The king drew bridle in front of the castle at Lissa,49 located back from the main street. Frederick pushed open the door to one of the rooms, and was astounded to find a group of Austrian officers, some engaged in eating, others wounded. Although startled, he put the best face on it and asked the equally astonished Austrians, “Bon joir, Messieurs! Would there be room left?” The enemy could easily have taken him captive, but they did not make an effort to do so. Instead, they led him to a room, and then made off to the bridge to the east, glad to be away from Lissa and the person of the king.
The Croats and the irregulars having been driven away, the noise of the scuffle had reached the main army. Battalions soon came marching up to see what the deal was and if their king was safe. When they found him quite well and by then asleep, they pressed on to the bridge. A steady fire was opened on the opposite end of the structure to make sure that the Austrians did not wreck it. The forward most bluecoat formations bivouacked for the rest of the night in a most contended state of mind.
So Frederick and his little army had accomplished the goal which had been set for it. They had overthrown an army of 65,000 men, well-rested and confident besides, with a bare 32,000 tired and exhausted men. And they had done all of this in less than four hours of daylight. During the night of December 5–6, the remaining Austrian forces streamed across the Schweidnitz towards the Silesian capital on four bridges: at Goldsmeiden; Hermmansdorf; Stabelwitz; and the main one at Lissa, all wooden bridges. The losses suffered in the battle were: Frederick lost approximately 6,259 men killed/wounded (5,118 wounded, 1,141 killed); plus 85 prisoners (taken near Sagschütz); a total loss from all causes of 6,344 men.50
The Austrian losses were much, much higher. Prince Charles lost about 7,000 wounded and about 3,000 killed—exact losses will never be known—for a total of, say, 10,000 men. In addition there were nearly 12,000 prisoners, of whom some 3,000 were also wounded. In equipment, the loss was also great. The number of guns lost, some 116, was bad, but nearly 4,000 wagons loaded with supplies for the Austrian army were also captured by the Prussians. Also lost were 51 regimental standards, plus countless muskets and miscellaneous soldiers’ equipment. Tempelhof estimated the final tally of loss came to approximately 50,446.51
The defeated army was finally halted well behind the Schweidnitz River and took pause. It was well scattered over the countryside and in no shape to rally for the defense of Breslau. The beaten men shivered through the miserably cold night, few of their battalions or regiments were intact, and only the rare commander had even the faintest idea where the majority of his men were. By early the following morning, December 6, Charles and Daun had gathered an army some 48,000 strong at Gräbischen (east of the Lohe); an army still large enough to outnumber Frederick’s. It could still have proven a tough obstacle if its leaders had handled it aright.
Prince de Ligne discovered his leaders at the headquarters in the village in a state of semi-disbelief over their total defeat. Prince Charles and Daun were preparing only to withdraw in the direction of home. Their beaten, demoralized “army” at that point was simply in no shape to defend Silesia without proper guidance. The two leaders had no offensive schemes left just then; they could only slump into “the depths of despondency.”52 One or the other apparently uttered, “I cannot believe this!” When Prince de Ligne discovered the dynamic duo, there was no way to take the open field against the victorious Prussian army.
Chapter Nineteen
Mopping Up After Leuthen
After the Austrian defeat at Leuthen, it was inevitable that the Prussians would undertake to drive the Austrians from the province. At one fell stroke, the successful battles before Breslau, the capture of Schweidnitz, and numerous other inroads into Silesia had been wiped away. All that remained was the mopping up operations by Frederick’s men in clearing as much of Silesia as possible.
First thing in the morning on December 6, the bluecoats crossed the Schweidnitz, capturing some 400 wagons of the Austrian baggage and hundreds of prisoners. The following day, Ziethen, taking 63 squadrons of horse and 111⁄2 battalions of foot, pressed off in pursuit of the retiring foe. A determined enemy stand at the Kleine-Lohe on December 8, threw Ziethen off his tether. Despite the urging of the king, the normally resolute hussar became less energetic. Fouquet, as we have observed, was sent to take over the pursuit, and, by December 23, the last of the Austrian forces were across the Bohemian border.
