The Thirty Years War

by C. V. Wedgwood

  The movements of Richelieu completed the other half of the design. He renewed his treaty with the United Provinces,[119] refused to recognize the marriage of Gaston to Margaret of Lorraine and dispatched an army to quell her irrepressible brother, Duke Charles. At Paris, Mademoiselle, the strapping tomboy who was Gaston’s only child, bounced about the Louvre singing all the vulgarest songs she could learn against the Cardinal. At seven years old, she was a licensed rebel.[120]

  But the centre towards which the policies of Bourbon and Hapsburg pointed was still in Germany, where Feuquières continued, carefully and tactfully, to build up Richelieu’s position. In the spring of 1634 the League of Heilbronn met at Frankfort-on-the-Main. In the intervening months since its last gathering certain mild alterations had taken place; superficially the French and Swedish position seemed much as before, but under the surface Oxenstierna had grown weaker, Feuquières stronger.

  Feuquières had the easier task. He had but one object in Germany: to make French protection indispensable. After the formation of the Heilbronn League he set himself to detach the princes and estates one by one from Sweden, exploiting Oxenstierna’s organization but driving the wedge of his insinuations and of his generous bribes[121] neatly between him and his allies. Trust in him grew as trust in Oxenstierna waned.

  The Swedish Chancellor was not to blame for the lessening of confidence among his allies. He had more to do than one man could easily manage, and the task was proving too much even for him. The army was the trouble. So long as Gustavus had lived, that conglomerate of native Swedish and recruited German troops had some sense of unity. But a storm was blowing up before the King died which broke over Oxenstierna.

  There had been four armies in the field after Lützen, under Gustavus Horn, Johan Baner, William of Hesse-Cassel and Bernard of Saxe-Weimar. Of these commanders the first two were Swedish marshals, incontrovertibly under the authority of the Swedish government; the third was, except for John George, the only truly independent ally that the King had made, a prince whose small but well-managed forces were treated consistently as an independent, self-reliant unit. The fourth commander, Bernard of Saxe-Weimar, was the difficulty.

  This prince was in the same position as Horn or Baner, that of a general under the Swedish Crown.[122] But he had had the impertinence to state that the King was jealous of him, and had clamoured for an independent command even before Lützen;[123] after the battle, which his own dexterity had done much to win, his presence on the scene of action and his admitted ability made him the only man fit to follow the King.

  Bernard’s character has never been altogether elucidated, and neither his writings nor his actions reveal a sympathetic personality. His harsh virtues one would not deny; ‘imperare sibi maximum imperium est’, he wrote platitudinously in the autograph book of a Saxon worthy,[124] and he was, it is true, self-commanding, temperate, chaste, brave, devout in the practice of his religion. But the face which looks out from contemporary engravings is not prepossessing, with its low forehead, hard, unimaginative eyes and mean, egoistic mouth. His elder brother was that William of Weimar who had attempted to form a Union of Patriots in 1622 and had been taken prisoner at Stadtlohn.[125] This pessimistic, gentle, courteous prince[126] also held a command in the Swedish army, but Bernard brutally pushed him out of his way. An ambitious man, conscious of his nation and of his princely rank, Bernard found Swedish, or indeed any, control galling. On this account a case has been made out for him as a single-minded patriot. The single-mindedness was there, certainly; of the patriotism there is less evidence. ‘An excellent commander,’ wrote Richelieu, ‘but so much for himself that no one could make sure of him.’[127]

