Historians, especially those whose writings are
intended for popular consumption, would have us believe
that the armies they write of had a uniform fabric. If faults
are to be found, these are usually expressed only in
cautious terms. Even the writings produced by militaires
for consumption by other militaires are often encumbered
by secondary considerations. While it is relatively easy to
find some soul-searching writings in the wake of a
defeated army, it is next to impossible to do so when an
effort was crowned by victory. Who, after all, would look a
gifthorse in the mouth?
Anyone who has ever been on active service can recal that one company had an s.o.b. for a CO while anothe was commanded by a "pushover"; one outfit where the tone of every day life was harsh, while another had a life that was more amiable; some COs that put great store in spit and polish, while others would insist only on the which was absolutely necessary -- and some did it well while others didn't; one battalion commander would keep a close eye on what went down in his companies while others gave the company commanders an unchecked rein. The variety on the theme is endless. To assume that none of these things would have an effect on the performance characteristics of a unit would be childish and unrealistic. Yet many writers often do just that!
During times of peace, there were certain signs one could read. If, for example, one company in a given battalion had a dozen courts martial during a given period of time, while the others had far fewer or none, then the wise battalion commander would do a little fact finding.
In combat situations, of course, such a problem unit would be burdened with its own set of liablilities. An accident waiting to happen once outside pressures, notably enemy action, began to exert themselves. Here again, there are numerous shadings in infinite variety.
Certainly, there was hardly ever a combat commander, who didn't keep a private book on his units and the men who led them. He could hardly do otherwise if he wanted predictable results.
Old Fritz kept such a book on his army. Based on the experience of the peacetime reviews, he had his own ideas on what might be expected form his various regiments in combat. Even so, he was not to be spared his own share of surprises when the chips were down. Some managed to retain his benevolence even after they experienced some failures. Others, especially those from whom he expected great things, drew the full weight of his wrath when they disappointed him. On occasion his wrath was unjustly severe. That was Old Fritzl Good or bad, he forgot nothing. Nor was it ever predictable whether he would remember the good or the bad.
After a quarter of a century, he would pick an old sergeant out of the ranks who had caught his eye as a young private in some battle. When, for example, the 27th Regiment blew a retiring maneuver at the Magdeburg review, all held their breath, waiting for the royal storm to break loose. But all Fritz said was: "They never did know how to retreat, but advance, advance they always could!" Of Forcade's 23rd he said: "When I want to see soldiers, I must look at this regiment."
In his old age, he did commit to paper his own assessment of the army. It was to be judgement day, a document compiled by a bitter old man in the twilight of his discontent. Hardly any escaped with their skins intact. As a body only the cavalry (especially the hussars) came away relatively unscathed. That is to say, his comments were directed at their habits rather than their performance.
Thus, the Bayreuth (5th) Dragoons, the heroes of Hohenfreidberg, were characterized as drunks, while the Death's Head Hussars (5th) duelled too much to suit his tastes. The 8th Dragoons, however did get to feel his ire. Stili, it was mild compared to what much of the infantry got to hear.
With the benefits of 20/20 hindsight, we can not only determine what a younger Frederick thought, but we can also get an idea about how the regiments fared in the course of the Seven Years' War.
THE INFANTRY
The fusiliers, culled from the shorter men in the recruiting cantons and armed with the shorter (i.e. standard) musket were from the start intended to be troops of the second line. Despite the presence of the garrison regiments in the Prussian fortresses, one always needed troops to invest enemy fortresses, to garrison them if they were taken, to guard lines of communication, to escort transports, etc., etc. No battle was ever fought in a vacuum.
A second level of differentiation was occasioned by the fact that some of the fusilier regiments had no recruiting cantons of their own: this complicated the replacement situation during the war. Three regiments, despite their title and fusilier caps, were little better than garrison regiments and were mobilized only when it came to scraping the bottom of the barrel.
Neither when it came to the backbone of the line did the musketiers (or, as they were officially known, the "regiments of foot"), have a uniform fibre either. For example, those which were to have their recruiting cantons transplanted to the Silesian provinces did not fare well in the long run. The catholic districts took many years before they accustomed themselves to the rule of protestant Prussia. As a result, the regiments based there found it difficult if not impossible to maintain their strength once battle losses occured.
