Hohenfriedberg - OOB MkII

Right, since my last post on the matter I've managed to scrutinise the German General Staff map* and having obtained a copy of Duffy's the Army of Frederick the Great, I've cobbled together an order of battle based on the maps; and converted that to 'brigades' for Twilight of the Soldier Kings ('TOSK'). And I'm actually content with it. Finally.

The German General Staff map names all the regiments (of all three armies). I was able to cross-reference these against the army lists in the Army of Frederick the Great and the Army of Maria Theresa, to confirm which cavalry units were which type (cuirassier, dragoon, chevauxleger, hussar). The infantry was more straightforward to determine which were combined grenadier battalions/guard and which were ordinary musketeer/fusiliers.

The southern half of the battlefield. These maps really are beautiful.

If you want to cut to the chase and avoid the waffle you can jump straight to the table below.

* admittedly this is a secondary source, produced 140 years after the event.

A note on names/language.

The town of Striegau (top right in the above map) was the point around which the Prussians orbited on their way to confront the enemy. The Saxons referred to the battle as Striegau and not Hohenfriedberg, which is off to the south west on the map below.

The region this was in, Silesia**, is now mostly in Poland. At the time it was a newly-acquired part of the Prussian state, passing via the German Empire into Polish control after WWI, and then again after WWII. Consequently Hohenfriedberg became Dobromierz and Striegau, Strzecom.

** Schlesien in German; Śląsk in Polish; Schläsing in Lower Silesian; Ślōnsk in Silesian.

Before becoming Prussian, it was part of the Habsburg realm. Before that it was part of the Kingdom of Poland. It seems like it's gone full circle.

Throughout I've used the German names, simply because they're the ones I'm more familiar with, and easier for me to say. Or rather, I probably pronounce them less incorrectly than I would the Polish names. Whilst in this period large numbers of inhabitants of Silesia spoke Lower Silesian (a German dialect), many spoke Silesian (a west Slavic language). What they called the towns and villages, I have no idea - NOT necessarily the same as the modern Polish names. 

First some caveats.

(1) The number of Prussian squadrons. 

I've assumed all cuirassier and dragoon regiments were at their complement of 5 squadrons apiece. Except the Garde du Corps (CR13) which I believe had only 1 squadron at this point, and it certainly looks that way on the map.

The hussars are not so straightforward. The size of the blocks on the map are the same size as the heavy cavalry. I've therefore assumed 5 squadrons apiece, except for Ziethen's regiment (HR2) which looks like it had the full complement of 10.

(2) The number of Austrian squadrons.

I've assumed all dragoons and cuirassiers were at 6 squadrons each. Hussars are not shown on any map. They don't appear to have been expected to take part in the main cavalry action in that period. Duffy says there were about 2,500 hussars and 'Croats' (i.e. Grenzers/light infantry) so I've assumed a 50:50 split. This equates to one 'brigade' of hussars in TOSK.

(3) 'Croats'

I've assumed 1/2 of the above mentioned light troops were 2 or 3 battalions, and converted this into 1 'brigade'. They'll sit somewhere in the centre, at the back with the Austrian hussars.

(4) Saxons

I can make out most of the names of the cavalry regiments and cross-reference these against Pagan apart from 3 names in the main line and two 'blocks' off to the left of the line. Pagan states that there were 4 squadrons of Karabiniersgarde, 12 of cuirassiers, 4 of chevauxlegers, 4 of dragoons and 22 companies of uhlans. 

Apart from the Karabiniere most heavies were on a strength of 2 squadrons. The units I couldn't make out could therefore be 1 regiment of cuirassiers and 2 of dragoons. The second line of the detached block looks like it could be '5 pulks uhlans', a pulk being a Polish*** for a regiment. On the basis of this I've allocated the Saxons 2 brigades of cuirassiers, 1 of dragoons****, and 1 of uhlans.

For the infantry I've allocated 4 line brigades for the 18 battalions (with 1 being large), and 1 for the 18 companies of grenadiers.

*** the Elector of Saxony at the time of Hohenfriedberg was also King of Poland. This put him on the same level as the other Elector-King, Fredrick II, which probably irked Old Fritz no end.

**** The Chevauxlégers don't seem to have worn the cuirass and the troopers were referred to as 'dragoons', so I've assumed they're the same tactically.

General notes (not notes for Generals).

For the Prussians and Austrians I've allocated 1 brigade per 2 regiments of cavalry/10 or 12 squadrons, or 4 battalions of infantry. It doesn't always work out neatly in terms of which wing they were in so there's a certain amount of fudging. TOSK allows for normal, large and small brigades in any case. 

Where there are different types of horse or foot interlaced (e.g. a dragoon unit between cuirassiers) I've moved them around to 'neaten' things up. In TOSK you can have mixed quality units, where you dice on first contact to determine which prevails, but I like to keep it simple for solo play. I've been more generous with the Saxons giving them a brigade for every 8 squadrons of heavies.

The General Staff map clearly marks each of the infantry unit blocks (is there a special term for these?) with those little sticks, one for each battalion. Thus it is easy to see which of the Austrian regiments has 2 and which has 3 battalions. For the Prussians incidentally only the regiment of Alt-Anhalt (IR3) had 3 battalions at Hohenfriedberg, and the Grenadier Garde (IR6, or Potsdam Grenadiers) had just the one. The Garde (IR15) are shown as having 2 of the 3 battalions present. All the rest of the Prussian infantry were on an establishment of 2 battalions.

