The Battle of Liegnitz August 1760 : Seven Years War

For our next venture into the Seven years war we have the Battle of Liegnitz, fought on the 15th August 1760. The battle came after a particularly difficult period for Frederick when he had been defeated at Kunnersdorf and had lost at Landeschutt. The Prussian army by now is only a shadow of its previous glory. The Prussian army of only about 30 000 men int cat and mouse with a much larger Austrian army under Daun. In danger of being trapped Frederick pulled back over the Katzbach River to a more defensive position on a plateau around the town of Hummel. The Austrian  army now sought to catch the Prussians in a pincer movement. louden attacking with his corps from the East and the main Austrian army from the west.

There are plenty of ‘period’ maps of the battle, many of which are quite confusing. Once again I have relied heavily on Frank Chadwicks : Battles of the the Seven Years War

A more upto date plan of the battle. Historically the Austrians bungled the attack and the main Austrian army, shown above here on the left never reached the battlefield and took no part. This allowed the Prussians to focus all their force against Louden’s Corps who attacked during the dark from the East. This felt a rather tough nut for the Austrians so I allowed Lacy’s Corps to arrive and take part in the Battle. They would have a difficult approach across difficult marshy ground but would give the Austrians numerical superiority as they were attacking the high ground.

This translated onto my Battlefield above.

The left wing of Louden’s Corps pushing through Bientowitz

The Left wing of the Prussians on the high ground with artillery on the Red-berg

Looking west towards Liegnitz itself and beyond the river Lacys corps from the main army

Lacy’s Corps

The town Liegnitz which actually didn’t see any fighting as far as I know

The battle then begins with the Austrians on the advance

Louden has a massive amount of infantry to push the frontal assault, but it will be uphill and tough

The first combat is a cavalry skirmish around the town of Rustern where the Prussian prevent the Austrians crossing the river

Argh ! The dice gods are with the Austrians today. Louden’s leading infantry division rolls a double move and is able to move and tremendous speed to the base of the hill, and then they win the fire initiative and before the Prussians can blow them to pieces the Austrians (presumably in the dark) get the first and decisive volley !

Cavalry continue to fight to prevent a crossing at Rustern

To the west Von Zieten is holding the flank and contesting the crossing of the main army

The Prussians hit hard in the first volley charge down the hill to push the Austrians back, but again they are hit by a volley as they go in

Loudens left wing has now advanced through Panten and his Grenadiers are pushing up the hill, they are held back for now

Prussian cavalry are thrown into the defence 

The swirling cavalry melee continues around Rustern

Calamity, whilst the first wave of Austrians have been beaten back, when we totalled  up the carnage more than half the defending Prussian division had been broken as well so they evaporated to the rear…..this as you can see left an alarming gap in Fredericks defences !!!!!

No matter the Prussians are still holding the Red-berg and there may be time to stabilise the line ?

Von Zieten is holding the right

And the Prussians now start to draw infantry from here back across the plateau to fill the gap 

Unfortunately these are the least reliable troops have rolled at the start making their commander a dithering commander ! This delays their movement as although they roll a six they can’t move at the double 😢

The Austrian second wave is now pushing up the flank of the hill, and the Prussian cavalry is struggling to hold the left flank

Things are now desperate for the Prussians and they really have nowhere to go, the Austrians grenadiers drive up the side of the Reh-berg to capture the guns

The Prussians have held the main army back (just) but Zieten’s troops have also had a hard fight

Some of the remaining Prussian Grenadiers are able to retake the Reh-berg

….but there is no way they can hold it

History is overturned and the Austrians have claimed a good victory, the Prussians do have a possible escape route and we judged that many of the Prussian troops on the plateau would probably be able to make their escape. An excellent battle and fun to play, hard fighting across the board. With hindsight perhaps we gave the Austrians the advantage with the early arrival of the main army this didn’t allow Zieten to engage and support Frederick on the plateau as he did historically. It will be fun to play this again in the future and perhaps remove the Austrian main army ?

These SYW battles continue to give entertaining and fun battles, hounds of war works wonderfully well with this scale of battle.

Thanks for checking by 👍 I will post up some more Napoleonic troops soon

Matt