Next, there was the unfortunate case of the East Prussians. For most of the war their districts were occupied by the Russians. Even though they turned in admirable and entirely adequate performances during most of the war, Frederick consigned them to the "deep six" on the eastern theatre of operations.
In part, Frederick's negative attitude toward the East Prussian regiments was due to the readiness with which the estates there had paid homage to the Russian Tsarina (there was little else they could do since being as close as they were to the Russian base of operations).
Far different was the reaction of the Pommeranians, when war came to their province. Militias and fencibles grew like weeds to back what few hussar formations and freicorps there existed to contain the Swedes and Russians between the big battles.
Against this crazy quilt of different backgrounds and special situations, the battle calendar gives the best indication of how to construct a "who's who" of Prussian infantry, of how Frederick saw it and what became of the regiments in the course of the war.
Obviously Frederick took what he considered to be his best regiments into his own army which he intended to be the main strike force. At the same time, he could hardly allow secondary corps to subsist entirely on second class troupe.
Originally, the first tier consisted of regiments No. 1-3- 5-6-7-8-9-10-12-13-15-17-18-19-20-21-23-24-25-26-27-30. I must emphasize that, as a matter of course, not all of these appeared in every main battle Frederick himself fought. Frequent detachments were made and only some were taken along to act as "corset stays" in the battles against the Russians.
Lobositz was not ideal ground for a linear battle. The battle had much the same character of the first round in a prize fight; cautious and inconclusive rounds of sparring until the grenadiers, galled by enemy fire, took the bit and jumped the Austrian irregulars and grenadiers with the bayonet.
The battle of Prague, on the other hand, was designed to be the grand knockout blow which was to overthrow the Austrians before the alliance could muster its full weight. Perhaps, Frederick reasoned, a decisive victory might even break the alliance. It was not to be. And two separate factors combined to burst the bubble. Conceived as an encirclement which was to trap the Austrians, one of the detached corps was unable to cross the River Moldau.
This enabled the greatest part of the Austrians to extricate themselves from the trap (until the advent of modern communications the business of detached corps and encirclements was saddled with rotten probability statistics, Napoleon's success at Ulm notwithstanding). Still, the failure at Prague might have been corrected at Kolin, but the successes of the First and Second Silesian War had given rise to a dangerous, indeed almost disastrous flaw in Frederick's tactical thinking. Wanting to speed up the action, he ordered his troops to advance at the quickmarch without firing. Even without preparatory musketry, the Prussian infantry carried the day. But at what price was the victory?
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Anhalt (No. 3) : over 25% casualties
Winterfeld (No. 1) : over 56% casualties
Forcade (No. 23) : over 36% casualties
Ostenreich (Green) : over 51% casualties
These are merely examples of what an undisturbed firing line could do to infantry who attempted to traverse that fateful 250 yards without firing back!
Bringing up strong reserves, the Austrians were quickly able to reconstitute their field army and took up a strong position at Kolin. Frederick, still aiming at a quick decision, did not wait to rebuild some of his shattered regiments, grabbed what good regiments he could lay his hands on and attacked -- once more without fire! He attempted too much with too little and suffered the first and most fateful defeat of his entire career.
Another horrendous butcher bill:
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Gren. Bn. Nimschoefsky : 95% casualties (Incl. unwounded prisoners)
Prince Heinrich (No. 35) : 77% casualties
Wied (No. 41) : 59% casualties
Anhalt (Moritz-No. 22) : 82% casualties
Contempt for his adversaries (this would trouble Napoleon as well) had caused Frederick to commit grave errors. There were to be other battles and five more years of war. But the chance for a Blitz had come and gone. From here onward, every battle was do-or-die and any defeat could spell the end of everything. Any ordinary army would have been finished after the bloodletting of Prague and Kolin, but the Prussian infantry had depth.
