second battalion the Saxon Rutowsky Cheveaulegers; this unit was disbanded because of heabvy desertion in April 1757, well before Leuthen, but reliable remnants would almost certainly have been retained by the Prussians because of their chronic manpower shortage.

As a final observation, it is possible that a "Bruhlander' cavalry unit might have been in some way associated with the Austrians, although there is no Saxon unit listed in the Austrian order of battle at Leuthen. Several Saxon cavalry regiments participated at Kolin as part of the Austrian forces, apparently with some distinction.

My specific objectives are to try to answer the following questions:

1. What information is available on the Saxon regiment IR Bruhl just prior to the defeat at Pima, and what happened to the remnants of Prussian regiment IR51 Wylich after its disbandment? Were any rosters of distributed Saxons preserved?

2. What were the designations of the Saxon horse regiments prior to Pima, and are any rosters preserved in any archive? Do any Prussian records list the names of impressed Saxon troopers?

3. Is there any unit history available for the Rutowsky Cheveaulegers, or any other Saxon regiment of the period?

4. What are the designations of the Saxon cavalry which fought with the Austrians at Kolin, and what records are preserved for these units?

I realize that this is a minor matter, and I would be grateful if you could steer me toward any information sources which might be useful. I have fairly well exhausted the standard library reference base available in the USA. Enquiries to Germany have not yielded even any significant identification of archives; I have tried the M.O.D. and private sources. The only specific archive identified is the Militarhistorisches Museum Dresden, to whom I have written without response to date.

[ Editor: does anyone have any information or advice for Gordon? If so, then please contact him at the following address, I hope that the Association can be of help: Dr. Gordon Breland, 3 Eastshore Road, Rockwell, Texas 75087-7603]