At Leuthen, the Prussian king had gained the greatest of his great victories. Never before and never again would the Prussian oblique order and line-of-march work with such perfection as it did at Leuthen. And never again would Frederick ever beat his enemy so thoroughly as on that day on that field. He had for a fleeting moment hopes that peace, hurried along by tidings of the near miraculous successes at Rossbach and Leuthen, might now come. Moreover, Leuthen had done more than alter the military scene. It had changed the very thinking of the king’s enemies. Before the battle, they had often referred to him in various unflattering, often demeaning, titles, such as the “Margrave of Brandenburg,” but after Leuthen, he was almost invariably referred to, in both polite and general society, as the “King of Prussia.” Even by his most bitter enemies. The two victories had earned a respectful fear among the king’s foes they would generally keep for the rest of the war, and even for a time after.
For this victory at Leuthen, unlike the singular success of Rossbach, was won against an enemy who were every bit the trained, disciplined soldiers that the bluecoats were. Incidently, most of the foreign elements had melted away by December 5; the royal army at Leuthen was almost entirely Prussian. In addition, never again would the allies after this day face Frederick on a battlefield by choice in the open. There was one other, as yet intangible, factor: Leuthen had transformed the kingdom of Prussia into a great military power in Europe, in the process displacing Austria. And Frederick the Great had become one of the Great Captains of History. As it worked out, “Frederick’s military glory reached its apex,” at Leuthen.1
The Prussian king, as soon as the battle was done, assembled Ziethen, Prince Ferdinand, Wedell, Retzow, and Prince Moritz in his new headquarters, at Lissa, and gave them their orders for the following day. He congratulated his commanders and told them, most correctly as it was to turn out, that Leuthen “will transmit the glory of your names as well as our nation for all posterity.”2 The results of the single victory at Leuthen “enabled his Majesty to recover … all [of Silesia], excepting Schweidnitz, that he had lost during the whole campaign.”3 Even so qualified a critic as Napoleon Bonaparte remarked that the battle was the masterpiece of Frederick’s military career. It is generally acknowledged that the Prussian king was the greatest tactician of modern history.
The Austrians were put in a bad way. There was no way they could hope to retain control of their Silesian capital with their field army vanquished. After spending December 6 giving the main body of his troops a well-deserved breather, the next morning the king took his army and marched upon Breslau, putting it under siege. There would be no walkover, for although the remainder of the Austrian field army had left the vicinity of the Silesian capital, an Austrian garrison of some 17,000 men present in the city, under Lt.-Gen. Sprecher.
The king had sent half of the available cavalry to pursue Charles’s retreating army, now moving homeward, as we have seen. The bluecoats followed the enemy for a number of days, capturing more than 2,000 additional prisoners. But, for the Austrians, it was determined that Breslau had to be defended, not only because of the loss of prestige and the forfeit of central Silesia that its fall would entail, but also because of the immense quantities of stores it held.
Sprecher stuck to his guns, posting placards on gallows and on poles throughout Breslau, which warned that anyone who spoke of surrender to the Prussians would be “instantly hanged.” He had no intention of backing down, at least without a fight.
In the meanwhile, the Prussian king ordered a bombardment to be laid down ag
ainst the city’s walls. Assaults against the discouraged defenders were launched time and again. Sprecher’s men suffered miserably in the bitter winter weather, and their trenches and abatis were on the point of freezing. It was true the Prussians faced the same elements, but they were the besiegers, rather than the besieged. December 14, a magazine, set afire during a heavy bombardment, blew skyward. The Prussians spent that night affecting some badly needed mending on the Great Battery south of Breslau, and doing all they could to bring the effort to an end. Especially in view of the worsening winter weather. Prussian siege lines were being pressed ever closer. December 16, shortly after dawn, the battery opened fire. Within hours it had scored a direct hit. A second magazine blew up, this one taking part of the defender’s lines with it, and killing/wounding some 800 of the defenders.4 During the night of December 17–18, the Austrians attempted to storm out in a sortie, but they were driven back decisively. All the while, the bluecoats continued to build more batteries and construct more siege lines. On December 19, seeing no hope of relief from Prince Charles or Daun anytime soon, and with his men being reduced to extremes, Sprecher surrendered the city to the Prussians.5
The haul of new Austrian prisoners, 17,000, included 13 generals and a grand total of 680 other officers, in addition to 81 guns, 1,024 horses, and abundant stores. On December 26, the Austrian garrison in Liegnitz, learning that Breslau was gone and the Prussians again were masters of the province, marched away homeward with nary a whimper. Thus, at one single stroke, the Prussians had effectively cleared Silesia of the Austrians. Before the year 1757 was over, the king knew he had driven the enemy there away, with one glaring exception: Schweidnitz. There the still astonished foe continued to keep a garrison. Prince Charles reached Königgrätz by Schweidnitz, Landshut, and Soor-Nachod—December 23–24. Only some 37,000 tired, beaten souls emerged with him out of an army of about 65,000 fully equipped and confident men that had marched into Silesia after Bevern. Where were the rest? Either dead, or prisoners-of-war, or deserted, or just plain stragglers. Estimate of total Austrian/allied losses in the Battle of Leuthen and its aftermath were at least 40,000 men, not to mention enormous losses in equipment, supplies, guns, etc.
