Leuthen Day Anniversary

Wargaming the Battle of Leuthen - March 2010 at the SYWA Convention.

Attack of the Prussian Guard Regiment on Leuthen Church - by Karl Rochling.

Good grief! I almost missed the anniversary of the battle of Leuthen on December 5, 1757. You know the know the battle, the one where Frederick the Great became great by defeating an Austrian army that was at least twice as large as his Prussian army. Combined with his victory over the French and Reichs Armee at Rossbach on November 7, 1757, Frederick wrested the initiative back from his foes and secured his possession of Silesia for at least another campaign season in the year ahead.

Here are a couple links that provide a summaries of the battle and the campaign.

Battle of Leuthen Summary

Leuthen

I have wargamed Leuthen maybe half a dozen times over large 24 feet long tables plus back tables to provide the necessary depth for the forces. It is a long hard slog for the Prussians and they usually get bogged down in the attack on the Austrian clump of troops huddling inside of the town of Leuthen. To game the battle properly, you really need a full 6 to 8 hours of wargaming to reach a conclusion, from my experience.

In fact, I've been so smitten by the battle of Leuthen that I actually had winter terrain built for the battle (by Herb Gundt) and commissioned The Terrain Guy to make special purpose-built winter terrain mats for the game. I have drawn the line though at basing the figures for Winter warfare, i.e. with snowy white bases. I suppose that if someone made 30mm figures of Prussians and Austrians in winter dress, with their lapels buttoned closed, then I would have to strongly consider building duplicate Winter and Summer Austrian and Prussian armies. Hmm, maybe I could talk Frank Hammond into adding winter gear SYW figures to his Minden Miniatures range. LOL!