At Rossbach, Seydlitz gave it a breathing spell, while at Breslau, at the same time, the Austrians threatened to upset everything. What follows is the impossible: At Leuthen, Frederick defeats the most powerful army the Austrians ever fielded. There will be another defeat at Kunersdorf and the bloody victories at Zorndorf, Liegnitz and Torgau. But as the fighting power of the cavalry rises until, by the end of the war, it reaches a peak never again to be equalled by any other. Indeed, the tremendous successes of the Prussian cavalry were to conceal for almost another century the fact that the fusil had already spelled an end to the traditional battle cavalry.
Returning to the first tier of Frederick's infantry, Prague and Kolin produced some interesting shifts in the peckI ing order. Apparently, the princely regiments, the drill machines like the Old Dessauer's No. 3, BrunswickBevern's No. 7 and Moritz von Dessau's No. 22 have a more difficult time in regaining their composure than others which were commanded by men who put more emphasis on leadership than drill. Thus, contrary to popular myth, there is already in Frederick's time the dichotomy of authoritarian versus persuasive leadership.
At any rate, 3, 7 and 22 fall into the second tier, along with 12. Of these, Dessau's No. 3 will again incur Frederick's displeasure at Leuthen and gets into real hot water when he takes away their sword straps and reduces them to a garrison regiment in 1760. This, calamity, however, befalls only two of the regiment's three battalions. Still, the regiment seizes the opportunity and regains its stature at Liegnitz.
Conversely, the heavyweights which are to emerge from the crucibles of these early battles (few took part in both 5 and 18 in neither) were to be Nos. 5-8-13-17-18-23- 24-25-26. These, of course, were joined by the three guard formations, Old Six (only of battalion strength), the erstwhile Giant Grenadiers, 15 (I) the "First Battalion, Guards," and No. 15 (II+III) the"Rigiment Garde".
Spared out at first, Nos. 6 and 15 were eventually used and easily upheld their reputation. At Hochkirch, Old Six was "a wall of fire," that helped many to get away. The First Battalion of the Guards, showpiece and training school of Frederick's army, stepped to the firing line only once. When all around them was breaking up and falling away at Kolin, they became a breakwater. Of 30 officers and just under 800 men, 24 officers (80%) and 499 men (62%+) were lost. And these figures include few unwounded prisoners.
We now come to the second line of regiments which, with addition of No.11 (East Prussian) and 28 (a Silesian transplant), included the bulk of the fusiliers, i.e. F34, F35, F36, F37, F38, F39, F40, F41, F42, F43, F46, F47, and F49.
Of these, F35 took a leading position, no doubt because its colonel, Prince Henry of Prussia, could command good replacements from the royal cantons. It easily maintained its place in the second line of the strike force at Prague, Leuthen, Kunersdorf and Torgau.
Others in this group gradually sank to the third level, i.e. F36 after Maxen; F37, burned out at Zorndorf and lost at Maxen; F38 saw Prague, Breslau, Kunersdorf and Maxen luckless Silesians, they were routed at Breslau, burned up at Kunersdorf, captured at Maxen and never mobilized again after 1760. F39, not able to replace itself after Leuthen; F40 - more cannon fodder for the Russian battles; F43 was a special case: At Breslau, the llnd Battalion ran away, after the first had been captured at Gabel. But they had a surprise in store for Frederick at Kunersdorf, where they fought well. F46 was fine at Leuthen but consigned to the Russian furnace afterward; F47 was not mobilized at first, then burned up at Kunersdorf; F42, on the other hand, were Silesians used only at Prague and Landeshut, where they seemed to have performed well. F34, F35 and F40 maintained their places in the second line and F41 (which was the dubious distinction of belonging to that sMaj. group which got to see both Prague and Kolin) weathered the early storm and survived Kunersdorf (a corset stay for the second line) to appear at Liegnitz and Torgau. Not at all bad for a garrison regiment which had acquired field regiment status only in 1756.
Finally, there was a third tier of regiments: F33, F43, F44, F45, and F48. These were little more than garrison regiments. F33, catholics from Glatz, saw Prague and Landeshut, where they caught Frederick's attention to the effect that "they couldn't compare to the lowliest militia battalion". F44/45 were garrisons which saw action only late in the game, when F44 fought at Freiberg while F45 had become part of the surrender at Maxen. F48 saw no major action at all.