Prince Charles was not so shocked by the overwhelming defeat that he thought of giving up the supreme command of the Austrian armies. The Prussian follow-up pursuit of the defeated main army ended at the Bohemian frontier, and the whitecoats were left to sort themselves out. Charles had completely miscalculated and handed the Austrian Empire its most complete defeat during the whole era of the Habsburgs. Under these circumstances, he could not remain in his command, even though he was the brother of the emperor.
On two separate occasions, softly-worded communications from the emperor failed to give Prince Charles the “hint” he was expected to relinquish his command post, then a hearing from Maria Theresa on January 16, 1758, left no doubt, and he stepped down.
In retrospect, Prince Charles was not an incompetent military leader. His misfortune was to come up against a leader who had no peers in his time, Frederick the Great. Simultaneously, Nádasti, for no good reason except ill-feeling on the part of Charles’s supporters, was relieved of his duties; a shame since he was the nearest equivalent to a Seydlitz or a Ziethen in the army.6 On the other hand, Prince Charles must have been hard to work with. He had had troubles both with Browne and Daun, as we have seen.
Daun, because of his standing with the Austrian regime—not to mention the single victory against the Prussian king during 1757 at Kolin—was appointed commander of all Austrian armies in the field against Prussia. In contrast, Prince Charles went home to the Netherlands to appear no more on a battlefield. It would be Marshal Daun who was to command the Austrian armies against Prussia for the rest of the war. So perhaps Kolin did accomplish something favorable for Prussia after all.
On the Eastern Front, we left the Russians besieging Memel in June 1757. The works at Memel were certainly formidable in appearance. A ditch of considerable size effectively enclosed the place, completed by five large bastions. On the negative side, the works were in a poor state of repair, and the buildings immediately adjacent to the walls were not well prepared. And the first priority of Frederick was elsewhere, most especially with regard to Brandenburg and the heart of the realm; East Prussia and Memel were low on the totem pole in terms of men and material. Still, events moved forward.
The Russians appeared first at the port entrance on June 28, 1757. Six Russian ships under Admiral Valrunt sailed into the Kurisches Haff. Not far behind were the land forces under Fermor.7 The protracted Russian advance had been good in one respect, they had waited until their preparations were well underway before they made their move.
Valrunt was helped by an English admiral in the Russian employ, Admiral Lewis, who brought 9,000 men from Revel.8 The Russians, under Fermor, were divided into three columns; the first two crossed the Dange River to take post on the other side of Memel, cutting it off from help by Lehwaldt. The Russians began to prepare for a siege, and, about dawn, June 30, their ships opened fire on Memel. Commander Hans Albrecht von Pölenz, the Prussian leader, ordered the wooden structures of Memel’s suburbs burned that very night so the enemy would not be able to shelter behind the buildings. Meanwhile, the Russians started working on the first parallel of the siege works.
July 1, the first of the Russian siege batteries, three five-pound mortars, joined by four of the Russian howitzers, opened to a steady crescendo upon the town.9 The Russian ships joined in on the shelling. A total of almost 300 shells were lobbed at Memel that day. Simultaneously, the second line of Russian siege works were completed, and nearly a thousand more shells were fired into Memel on July 3. Soltikov closed in on the city from the land gradually, from his base at Remelshof. By July 4, the new commandant of Memel was Lieutenant von Rummel. He immediately sent word to Lehwaldt that he needed assistance, while the Russians redoubled their shelling. On July 5, with no hope of succor, Rummel surrendered Memel to Fermor. Russian losses in this endeavor were about 25 men killed/wounded.