  The other claimant to command over the two armies was Gustavus Horn. During the King’s life, Horn and Oxenstierna had been called his two arms,[128] and the simile was not undeserved, for the marshal was, in his own profession, as reliable and capable as the Chancellor. Horn’s commander-in-chief would certainly have pleased Oxenstierna best, for he was the marshal’s father-in-law and they had worked together amicably for many years. Bernard, however, was determined that this should not be; he was reported to have said that a German prince was worth ten Swedish noblemen, and if he might not be above Horn, he would at least be equal and independent. When the two commanders had met on the frontiers of Bavaria in the previous summer, Bernard had arrogantly demanded the title generalissimus, while Horn, with less arrogance but as much obstinacy, had offered him that of lieutenant-general only.[129] There was, in point of fact, a serious difference both in their political and strategic outlook. Horn, the more constructive if technically the less brilliant soldier, was for concentrating on the head of the Rhine valley and there building up a bulwark against the joint Spanish and Austrian powers. Bernard had more directly personal interests in the war;[130] suddenly in the summer of 1633 he demanded the duchy of Franconia. This move may be interpreted variously; Bernard may have been anxious for a reward as Mansfeld had been; or he may have believed that by seizing land, even under Swedish control, he would be able to assert the interests of the native Germans against the invaders and rescue some at least of the Fatherland. To pacify him, Axel Oxenstierna drew him a patent creating him Duke of Franconia under the Swedish Crown,[131] and partly solved the military problem by agreeing to a free alliance with the new Duke, on the model of that recently renewed with William of Hesse-Cassel.[132]

  This land of ill-feeling did not reassure Oxenstierna’s allies, and moreover it provided the opportunity for which Feuquières was watching; as early as April 1633 he had attempted to detach the ambitious Bernard from the Swedes and bind him to France.[133] Further cause for anxiety was given by the actual behaviour of the troops. French subsidies were not paid fast enough, and Oxenstierna’s system of distribution broke down badly even before the King’s death; afterwards the situation grew steadily worse, culminating in active unrest among both officers and men, and at last in mutiny. The rising was stilled by the partial satisfaction of the demand for pay and by the reckless gift of German estates to the more querulous officers.[134] The danger was past for the moment, but it was not obviated; Oxenstierna realized that he had now both to preserve the peace between his two leading generals, and to keep the soldiers contented if the war was to be fought at all; in so far as he calmed the officers with morsels of Germany, he would provoke the annoyance of his German allies in the Heilbronn League. ‘J’ai peur’, wrote a Dutch politician in April 1634, ‘qu’enfin tout ne s’éclate contre les Suédois.’[135]

  When the representatives met at Frankfort in the spring of 1634, they treated Oxenstierna’s propositions, especially when he spoke of indemnification for Sweden, with open suspicion.[136] This was distressing, particularly as the Chancellor had approached two more divisions of the Empire, the Lower and the Upper Saxon Circles, to join the League,[137] and naturally did not wish to reveal to their ambassadors any discontent among those who were already his allies. An attempt to persuade John George to join the allies ended only in a letter from the Elector warning all honest Germans against specious foreign allies,[138] a statement which cut too dangerously near the bone for Oxenstierna’s liking.

  Into this uncomfortable situation Feuquières slyly interjected a new proposal of French help. His King was prepared to support the Protestant Cause with money and diplomacy, far more money than the Swedish Crown could give, in return for a very small guarantee. He demanded only the control of the fortress of Philippsburg on the Rhine for the duration of the war.[139] On the right bank of the river, in the lands of the Bishop of Speier and near the junction of the Rhine and Saal, Philippsburg had surrendered to the Swedes early in the year; it was thus technically under the Heilbronn League, and should they decide to hand it over to the French government, Oxenstierna could hardly disagree without precipitating a breach. Such a concession would indicate the definite turning of the balance in favour of Richelieu as protector of German rights.

  The proposition was made in July 1634. M
eanwhile, in south Germany along the line of the Danube, the armies were once more active. The ravages of the plague and famine[140] hindered the troops of Bernard from carrying out any project until the summer was already advanced. The Cardinal-Infant with twenty thousand men was on his way from Italy; to intercept him Horn besieged the fortress of Uberlingen, which guards the southern shore of Constance, along which the Spaniards would march; the town held him up for a month before he at length, very much against his will, agreed to join with Bernard[141] in an attempt to shatter the King of Hungary and his army before the Spanish reinforcements could come.