There remains a group of regiments, Nos. 2-4-14-16- 29-31 and 32, all of them musketier regiments which ought to have been placed in the first or second tier. All of these had special problems and some did not place properly mainly because of the use to which Frederick put them.
Of these, No.2 was the best and part of the East Prussian group. Certainly a candidate for the strike force, it shared the replacement problems of all the East Prussian regiments and was destined to become fuel for all four Russian battles, i.e. Gross Jaegersdorf, Zorndorf, Kay and Kunersdorf, thereby assuming second tier status. No. 4, another East Prussian regiment, saw relatively little use, but fought well at Gross Jaegersdorf and had one battalion at Zorndorf. It appeared at Burkersdorf in 1762. No.14 was another East Prussian veteran of all four Russian battles.
No. 16, last of the unfortunate East Prussians, fought all the Russian battles and still joined the main group at Torgau. Thus, in his hour of need, Frederick reached for one of the regiments of the eastern group and, apparently, it delivered.
Dr. Bleckwenn points out that notwithstanding the
king's prejudice against the East Prussian regiments, they
performed well. Had they not, surely, the Russians would
have summarily swept them from the board. In the face of
their recruitment handicap and their continued survival
against substantial odds, there can be little question that
these regiments were of the fibre that composed the first
tier.
No. 32 saw Prague and Kay, but these troops from the heart of catholic Upper Silesia were considered unreliable. Not mobilized in 1760 and 1761, they sat in Schweidnitz, where they were captured when that fortress fell to the Austrians in'61. No.31 is another Silesian which, by numerical order, should have preceeded the above. But I saved it for last, because it broke the mold in which its destiny was to be cast. Weathering Prague, the regiment failed at Breslau and was consigned to the Eastern Theatre of Operations. But the turnaround came at Kunersdorf, where the regiment performed so well that the king took it back with him. Then, as part of the battle group, it took part in the battles of Liegnitz and Torgau.
In the course of the war, several of the garrison regiments became involved in siege operations and all of them, of course, sent replacements to the field army. In the course of events, some of the garrisons became tied even closer to the events in the field. Some were mobilized for the field army and the following took part in major actions: II. Gross Jaegersdorf, Torgau (1st Bn), Freiberg (1st Bn); V. Kay, Kunersdorf; Xl. Gross Jaegersdorf, Landeshut (IVth Bn).
GRENADIER BATTALION ORGANIZATION
Each battalion of infantry included five line companies and one grenadier company. With but three exceptions, all Prussian infantry regiments consisted of two battalions.
The grenadier companies, however, remained with their parent units only during peacetime. When the army was mobilized, the two grenadier companies of each regiment were detached and brigaded with those of another to form independent grenadier battalions of four companies. (Figure gamers and collectors note: these battalions carried no colors!)
The three odd regiments which did not fit the twobattalion scheme disposed of their grenadier companies as follows: Since the "flank-grenadier company" of the first battalion of the kings guards (15 + I) always served at headquarters as the king's personal guard in the field, this left the remaining two battalions (15 + I + III) free to brigade their grenadiers with any of the two battalion regiments. Old Six, the erstwhile Giant Grenadiers, had been reduced to but a single battalion in 1740, the Grenadier Garde (No. 6). Since this too was a grenadier formation, its grenadier company, like that of 15 I, was known as "flank grenadiers". In a manner of speaking they were the grenadiers of the grenadiers. Since the Old Dessauer's regiment (No. 3) had three battalions, their three grenadier companies formed a battalion with the single company from "Six".
When assessing the combat effectiveness of the grenadier battalions, the first order of business is to forget all that was said of their parent regiments. Musketiers, fusiliers, Silesians or East Prussians, the grenadiers seemed to be cut from a common mold -- all top drawer. If a forlorn hope was needed, if the going was uphill without cannon, if a flank was to be secured against cavalry, if a wall of grapeshot was to be breached, one called upon the grenadiers. And if they had a common fault, it was that they would frequently hang in there too long, to the point of self-destruction.
