Russian officers desperately ordered their soldiers into neat ranks, but with more than ten thousand men in chaos under relentless cannon fire, restoring order quickly was impossible.
The Russian soldiers at the front traded shots with the Persians through sheer courage. Soon, though, thousands of Turkmen Cavalry swept past both flanks, bowstrings thrumming as densely as cicadas on a summer day. The cold weapons the Russians had looked down on now reaped lives no less efficiently than Flintlock Guns. In under twenty minutes, the Russian infantry began retreating along the entire line.
Gazmanov reluctantly abandoned the Cossack Cavalry and doubled back to organize a rearguard. But under repeated attacks by Persian horsemen, he could not form an effective defensive line. When the Russians fell back to the two earlier bastions, another band of Persian light cavalry charged in from the north and blocked the passage, less than two kilometers wide.
Zubov, still waiting at headquarters for news of a great victory, received a messenger pleading for help instead.
When he learned that the Persians had European-style heavy artillery and that the Gazmanov Legion was nearly surrounded by a Persian force three times its size, he was so shocked he lost his head.
In the end, he left Strakhovsky with five thousand soldiers to support Gazmanov, while he withdrew to Tabriz under cover of the main force in the center.
Abbas Mirza, however, had little standing in the army. Since this Persian force had also been hastily assembled, its command was woefully inefficient.
Even by dusk, the Persian Army had failed to break the Gazmanov Legion completely.
At dawn the next day, Strakhovsky fought desperately to open a passage between the two bastions, allowing Gazmanov's men to escape. Only after retreating nearly a hundred kilometers to the vicinity of Miyaneh did