  Arnim, acting theoretically in conjunction with a Swedish detachment under Baner, with whom his relations grew daily more embittered and suspicious,[142] had once more invaded Bohemia. This was the occasion, therefore, for Horn and Bernard to fall on the inexperienced King of Hungary and the incompetent Gallas while they were uncertain whether to defend Prague or to march towards the Cardinal-Infant.

  On July 12th 1634, Bernard and Horn met at Augsburg, having about twenty thousand men between them,[143] and marched thence for the Bavarian-Bohemian border. They had information that the King of Hungary was advancing on Regensburg, and they thought that by appearing to join Arnim in Bohemia they would induce him to turn back. On July 22nd they stormed and took Landshut which was occupied by almost all the Bavarian and some of the imperialist cavalry. Aldringer, hastening to the rescue, came too late to organize the resistance and was himself shot, some said by his own men, in the ill-managed retreat.[144] This victory was spectacular enough and, almost at the same moment, Arnim appeared outside the walls of Prague.

  The King of Hungary, with unshaken nerve, held on his original course. Horn and Bernard had hardly taken Landshut before they lost Regensburg.[145] Far from hastening back to defend Bohemia, young Ferdinand had profited by the absence of the larger part of the Protestant army to attack their line of communication on the Danube. It was a risk to expose Bohemia so utterly, but he calculated rightly, for no sooner did Regensburg fall than Bernard and Horn swung round and marched after him, while Arnim at once thought it better to withdraw from Prague and await developments.

  The fall of Regensburg was unwelcome to Oxenstierna at Frankfort; still more unwelcome were the messages that came through from Horn and Bernard during the next three weeks. Ferdinand was outmarching them in the race to meet the Cardinal-Infant, and neither Horn nor Saxe-Weimar could force their pestilence-ridden and ill-furnished troops to make the necessary effort to circumvent the imperial army before the Cardinal should come. On August 16th Ferdinand crossed the Danube at Donauwörth; the Cardinal-Infant was approaching from the Black Forest. It would be only a matter of days until they met. But at Nördlingen, not far from Donauwörth, a strong Swedish garrison lay encamped, and Ferdinand dared not risk a flank attack on his march. He was still some days ahead of Horn and Saxe-Weimar, and turning aside he set himself to reduce the city.

  Meanwhile at Frankfort the Heilbronn League was a prey to growing anxiety, which Feuquières was ready enough to fan.[146] Oxenstierna’s efforts to reassure his allies were useless, and on hearing that Ferdinand of Hungary had taken Donauwörth, the German representatives agreed to buy Richelieu’s support by the preliminary cession of Philippsburg.[147] The articles, which marked the first diplomatic triumph of Feuquières, were signed on August 26th 1634, about the time when the armies of Horn and Saxe-Weimar, hastening on, came in sight of the King of Hungary’s encampment among the wooded hills round Nördlingen.

  Horn and Bernard had about twenty thousand men,[148] the King of Hungary about fifteen thousand, and the surrounding country could ill-furnish even one army with supplies. Bernard hoped at first that hunger would force the enemy to retreat without fighting.[149] Both he and Horn, in agreement for once, knew that the town could not be relieved without risking an engagement on singularly difficult and broken ground, and with barely equal numbers.[150] When it became apparent that Ferdinand intended to wait for the coming of the Cardinal-Infant, they sent for all the scattered troops which they could summon, in the hope that they would force the King of Hungary to retreat before the Spaniards came. Their hope was not realized, for the new troops were so weak, few, and dispirited that the King of Hungary did not budge.

  Meanwhile the colonel of the garrison at Nördlingen with difficulty prevented the burghers from forcing a surrender. They had, not unnaturally, no desire to share the fate of Magdeburg. Horn contrived to send them messages exhorting them to hold out for six days, and yet another six days, but night after night he could see rockets of distress against the darkened sky, and hear through the day the intermittent thunder of the King of Hungary’s cannon bombarding the walls. Once, when a long silence intervened, he was convinced that the town had surrendered.[151]

  Among the imperialists there was joyful news of the Cardinal’s approach, and on September 2nd the King of Hungary himself went out to meet him. The cousins came together a few miles from Donauwörth and, each dismounting as he saw the other, almost ran into each other’s arms.[152] After the long-distance planning of their scheme, it was almost too good to be true that the cousins should be as firm friends in practice as they had long been in theory, but so it was, and the generals who had been set to control them gave way before their combined obstinacy.

