70 THE SILESIAN WARS, 1740-5
the march with sword in hand. (Henckel von Donnersmarck,
1858, I, parti, 127-8)Frederick directed the cavaliy around to the north side of the
mound, where they were to clear away the enemy squadrons and
thereby open the way for the direct infantry assault. The Gens
d'armes (C 10; see Map 5, p. 344) and the Buddenbrock Cuirassiers
(C 1) formed the first line of attack, and three further regiments and
the squadron of Garde du Corps moved up in support.
The wheel around to the right of the Graner-Koppe took the
Prussian cavalry out of the arc of fire of the allied guns, but it swept
the squadrons into a steep little valley which, almost certainly
unknown to Frederick, guarded the access to the mound from the
north. Only a tight discipline could have prevented the Prussians
from piling together in disorder at the bottom, and only powerful and
well-fed mounts could have carried them up the further slope. Horse-
men ever since have wondered how the thing was done.
The forty-five squadrons of the allied left failed to seize their
opportunity, and they met the Prussians at a stand with carbine and
pistol fire. In the confused fighting which followed, the twenty-six
Prussian squadrons maintained enough momentum to push most of
the enemy horse back into the woods, but the Austrian infantry, now
that their front was unmasked, were at last able to open fire, and the
attack broke up into a multitude of smaller combats.
By this time the Graner-Koppe was coming under frontal assault
from the right wing of the Prussian infantiy. The first line was made
up of some of the best troops the army had to offer, comprising three
battalions of grenadiers, and three more of the large regiment of
Anhalt (3) - a body which had been formed under the eye of the Old
Dessauer. These troops were set the task of marching across six
hundred paces of open ground to the muzzles of the Austrian guns -
'never have We undergone a more terrible cannonade' (PC 2002). The
casualties among all ranks were dreadful. The young Prince Albrecht
of Brunswick, brother of the queen, was struck dead in front of the
grenadiers, and the battalion of Wedel (15/18), already badly hit in
1744, now lost three-quarters of its effectives. The advance was
finally turned back 150 paces short of its objective by five companies
of Austrian grenadiers, who surged from the Graner-Koppe crying 'Es
lebe Maria Theresa!'
Frederick now committed the five battalions of his second line,
and the issue of the day hung upon the Geist Grenadiers (13/37) and
two regiments of musketeers - the Blanckensee regiment (23) from
Berlin, and the Pomeranians of La Motte (17). These last people came
from around Coslin, and Frederick regarded them as Low Germans of