Part 490

During 1706, little was attempted on either side by the forces which watched each other along the Rhine. In 1707 Villars, the French commander, obtained liberty to act. "The Emperor, greatly preoccupied with Hungary, had furnished but indifferent resources to the new general of the army of the Rhine, Brandenburg-Baireuth; the German army was ill paid and in bad condition in its immense lines on the right bank, which extended along the Rhine from Philippsburg as far as Stolhofen, then, in a square, from Stolhofen to the Black Mountains by Bühl. May 22, the lines were attacked simultaneously at four points. … The success was complete; the enemy fled into the mountains, abandoning artillery, baggage, and munitions, and did not stop till beyond the Neckar. The lines were razed; Swabia and a part of Franconia were put under contribution. Villars marched on Stuttgart, crossed the Neckar, and subjected the whole country to ransom as far as the Danube. The enemies in vain rallied and reinforced themselves with tardy contingents of the Empire; they could not prevent Villars from laying under contribution the Lower Neckar, then the country between the Danube and Lake Constance, and from maintaining himself beyond the Rhine till he went into winter-quarters. French parties scoured the country as conquerors as far as the fatal field of Hochstadt." At the beginning of the campaign of 1708, it was the plan of the allies to make their chief attack on France "by the way of the Rhine and the Moselle, with two armies of 60,000 men each, under the command of the Elector of Hanover and Eugene, whilst Marlborough occupied the great French army in Flanders." But this plan was changed. "Eugene left the Elector of Hanover in the north of Swabia, behind the lines of Etlingen, which the allies had raised during the winter to replace the lines of Bühl at Stolhofen, and, with 24,000 soldiers collected on the Moselle, he marched by the way of Coblentz towards Belgium (June 30). The French forces of the Rhine and the Moselle followed this movement." The campaign then ensuing in the Netherlands was that which was signalized by Marlborough and Eugene's victory at Oudenarde and the siege of Lille. In 1709, "the attention of Europe, as in 1708, was chiefly directed to Flanders; but it was not only on that side that France was menaced. France was to be encroached upon at once on the north and the east. Whilst the great allied army penetrated into Artois, the army of the Rhine and the army of the Alps were to penetrate, the latter into Bresse by the way of Savoy, the former into Franche-Comté by the way of Alsace, and to combine their operations. … The Germans had not taken the offensive in Alsace till in the month of August. Marshal Harcourt, with over 20,000 men, had covered himself with the lines of the Lauter: the Elector of Hanover, who had crossed the Rhine at Philippsburg with superior forces, did not attack Harcourt, and strove to amuse him whilst 8,000 or 9,000 Germans, left in Swabia with General Merci, moved rapidly on Neuberg … and established there a tête-du-pont in order to enter Upper Alsace." By swiftly sending a sufficient force to attack and defeat Merci at Neuberg, August 26, Harcourt completely frustrated these plans. "The Elector of Hanover recrossed the river and retired behind the lines of Etlingen." During the two following years the French and German forces on the side of the Rhine did little more than observe one another.

_H. Martin, History of France: Age of Louis XIV:, volume 2, chapters 5-6._

Meantime, Ramillies, Oudenarde and Malplaquet had been fought in the Netherlands; Prince Eugene had won his victory at Turin, and the contest had been practically decided in Spain, at Almanza.

See NETHERLANDS: A. D. 1706-1707, 1708-1709, 1710-1712; ITALY: A. D. 1701-1713; SPAIN: A. D. 1706, 1707, and 1707-1710; and ENGLAND: A. D. 1710-1712.

ALSO IN: _W. Coxe, History of the House of Austria, chapters 75-79 (volume 3)._

_F. P. Guizot, Popular History of France, chapter 45 (volume 5)._

GERMANY: A. D. 1711. Election of the Emperor Charles VI.

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GERMANY: A. D. 1711. The War of the Spanish Succession: Change in the circumstances of the war.

See AUSTRIA: A. D. 1711.

GERMANY: A. D. 1713-1719. The Emperor's continued differences with the King of Spain. The Triple Alliance. The Quadruple Alliance.