For an officer to be posted to the grenadiers was a double edged proposition: Fast promotion or an early farm. He might just as well hold up a target on the firing range, yet none needed prodding. Since line regiments bore the names of their colonels-in-chief, one had to become at least a major general to achieve such a distinction. The grenadier battalions, however, bore the names of their commanders.
It was a quick way for a major or even a captain to get his name up on the "score board". For the rank and file, the grenadier cap was not so much a badge of priviliged status as it was a distinct liability. In the linear battles, the elites did not stand back to exploit the victory others had prepared. In the linear battle, it was they who went in first!
If any group of grenadiers bears singling out from such a body of heavyweights, then this distinction must belong to the grenadiers culled from the leftovers of the infantry, the garrison regiments, the chaff of the army. In the words of Dr. Bleckwenn, the garrison grenadiers were "the bravest of the brave", who fought with the desperate valour of those who would both prove and defend their social ascendancy to the status of elites.
Since the garrison grenadiers never did garrison service but were detached from their parent units even in peacetime and brigaded into grenadier battalions, these were known as the "standing" grenadier battalions. As the grenadier battalions bore no numbers either, but were known only by the names of their commanders, a listing is appended, based on the composition of their constituent regiments.
For those who are not familiar with the details of Prussian organization, it should be pointed out that the regimental numbers cited above and in the following stemmed from the Old Dessauer's general "date of rank" listing accompanying the Specifications of 1729. It was never in official use during Frederick's time and did not become regulatory until 1806. Thus, the regiment's order of precedence on the muster lists was determined by the rank of their colonels-in-chief, while the orders of battle only show the colonel's names. Relatively modern histories, however, generally append the regimental numbers in parentheses.
In the chart of the grenadier battalions, 4/16, to cite an example, means that the battalion consisted of two companies each, from the 4th and 16th regiments. The Roman numerals refer to the garrison regiments, while NG stands for the New Garrison, an unnumbered regiment.
The frequent amalgamations of the grenadier battalions and the life expectancy of their commanding officers speak a language of their own. Indeed, the fate of the grenadier battalions and of their parent units persent some interesting problems for the probability statistician and game designer.
It seems that with but few exceptions, most of the units with their original manpower were able to accept an inordinately high percentage of casualties. The X-factor, if we may call it that for want of a better name, was very much a question of how these units came away from the experience of a heavy blood letting as was occasioned by the linear battle.
That is to say, how well did the morale hold up after a unit had been forced to accept casualty rates of 25, 50 and even 75%? These are figures which must set a modern statistician's head swimming! Unfortunately, there were as yet no psychologists in the Eighteenth Century, but reading the letters cited in Part I of this essay, one immediately comes away with the impression that these men had fortified themselves against the horror of war with a strong belief in God and the hereafter.
Next, the game designer must keep in mind that the Prussians almost invariably cast themselves into the role of the attacker while the Austrians increasingly took to the high ground and awaited these attacks in improved positions. Indeed, the only time the Austrians or the Russians ever took the tactical offensive was either when they enjoyed a margin of superiority that promised virtually automatic success as did the Austrians at Hochkirch when they caught the Prussians napping.
Rossbach finally proved how dangerous it was to attempt tactical maneuvers against Frederick in the open field. The corollary to be drawn from this is simple: though the firepower of the Prussian infantry has been both talked down or grossly exaggerated, the record, when one keeps the mechanics of the linear in mind, is clear. In victory or in defeat, even while taking upon themselves the disadvantage of a firing line in motion, the punishment dealt and received clearly points up that the Prussians could outshoot any army, bar none!
By what margin will forever remain a moot point -- 5:3 is a commonly quoted ratio, mere numbers based on parade ground statistics. Certainly, once battlefire ensued, with every man firing at will, the cyclic rate of fire must have increased. And if a Prussian firing line was stopped and beaten back, more often than not, it was cannister rather than enemy musketry that did the job.
Taking account of the numerical odds arrayed against Frederick and the uneven fabric of his own infantry -- then truly the "Queen of the Battlefield" -- and its steady depletion, the fate of Prussia, time and again, rested upon the shoulder of but a few thousand musketiers and grenadiers. When seen from this perspective, the derisive remarks made by an Austrian at Leuthen, when he referred to the Prussian advance as the "Potsdamer Wachparade" (this has generally been misinterpreted as the Potsdam Guards Parade. What it really meant was the mounting of the guard detail at Potsdam), acquires a new meaning. Of couse, the officer had also committed a serious error in judgement!