Brigades for Twilight of the Soldier Kings.

Surprisingly the opponents were evenly matched in terms of numbers of men and units. 136 squadrons Prussians (more than Duffy but not as many as Chandler) versus 125 Austro-Saxons (counting an Uhlan company as 1/2 a squadron). The infantry faces off at 69 Prussian battalions against 71 Austro-Saxon battalions.

The Prussians have a slight edge in cavalry numbers, but the Allies have more cuirassiers. The Prussians have a distinct qualitative edge in infantry, and more heavy guns. Light pieces are not classed as game pieces in TOSK.

	Total Brigades
	Prussians	Austro-Saxons
Cuirassiers	5	7
Dragoons	5	3
Hussars	3	1
Uhlans	0	1
Garde/Grenadiers	5	2
Musketeers	12	15
Croats	0	1
Heavy Guns	3	2
	33	32

In terms of the overall numbers of men engaged, this seems bout right. The Prussians had more cavalry and the Allies had more infantry. Fuller detail is shown below, including the split between the different wings.

I need to allocate subordinate commanders to each army.

Next Step

Next on the agenda is to work out a way of creating a game that reflects the semi-encounter nature of the battle. The whole field can be contained within an area of 3 miles by 4, or about 108 x 132 centimetres, if I use the German General Staff map.

Maybe I should just go with this layout

The full OOBs.

The regimental designations were only given much later after the war, and contemporaries used the Inhaber's name (i.e. the Colonel-Proprietor). 'Bde' refers to Twilight of the Soldier Kings game units.

	Desig	Sq	Bn	Cav. Bde	Inf Bde	Artillery Bde	Remarks
Prussian OOB
Right Wing
Natzmer	HR4	5		1			Large
Reusch	HR5	5
Suldan	HR6	5
Garde du Corps	CR13	1		1			1 small elite
Gensd’armes	CR10	5
Buddenbrock	CR1	5		1
Prinz v.Preussen	CR2	5
Leib-Karabinier	CR11	5		1
Kyau	CR12	5
Möllendorf	DR6	10		1
Possadowsky	DR1	5		1
Wurttemburg	DR2	5
Grenadiers			12		3
Holstein-Beck	11		2		1
La Motte	17		2
Alt-Anhalt	3		3		1
Prinz Moritz	22		2		1
Hesse-Darmstadt	12		2
Hautcharmoy	28		2		1
Polenz	4?		2
Kalckstein	25		2		1
Lehwald	14		2
Artillery						2
Centre
Alt-Wurttemburg	DR11	5		1
Nassau	DR12	5
Bronikowski	HR1	5		1
Hallasz	HR7	5
Truchess	13		2		1
Markgraf Karl	19		2
Garde	15		2		1		Small
Grenadier Garde	6		1
Hacke	1		2		1
Blanckensee	23		2
Bevern	7		2		1
Schlichting	2		2
Dohna	4?		2		1
Alt-Schwerin	24		2
Du Moulin	37		2				Fusilier
Borcke	29		2		1
Jeetze	30		2
Bredow	21		2		1
Hertzberg	20		2
Bonin	5		2		1
Anhalt-Zerbst	8		2
Grenadiers			5		1
Artillery						1
Left Wing
DR5	DR5	10		1			Bayreuth
CR8	CR8	5		1
CR9	CR9	5
CR4	CR4	5		1			Large
CR5	CR5	5
CR7	CR7	5
DR3	DR3	5		1
DR4	DR4	5
HR2	HR2	10		1
Prussian Totals		136	69	13	17	3
Austrian OOB
Right Wing
Hohenembs	CR4	6		1
K.St Ignon	CR22	6
J.Pálffy	C27	6		1
Diemar	C33	6
Bernes	C21	6		1
F.St.Ignon	C12	6
Liechtenstein	D6	6		1
Preysing	Dii	6
Wurttemburg	D38	6		1			Large
Philipert	D37	6
Althann	D1	6
Centre
1st line
Franz Lothringen	IR1		3		5
Alt-Königsegg	IR54		3
Hessen-Kassel	IR37		3
Thüngen	IR57		3
Grünne	IR26		3
Maschall	IR18		2
Baden-Baden	IR23		3
2nd line
Karl Lotharingen	IR3		3		3		1 large
Harrach	IR47		2
Neipperg	IR7		2
Leopold Daun	IR59		3
Kollowrat	IR17		3
Hussars	HR24			1
Croats	?		3		1
Artillery						2
Left Wing
Grenadiers	N/A		4		1		16 companies
1st line
Vettes	IR34		3		3
Botta	IR12		3
2nd line
Gyulai	IR51		4
Browne	IR36		2
Cavalry
Birkenfeld	CR23	6		1
Czernin	CRiii	6
Lucchesi	CRii	6		1
K.Pálffy	CR8	6
Saxon OOB
Infantry			18		4		Inferior, 1 large
Grenadiers			1		1		18 companies. Standard/trained
Cavalry
Königlicher Prinz	CR2	2		2
Maffei	CR3	2
Garde Karabinier	GC	4
O’Bryan	CR5	2
Gersdorff	CR8	2
Haudring	CR4	2
?	CR?	2
?	DR	4		1
?	CLR	4
Uhlans		11		1			22 companies (Fahnen)
Allied Totals		125	71	12	18	2