See SPAIN: A. D. 1713-1725.

GERMANY: A. D. 1714. Ending of the War of the Spanish Succession: The Peace of Utrecht and the Treaty of Rastadt.

See UTRECHT: A. D. 1712-1714.

GERMANY: A. D. 1732-1733. Interference in the election of the King of Poland.

See POLAND: A. D. 1732-1733.

GERMANY: A. D. 1733-1735. The War of the Polish Succession. Cession of Lorraine to France.

See FRANCE: A. D. 1733-1735.

GERMANY: A. D. 1740. The question of the Austrian Succession. The Pragmatic Sanction.

See AUSTRIA: A. D. 1718-1738, and 1740.

GERMANY: A. D. 1740-1756. Early years of the reign of Frederick the Great in Prussia. The War of the Austrian Succession.

When Frederick II., known as Frederick the Great, succeeded his father, in 1740, "nobody had the least suspicion that a tyrant of extraordinary military and political talents, of industry more extraordinary still, without fear, without faith, and without mercy, had ascended the throne."

_Lord Macaulay, Frederic the Great (Essays)._

The reign of Frederick II. "was expected to be an effeminate one; but when at the age of twenty-nine he became king, he forgot his pleasures, thought of nothing but glory, and no longer employed himself but in attention to his finances, his army, his policy, and his laws. His provinces were scattered, his resources weak, his power precarious; his army of seventy thousand soldiers was more remarkable for handsomeness of the men, and the elegance of their appearance, than for their discipline. He augmented it, instructed it, exercised it, and fortune began to open the field of glory to him at the moment he was fully prepared to enjoy her favours. Charles XII. was dead, and his station filled by a king without authority. Russia, deprived of Peter the Great, who had only rough-hewn her civilization, languished under the feeble government of the Empress Anne, and of a cruel and ignorant minister. Augustus III. King of Poland and Elector of Saxony, a Prince devoid of character, could not inspire him with any dread. Louis XV., a weak and peaceable king, was governed by Cardinal Fleuri, who loved peace, but always by his weakness suffered himself to be drawn into war. He presented to Frederic rather a support than an obstacle. The court of France had espoused the cause of Charles VII. against Francis I. Maria Theresa, wife of Francis, and Queen of Hungary, saw herself threatened by England, Holland, and France; and whilst she had but little reason to hope the preservation of her hereditary dominions, that arrogant princess wished to place her husband on the Imperial Throne. This quarrel kindled the flames of war in Europe; the genius of Frederic saw by a single glance that the moment was arrived for elevating Prussia to the second order of powers; he made an offer to Maria Theresa to defend her, if she would cede Silesia to him, and threatened her with war in case of refusal. The Empress, whose firmness nothing could shake, impoliticly refused that proposition; war was declared, and Frederic entered Silesia at the head of eighty thousand men. This first war lasted eighteen months.

See AUSTRIA: A. D. 1740 to 1741.

Frederic, by gaining five battles, shewed that Europe would recognize one great man more in her bloody annals. He had begun the war from ambition, and contrary to strict justice; he concluded it with ability, but by the abandonment of France his ally, without giving her information of it, and he thus put in practice, when he was seated on the throne, the principles of Machiavel, whom he had refuted before he ascended it. Men judge according to the event. The hero was absolved by victory from the wrongs with which justice reproached him; and this brilliant example serves to confirm men in that error, too generally and too lightly adopted, that ability in politics is incompatible with the strict rule of morality. Four years after, in [1744], Frederic again took up arms.

See AUSTRIA: A. D. 1743-1744 to 1744-1745.