  On both sides things now moved towards an issue. Horn was anxious to avoid a battle until further reinforcements came, so that the inequality of numbers should be lessened, but both he and Bernard knew that the fall of Nördlingen, coming so soon after the rapid surrender of Regensburg and Donauwörth, would shake the confidence of their German allies, and go far to shatter the Heilbronn League. The political risk of retirement at this eleventh hour was greater than the military risk of staying.[153]

  The country south of Nördlingen, with its smooth, rounded hills and thickly scattered woods, was unsuited to the type of pitched battle beloved of the seventeenth-century tactician. The imperial and Spanish troops occupied the flatter ground in front of the town itself, and had placed an advance guard on the ridge of a hill which dominated the road to the town. The Swedish army lay on a farther low range of hills, about a mile to the south-west. Should they attempt to relieve the town, they would have to march down into the valley and pass under the menacing outposts of the enemy.

  Rashly impulsive, the Cardinal-Infant sent forward some of his musketeers to occupy a small wood on the very fringe of the hill, in the direct path of the enemy’s possible advance. The force was too small, and on the evening of September 5th Bernard’s troops drove it out and occupied the outpost, thus gaining an important point on the road into the town. The major in command had surrendered and was at once taken before Bernard, whom he found at supper in his coach, apparently in very bad humour. When asked the number of the Spanish reinforcement, the prisoner gave an answer approximating to the truth—about twenty thousand. Bernard swore at him; he had information, he said, that there were not more than seven thousand, and unless the prisoner told the truth he would hang him out of hand. The major stuck to his story and Bernard angrily ordered him away. Horn, who was with him in the coach, said little, but it is clear from Bernard’s annoyance, and from the hasty removal of the prisoner, that Horn’s decision to fight was still uncertain and liable to be shaken if Bernard’s optimistic under-estimate of the Spanish forces proved false.[154]

  Meanwhile, not far off, at the imperialist headquarters they were holding a council of war. Gallas openly blamed the Cardinal-Infant for having put too few soldiers in the wood, but the prince quelled him with the unoriginal but comforting statement that what was done could not be undone; for the rest, the two cousins planned the action for the following day with little reference to their elders.[155] They arranged that the forces on the hill should be strengthened so as to be ready for the probable attack of the enemy. The main body of the army was to be massed in the open country before the town, the Germans in front, the Spanish troops behind to reinforce the line where necessar
y and to beat off any sally from the town itself. The weary garrison of Nördlingen was so small that there was little danger of an effective rear attack. The two princes had thirty-three thousand men—about twenty thousand foot, including the highly trained and disciplined Spanish infantry, and thirteen thousand horse.[156]

  In spite of his continued disbelief, Bernard was outnumbered. The united Protestant troops amounted to little more than sixteen thousand foot and nine thousand horse, all suffering from lack of supplies. Yet it was essential to relieve Nördlingen. Consulting together, Horn and Bernard concluded that if they could once dislodge the enemy from the outpost on the hill and occupy it themselves, Ferdinand’s position before the town would be untenable and he would have to withdraw. They planned therefore to manoeuvre for this position, if possible without provoking a general engagement. Horn on the right wing was to advance by night to the very slopes of the hill and attack it at daybreak. Bernard, on the left, was to follow the valley road into the open plain, draw up his troops before the enemy lines and prevent them by his threatening aspect from reinforcing their fellows on the ridge. The two generals were to work in conjunction, although their spheres of action would be far apart; but they did not allow for the intervening belts of woodland, still in full leaf, which on the morrow prevented each from seeing clearly what the other did. The jealousy between them augured very ill for the conduct of a joint attack, and though in fact neither betrayed the other on the following day, each blamed the other afterwards.