THE ARTIILERY
The field artillery of the 18th Century divided itself into two distinct categories: the position batteries and the battalion guns.
The position batteries, generally light or short twelve pounders, operated form fixed positions, i.e. batteries. When arriving on the battlefield, one sought out a commanding position from whence the big guns could fire for as long and as effectively as possible before becoming masked by their own attacking forces.
Ideally, if the ground was sufficiently hard and flat, one employed the rolling shot. That is to say, one hoped the ball would skip or bounce along. And the lower the elevation of the gun (no more than one or two degrees) the flatter the trajectory of the bounce, causing the ball to touch down four, five or six times, up to a range of 2,000 yards, plus or minus, depending on ground conditions. In this way, relatively little of the arcs described by the bouncing ball would rise above the height of a man and/or horse.
When the heavy guns found the range and acheived an effective angle on the target, they could be devastating, especially if the tactical situation had caused a bunching of the troops. The Russians, for example, cite an occasion where a single cannon ball took down 42 men!! In view of this, it becomes understandable when the Austrians cried "foul" because Frederick had taken a battery of heavy twelves from the bastions of Glogau and brought it onto the battlefield at Leuthen. Their very sound was to inspire terror.
Of course, situation demanding and time permitting, the position batteries could make a move in the course of a battle. This, however, could also remove them from the board if a crisis arose during the move.
Most important to the infantry attack were the battalion guns. Consisting of six pounders for troops of the first line and three pounders for the second -- each battalion had two. These were deployed in pairs in the battalion intervals and about twenty to thirty paces ahead of the line.
Once these guns had been brought into the line, the teams were unhitched and the guns were manhandled forward, all the while staying about twenty yards ahead of the infantry line until the range got down to about a hundred yards or so. By the book, they were to open up with ball at 600 paces while cannister was not to be used at ranges above 300 paces. The reason for this latter limitation was not so much a matter of range as it was one of the spraying pattern, which was found to be an arithmetic progression in which the shot sprayed in a circle of ever increasing diameter at the rate of about 25 feet per hundred paces range, i.e. 50 feet at 200 paces, 75 feet at 300 paces, etc., etc. Here, it must be kept in mind that this spraying did not only take place in the lateral but also in the vertical plane, causing an increasing number of balls to either hit the ground short of the target or fly harmlessly overhead.
As the war progressed, artillery assumed ever increasing importance. Owing to Frederick's habit of taking the offensive, the battalion guns often found it difficult to accompany their infantry all the way in. As the Austrians took to the high ground, the Prussian chances to bring their guns into cannister range diminished. It became a matter of whether or not the defenders would stick to their guns.
At Prague, the Austrian didn't, at Kolin they did. At Torgau, the Prussians failed twice until, in the third attempt, the Austrian gunners lost their nerve and caved in. At Zorndorf, the numerous and excellent Russian artillery wreaked havoc amongst the oncoming Prussian cavalry line during the grand charge. Beginning to rein in, it was the power of Seydlitz' personality which brought it forward again at a galloping charge over an almost unheard of distance of a thousand paces (about two to three hundred paces was normal for the chargehome at the gallop). When this juggernaut came on despite heavy gunfire, the Russian gunners finally lost heart and sought the safety of their infantry line -- in vain. What followed was a bloodbath!
In summation, it can be readily demonstrated that artillery, especially the battalion guns in the course of an infantry attack, constituted a factor of ever increasing importance, as the war went on. At any rate, their support factor bore a direct relationship to casualties sustained and inflicted.
THE CAVALRY
In the crucible of the Seven Years' War, the Prussian
cavalry emerged as the best and most effective battle
cavalry of modern military history. That is not to say that it
didn't experience its own moments of frustration and
defeat. The Austrian cavalry was as good as it was
numerous. Indeed, until the meteoric rise of the Prussian
cavalry, it set the standards of the times. And if the
Prussian cavalry rose to the heights it did, it was primarily
because the Austrians demanded nothing less if they were
to be beaten at all!