He invaded Bohemia, Upper Silesia, and Moravia. Vienna thought him at her gates; but the defection of the Bavarians, the retreat of the French, and the return of Prince Charles into Bohemia, rapidly changed the face of affairs. The position of Frederic became as dangerous as it had been menacing; he was on the point of being lost, and he saw himself compelled to retire with as much precipitation, as he had advanced with boldness. The gaining the battle of Hohen-Friedberg saved him. That retreat and that victory fixed the seal to his reputation. It was after this action that he wrote to Louis XV. 'I have just discharged in Silesia the bill of exchange which your majesty drew on me at Fontenoy.' A letter so much the more modest, as Frederic had conquered, and Louis had only been witness to a victory. He displayed the same genius and the same activity in the campaign of 1745, and once more abandoned France in making his separate peace at Dresden. By this treaty Francis was peaceably assured of the empire, and the cession of Silesia was confirmed to Frederic. France during this war committed some wrongs, which might palliate the abandonment of Prussia. The French did not keep Prince Charles within bounds, they made no diversion into Germany, and fought no where but in Flanders. … In 1756, Europe was again in a flame. France and England declared war against each other, and both sought alliances; Frederic ranged himself on the side of England, and by that became the object of the unreflecting vengeance of the French, and of the alliance of that power with Austria; Austria also formed an alliance with the Court of Petersburg by means of a Saxon secretary; Frederic discovered the project of the Courts of Petersburg, Dresden, and Vienna, to invade the Prussian dominions. He was before-hand with them, and began the war by some conquests."

_L. P. Ségur, the elder, History of the Principal Events of the Reign of Frederic William II., King of Prussia, volume 1, pages 2-6._

GERMANY: A. D. 1742. The Elector of Bavaria crowned Emperor (Charles VII.).

See AUSTRIA: A. D. 1741 (OCTOBER).

GERMANY: A. D. 1745. The consort of Maria Theresa elected Emperor (Francis I.). Rise of the imperial house of Hapsburg-Lorraine.

See AUSTRIA: A. D.1745 (SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER); also, 1744-1745.

GERMANY: A. D. 1748. End and results of the War of the Austrian Succession.

See AIX-LA-CHAPELLE. THE CONGRESS.

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GERMANY: A. D. 1755-1756. The Seven Years War: Its causes and provocations.

"The great national quarrel between England and the powers which restrained her free movements on the sea and her extension of colonies, had never ceased. England would have the freedom of the sea: and on land she pushed population and ploughs where France paraded soldiers. In such a struggle war must come, but, by laws invariable as the laws of nature, the population will win in the end. After much bickering, blows began in 1754, and at the beginning of 1755 England despatched the ill-fated Braddock with a small force, which was destroyed in July. … As yet, however, the quarrel was only colonial. England embittered it by seizing French ships without any declaration of war. But why did Frederick [of Prussia] strike in, if indeed he desired peace? In truth there was no choice for him. As early as 1752-53 his secret agents had discovered that Austria, Russia and Saxony were hatching a plot for the destruction of Prussia, and such a partition as afterwards befell unhappy Poland. In 1753 a Saxon official, Mentzel by name, began to supply the Prussian agents with copies of secret documents from the archives at Dresden, which proved that, during the whole of the peace, negotiations had been proceeding for a simultaneous attack on Frederick, though the astute Brühl [Saxon minister], mindful of former defeats, objected to playing the part of jackal to the neighbouring lions. In short, by the end of 1755 the king knew that preparations were already on foot in Austria and Russia, and that he would probably be attacked next year certainly, or, at latest, the year after. A great war was coming between England and France, in which the continental power would attack Hanover, and tread closely on the skirts of Prussia. The situation was dangerous, and became terribly menacing when England bargained with Russia to subsidise a Muscovite army of 55,000 men for defence of Hanover. Russia consented with alacrity. Money was all that the czarina needed for her preparations against Frederick, and in the autumn of 1755 she assembled, not 55,000, but 70,000 men on the Prussian frontier, nominally for the use of England. But throughout the winter all the talk at St. Petersburg was of Frederick's destruction in the coming spring. It was time for him to stir. His first move was one of policy. He offered England a 'neutrality convention' by which the two powers jointly should guarantee the German Reich against all foreign intervention during the coming war. On the 16th of January, 1756, the convention was signed in London, and the Russian agreement thrown over, as it could well be, since it had not been ratified. Europe was now ranking herself for the struggle. In preceding years, the Austrian diplomatist, Kaunitz, had so managed the French court, especially through the medium of Madame de Pompadour, that Louis XV. was now on the side of Maria Theresa, who had bowed her neck so far as to write to the French king's mistress as 'Ma Cousine,' while Frederick forgot policy, and spoke of the Pompadour in slighting terms. 'Je ne la connais pas,' said he once, and was never forgiven. … The agreement with Russia to partition Prussia had already been made, and Frederick's sharp tongue had betrayed him into calling the czarina that 'Infame catin du nord.' Saxony waited for the appearance of her stronger neighbours in order to join them. England alone was Frederick's ally."

