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Schematic plan · English Civil War

Battle of Marston Moor

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A schematic plan, generated from the statistics of the CAA Database of Battles: the armies' size and width, the hours of fighting, the plan of attack and the outcome are as recorded; the ground and the positions are not.
Rolling, Mixed groundCentreHorseHorseLeft wingRight wingReserveCentreHorseHorseLeft wingRight wingReserveGunsGuns0500 m1 kmN

Royalist (Eng Parl Army, 27,000 men under Manchester) attacked Royalist (Eng Roy Army, 17,500 men under Rupert) in England. The CAA Database of Battles records 3 hours of fighting on a front of 2.8 km, a frontal attack against hasty defense, and that Royalist won. Losses: Royalist 1,500 (6%), Royalist 6,000 (34%).

This plan is generated from those figures. It shows the shape of the battle the database describes: the size and width of the armies, the plan of attack and the outcome. It does not show where the units actually stood.

The armies

Royalist

Manchester

UnitArmMen
Royalist left wingInfantry4,230
Royalist centreInfantry5,640
Royalist right wingInfantry4,230
Royalist reserveInfantry3,525
Royalist cavalry of the leftCavalry4,500
Royalist cavalry of the rightCavalry4,500
Royalist artillery (25 guns)Artillery375
ManchesterCommander—
In this plan27,000

Royalist

Rupert

UnitArmMen
Royalist left wingInfantry2,582
Royalist centreInfantry3,443
Royalist right wingInfantry2,582
Royalist reserveInfantry2,152
Royalist cavalry of the leftCavalry3,250
Royalist cavalry of the rightCavalry3,250
Royalist artillery (16 guns)Artillery240
RupertCommander—
In this plan17,499

What the sources report

Royalist (attacker)Royalist (defender)
Strength, this plan27,00017,500
Losses, this plan1,5006,000

In the CAA Database of Battles

CDB90 no. 21, “Marston Moor”, compiled for the US Army to study what decides battles. These are the figures a what-if engine can be calibrated against.

Fighting
3 hours
Winner
the attacker
Terrain
Rolling, Mixed
Weather
Wet, Heavy precipitation, Temperate, Summer, Temperate
Defender’s posture
Hasty defense
Front width
2.8 km (attacker), 2.8 km (defender)
ForceStrengthLossesHorseGunsPlan and outcome
Royalistattacker27,0001,5009,00025Frontal attack; Breakthrough; Pursued
Royalistdefender17,5006,0006,50016Defensive/offensive plan; Frontal attack; Penetration; Repulse; Withdrew with heavy losses

Attacker’s advantages leadership +1

CDB90 (US Army Concepts Analysis Agency, 1990), tidy edition by Jeffrey B. Arnold; data under ODC-BY 1.0.

Notes

On this reconstruction

Generated automatically from the statistics in CDB90. Frontages, depths, distances, the order of events and the terrain are schematic: they follow the recorded strengths, front widths, hours of fighting, tactical plan and outcome, not maps or accounts of the battle. The sources give no hours; the timing is conjectural.

Sources

Facts gathered from Wikidata (CC0), Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0) and Wikimedia Commons (licence per file); the plan and its text are timeastra’s own.