The cuirassier, chest protected by a steel plate, was usually deployed in the first line, with the dragoons in the second, hussars to the flanks and the rear. Depending, however, on circumstances, dragoons are, at times, to be found up front as well. The hussars, as light horse barely risen from the ranks of the irregulars, were not expected to function in the line as battle cavalry, But Frederick did not seem to know this. As a result, the king ordered and, in the words of Dr. Bleckwenn, "the hussars obeyed and attacked" anybody before them, including cuirassiers. Austrians, French or Russians, cavalry of whatever denomination, position batteries or whatever, there were none the Prussian hussars would not or did not take to task.
Despite the fondness for the "hollow square", exhibited by so many, it was a formation widely practiced on the drill grounds but virtually unknown on the battlefields of the Seven Years War. Why? Because in view of the fire discipline inherent in 18th Century infantry -- and this includes all of it -- attacking unbroken infantry was considered suicidal! It requires no stretch of the imagination to consider what a salvo of some five hundred muskets, unleashed at 50 paces, could do to an oncoming cavalry line.
Indeed, if the celebrated case of the British 28th Foot (badge on the back of the shako to commemorate a fore and aft defense) had been the norm, half of the Prussiarl grenadier battalions and some of the line as well, would have worn such distinctions. After Hochkirch, they could have even plastered them all over their underwear! Nol Cavalry had no business fooling with infantry unless they could catch it at "sixes and sevens". All the good cavalry commander could do here was to be on the lookout for opportunities and seize upon them when they presented themselves.
The primary reasons for the great successes of the Prussian cavalry must be sought in its pugnacity tnever wait to be attacked but attack first), speed (galloping charges which were much rarer than most romantics believe), resolution (drive-home at all costs), superior tactical mobility (no cavalry could match its capacity to deploy, break off, redeploy and negotiate difficult terrain in masses) and, finally, the extraordinary standards of horsemanship which made all of this possible.
And, lest we forget, that most important ingredient of cavalry success, there was the matter of leadership which could descend from the Olympian heights of a Seydlitz down the private hussar troopers who, on at least one occasion, were known to have rallied and led back into the fray, line cavalry which had been thrown back.
SUMMARY
From the foregoing, it can be readily seen that a game design for the linear battle can contain many more interesting wrinkles than one would generally abstract from the written narratives of battles.
Who will stand and who will attack? Must the going be uphill without the benefit of the battalion guns? Can the direction of the attack be changed and spoil the defenders broth? Can the defender react quickly enough to an unexpected situation? This much even before the gamer can experience that agonizing 200 yard walk through the sMaj. arms fire zone, where incoming and outgoing freight can alter the situation volley by volley, step by step.
Will the cavalry see a chance to intervene in the infantry fight (it did at Hohenfriedberg and Leuthen, to name but two examples)? Can the battalion commander stop his troops from firing and mount a bayonet charge? Will the defender or attacker give in before then? Will the bores of the muskets foul before the decision is reached? Will there be cavalry on hand to exploit the situation? Here, one need not roll the die thirty or more times to gauge the effect of volleys or to reach the point of fouled bores. One may scale this down as desired.
These are but examples of variants which may be introduced into the tactical game. On the operational plane, those who play frequently, may wish to keep a record of their army's condition at the end of a game and use this as a basis for the next.
Parallelling, for example the events leading from Prague to Kolin, die rolls can determine how much time the attacker will be given before he must seek a decision again, to what extent his damaged units can be repaired during the time intervening and how many fresh reserves he may summon. Again, an entire array of divergent possibilities. But that's what makes wargaming different from Parchesi.
The name of the game is for the would-be designer to reread the narratives of Seven Years' War battles already familiar to him. But this time with great attention to the details in the light of what he has (hopefully)learned from this modest effort. He may then reach that point where he can go beyond what happened and develop a sound opinion on why it happened. Then, he will have the ingredients that should go into the making of a good scenario for a war game.
Grenadier Battalions 1756-1763
More Linear Tactics
Response: Letter to Editor (v2n6)
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