_Colonel C. B. Brackenbury, Frederick the Great, chapter 9._

"The secret sources of the Third Silesian War, since called 'Seven-Years War,' go back to 1745; nay, we may say, to the First Invasion of Silesia in 1740. For it was in Maria Theresa's incurable sorrow at loss of Silesia, and her inextinguishable hope to reconquer it, that this and all Friedrich's other Wars had their origin. … Traitor Menzel the Saxon Kanzellist … has been busy for Prussia ever since 'the end of 1752.' Got admittance to the Presses; sent his first Excerpt 'about the time of Easter-Fair 1753,'—time of Voltaire's taking wing. And has been at work ever since. Copying Despatches from the most secret Saxon Repositories; ready always on Excellency Maltzahn's indicating the Piece wanted [Maltzahn being the Prussian Minister at Dresden]. … Menzel … lasted in free activity till 1757; and was then put under lock and key. Was not hanged: sat prisoner for twenty-seven years after; over-grown with hair, legs and arms chained together, heavy iron-bar uniting both ankles; diet bread-and-water;—for the rest, healthy; and died, not very miserable it is said, in 1784."

_T. Carlyle, History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, book 17, chapter 1 (volume 7)._

ALSO IN: _Duc de Broglie, The King's Secret, chapters 1-2 (volume 1)._

_Frederick II., History of the Seven Years War (Posthumous Works, volume 2), chapter 3._

_H. Tuttle, History of Prussia, 1745-1756 (volume 3), chapters 6-9._

_F. Von Raumer, Contributions to Modern History: Frederick II. and his Times, chapters 24-28._

See, also, ENGLAND: A. D. 1754-1755; and AUSTRIA: A. D. 1755-1763.

GERMANY: A. D. 1756. The Seven Years War: Frederick strikes the first blow. Saxony subdued.

"Finding that the storm was wholly inevitable, and must burst on him next year, he [Frederick], with bold sagacity, determined to forestall it. First, then, in August, 1756, his ambassador at Vienna had orders to demand of the Empress Queen a statement of her intentions, to announce war as the alternative, and to declare that he would accept no answer 'in the style of an oracle.' The answer, as he expected, was evasive. Without further delay an army of 60,000 Prussians, headed by Frederick in person, poured into Saxony. The Queen of Poland was taken in Dresden: the King of Poland [Augustus III. Elector of Saxony, and, by election, King of Poland] and his troops were blockaded in Pirna. Thus did Frederick commence that mighty struggle which is known to Germans by the name of the Seven Years' War. The first object of the Prussian monarch at Dresden was to obtain possession of the original documents of the coalition against him, whose existence he knew by means of the traitor Menzel. The Queen of Poland, no less aware than Frederick of the importance of these papers, had carried them to her own bed-chamber. She sat down on the trunk which contained the most material ones, and declared to the Prussian officer sent to seize them that nothing but force should move her from the spot. [The official account of this occurrence which Carlyle produces represents the Queen as 'standing before the door' of the 'archive apartment' in which the compromising documents were locked up, she having previously sealed the door.] This officer was of Scottish blood, General Keith, the Earl Marischal's brother. {1496} 'All Europe,' said the Queen, 'would exclaim against this outrage; and then, sir, you will be the victim; depend upon it, your King is a man to sacrifice you to his own honour!' Keith, who knew Frederick's character, was startled, and sent for further orders; but on receiving a reiteration of the first he did his duty. The papers were then made public, appended to a manifesto in vindication of Frederick's conduct; and they convinced the world that, although the apparent aggressor in his invasion of Saxony, he had only acted on the principles of self-defence. Meanwhile, the Prussian army closely blockaded the Saxon in Pirna, but the Austrian, under Marshal Brown, an officer of British extraction, was advancing to its relief through the mountain passes of Bohemia. Frederick left a sufficient force to maintain the blockade, marched against Brown with the remainder, and gave him battle at Lowositz [or Lobositz] on the 1st of October. It proved a hard-fought day; the King no longer found, as he says in one of his letters, the old Austrians he remembered; and his loss in killed and wounded was greater than theirs [3,308 against 2,984]; but victory declared on his side. Then retracing his steps towards Pirna he compelled, by the pressure of famine, the whole Saxon army, 17,000 strong, to an unconditional surrender. The officers were sent home on parole, but the soldiers were induced, partly by force and partly by persuasion, to enlist in the Prussian ranks, and swear fidelity to Frederick. Their former sovereign, King Augustus, remained securely perched on his castle-rock of Königstein, but, becoming weary of confinement, solicited, and was most readily granted, passports to Warsaw. During the whole winter Frederick fixed his head-quarters at Dresden, treating Saxony in all respects as a conquered province, or as one of his own. Troops and taxes were levied throughout that rich and populous land with unsparing rigour, and were directed against the very cause which the sovereign of that land had embraced."