At the Northern Front, the situation for the bluecoats had stabilized. Following Apraxsin’s withdrawal from East Prussia, Lehwaldt had marched towards Mecklenburg and Pomerania against the Swedes, leaving only a few battalions in that province to hold it in case the Russians should return. November 22, Lehwaldt’s men got to Stettin to join up with the bluecoats thereabouts. The Prussian force, nearly 25,000 strong, pressed on Demmin and Anklam. A probing force, divided into two separate columns, pressed out upon the Swedes. Major Kahlenburg brought a force of 700 men (500 infantry and 200 hussars) through Massow on Kamenky. Major Kleist took another 500 (400 foot soldiers, and 100 horsemen) towards Wollin.10 Sternberg, on December 3, issued orders to retire towards Stralsund. He was already across the Peene by then. Lehwaldt took his time following in pursuit, and lethargically pressed the enemy into Anklam and Peenemünde. The Swedish deficiency in transport and material really hampered their efforts to keep to any active military operations. On December 26, the Swedes, under General Herrenstein, abandoned Usedom, while a Prussian detachment under General the Prince of Holstein hemmed in their desperate opponents at Demmin. Prussian cavalry reconnoitered the posts held thereabouts, held by elements of the Vastmänlands Infantry and the riders of the Smålands unit. Swedish efforts to block this resulted in an altercation with Holstein’s men (December 27). Although this tussle was essentially a short brawl, Holstein’s men promptly crossed the Trebel, forcing Sternberg to recoil upon Grefswald. This effectively sealed off Demmin. On December 29, the trapped Swedes took free withdrawal, and this force moved towards Stralsund. The soldiers were given the opportunity to march out with their weapons. The Prussian 7th Hussars (Malachowski) then mopped up Swedish posts in the territory just recovered.11 This left the Swedes only in possession of Stralsund on the mainland and immediately near to Peenemünde.
The Swedes abandoned Wollin, Demmin, and the country between Stralsund and Rugen. The water route ha
d frozen, and the Swedish supply ships could not get through. Lehwaldt laid Stralsund under siege, January 1–18, 1758, hoping to force the garrison to surrender before the thaws came. The Prussians pressed home their advantage too slowly, however, and an early warming period gave the Swedes the chance to slip into the bay with provisions, thereby saving their countrymen from certain surrender or starvation. But, as the campaign closed, the Swedes held only Stralsund and a small stretch beyond the fortress, the Peenemünde and Anklam Stretch. The Prussians had occupied the rest of Swedish Pomerania.12 From Stockholm, there was a change in command. Sternberg was replaced on January 7, 1758, by General Gustav Friedrich Graf Rosen. Sternberg’s less than stellar performance during the campaign had been the culprit. Finally, on March 13, 1758, meanwhile, Peenemünde finally fell to the Prussians.
As for Apraxsin, he was severely criticized by the Russian people, for having withdrawn from an enemy province that was by all means conquered. Empress Elizabeth was not pleased with the performance of her commander. She relieved him of his command and had him recalled. One should not be too hasty to judge Apraxsin. Yes, he was afraid of Elizabeth’s death and of the wrath of her successor, Peter, but in retrospect the Russian commissariat appears to have functioned as inefficiently as the French. A council-of-war called before the withdrawal could find no other alternatives. Tuttle hints that the general may have been afraid of an uprising by the Poles in his rear.13 Apraxsin was court-martialed, sold out by Count Bestischef-Riumin, the contemporary Russian Chancellor, but died of natural causes before it could convene. As for Count Bestischef-Riumin, he was discredited and removed from office.14 The minister had steadily lost his influence over the preceding few years, but when a hint of Apraxsin having been ordered to retreat by the count, his political career was effectively at an end. The connection between Apraxsin and the count may largely have been a fabrication, but a scapegoat Apraxsin would become.15
Frederick the Great and the Seven Years' War Page 35