_Lord Mahon (Earl Stanhope), History of England, 1713-1783, chapter 33 (volume 4)._

ALSO IN: _T. Carlyle, History of Friedrich II., book 17, chapters 4-8 (volume 7)._

_Lord Dover, Life of Frederick IL, volume 2, chapter 1._

GERMANY: A.-D. 1756-1757. The Seven Years War: Frederick under the Ban of the Empire. The coalition against Frederick.

"All through the winter Austria strained every nerve to consolidate her alliances, and she did not scruple to use her position at the head of the Empire, in order to drag that body into the quarrel that had arisen between two of its members. On his own responsibility, without consulting the electors, princes, and cities, the Emperor passed sentence on Frederick, and condemned him, unheard, as a disturber of the peace. Many of the great cities altogether refused to publish the Emperor's decree, and even among the states generally subservient to Austria there were some that were alarmed at so flagrant a disregard of law and precedent. It may have seemed a sign of what was to be expected should Prussia be annihilated, and no state remain in Germany that dared to lift up its voice against Austria. Nevertheless, in spite of this feeling, and in spite of the opposition of nearly all the Protestant states, Austria succeeded in inducing the Empire to espouse her cause. In all three colleges of electors, princes, and cities she obtained a majority, and at a diet held on January 17, 1757, it was resolved that an army of the Empire should be set on foot for the purpose of making war on Prussia. Some months later Frederick was put to the ban of the Empire. But the use of this antiquated weapon served rather to throw ridicule on those who employed it than to injure him against whom it was launched. … It has been calculated that the population of the States arrayed against Frederick the Great amounted to 90,000,000, and that they put 430,000 men into the field in the year 1757. The population of Prussia was 4,500,000, her army 200,000 strong; but, after deducting the garrisons of the fortresses, there remained little over 150,000 men available for service in the field. The odds against Frederick were great, but they were not absolutely overwhelming. His territories were scattered and difficult of defence, the extremities hardly defensible at all; but he occupied a central position from which he might, by rapidity of movement, be able to take his assailants in detail, unless their plans were distinguished by a harmony unusual in the efforts of a coalition."

_F. W. Longman, Frederick the Great and the Seven Years' War, chapter 8, section 3._

GERMANY: A. D. 1756-1758. War of Prussia with Sweden in Pomerania.

See SCANDINAVIAN STATES (SWEDEN): A. D. 1720-1792.

GERMANY: A. D. 1757 (April-June). The Seven Years War: Frederick's, invasion of Bohemia. Victory at Prague and defeat at Kolin.