by H M Hozier
General von Bonin had intended to hold the line of the Aupa on the north of Trautenau, but General Gablenz pressed upon him, and he was forced to continue his retreat to the same position as he had occupied on the morning of the day of the action, keeping his rearguard at Golden-Oels, about three miles from Trautenau.
The cavalry division of the army, which was to have followed the first corps through the mountains as soon as the defile was cleared, remained at Schömberg.
The first Prussian corps lost in this action, in killed and wounded, sixty-three officers and twelve hundred and fourteen men; the Austrian tenth corps, according to Austrian returns, lost one hundred and ninety-six officers and five thousand five hundred and thirty-six men; a terrible disparity in numbers! The Austrian infantry, with a muzzle-loading arm, had indeed gained a victory over an enemy equipped with a breech-loading weapon, but at such a sacrifice as made success almost as costly as defeat.
General Gablenz did not pursue beyond Trautenau. He kept his advanced guard there for the night, and bivouacked at Neu-Rognitz. His corps was considerably shaken by its victory, of which it was soon to be deprived by the fortune of war.
The corps of the Guards had crossed the Bohemian frontier at Steinethal on the evening of the 26th, and had pushed forward the second division by Braunau, as far as Weckelsdorf. On the 27th June this corps was to move in a south-westerly direction, in order to open the communication between the first corps, which was advancing against Trautenau on the right, and the fifth corps at Nachod on the left. At mid-day the first division of the Guards was to march on Eypel. At Qualitch, the general commanding this division hearing the heavy firing at Trautenau halted, and sent an offer of assistance to General von Bonin.
Then the Prussian infantry of the first corps, advancing on the road beyond Trautenau, were everywhere pressing the Austrians back, when a staff-officer came up to the commander of the first corps, and told him that the Prussian Guard was ready to come to his assistance. General von Bonin thought his victory already secure, and declined the proffered aid. For another four hours he did not want it, for the Prussians kept advancing slowly, steadily, pressing the Austrians back, but at four o’clock large reinforcements of artillery came up upon the Austrian side, and General von Bonin ordered his retreat
The first division of the Guard corps, ignorant of the failure of the first corps at Trautenau, continued its march, and in the evening reached the neighbourhood of Eypel, on the Aupa, while the second division moved to Kosteletz, about five miles to the south-east of that place. The reserve artillery and heavy cavalry were still one day’s march in rear. The Prince of Würtemburg, who commanded the Guards, received in the night intelligence from the crown prince, and instructions to move to its relief—of the result of the action at Trautenau, and he immediately gave orders that at daybreak the next morning his corps should cross the Aupa, attack the corps of General Gablenz, and thus disengage the first Prussian corps, and restore the broken communication with General von Bonin. According to the disposition of the Prince of Würtemburg, the first division of the Prussian Guard was to advance by Eypel, in a westerly direction, and the second division to move from Kosteletz to Eypel, to serve as a support to the first division.
The first division, under General Hiller, defiled over the Aupa at Eypel on the 28th June, at five in the morning, and threw out cavalry patrols in the direction of both Trautenau and Königinhof. These patrols discovered that General Gablenz was bivouacked with the main body of his corps at Neu-Rognitz, about two miles south of Trautenau, and that he held the latter town with a strong advanced guard. His position was therefore pointed northward against the first Prussian corps, and his right flank was now threatened by the advance of the Guards from Eypel. The Prussian patrols also discovered that the baggage of the corps of General Gablenz was drawing off towards Königinhof, but was still five miles distant from that town. Under these favourable strategical conditions, the first division of the Guards received orders immediately to advance by Standenz, to attack the enemy in the direction of Königinhof, while the second division, as a reserve, was advanced beyond the defile of Eypel. At the same time two battalions of the Franz Grenadiers were sent forward towards the north-west against Trautenau, in order to cover the right wing of the advance. These dispositions led to the
ACTION OF SOOR
General Gablenz desired to change his front to the right, in consequence of finding his right wing thus threatened. To cover this evolution he ranged his whole artillery, covered by Knobel’s brigade, on the hills between Neu-Rognitz and Burgersdorf. In this he succeeded, and extended his right wing to Prausnitz, where he gave his hand to Fleischhacker’s brigade of the fourth Austrian corps, which had been sent to his assistance. The advance of the two Prussian grenadier battalions against Alt-Rognitz threatened, however, to cut off from him the brigade which he had posted in Trautenau.
The Prussian advanced guard, under Colonel Kessel, which consisted of four battalions of the fusiliers, one company of the Jägers of the Guard, two companies of the pioneers of the Guard, the fourth squadron of the hussars of the Guard, and one 4-pounder battery, came upon the Austrian position before the whole of General Gablenz’s guns were formed. It was, however, received by a hot fire from twenty-four pieces, which had already taken up their position. The single Prussian battery engaged these guns with considerable rashness, while the infantry attacked the plantations west of Standenz, and drove the Austrian position slightly in.
Soon the guns of General Gablenz were all in position, and sixty-four pieces opened a withering fire on the six Prussian guns, which, however, held their ground, though with great loss. While the Fusiliers and the Jägers of the advanced guard sought to gain some ground, some of the battalions of the Prussian main body, under General Alvensleben, came up, and hurried into the action wherever they were most required. Next arrived the first and second battalions of the Fusiliers, and the second company of the Jägers of the Guard, who moved in the direction of Burgersdorf and Alt-Rognitz. After these followed the Second regiment of Grenadiers, and with them came a very welcome field-battery, which immediately opened fire to support the only Prussian battery as yet in action.
Burgersdorf and the plantations near it were now captured by the Prussians, and at that moment the rest of the Prussian infantry and the remainder of the artillery came into play. The action then became general. The Prussian infantry advanced, and stormed the rising ground on which the Austrian battalions stood, but at an awful sacrifice; men fell every moment, and officers went down so quickly that hardly a company reached the summit commanded by its captain. But the Guards pressed on, and the Austrians had to retire from position to position, while the Prussians advanced steadily, urging them backwards. The Austrian corps of Gablenz was then defeated, for the troops could not rally under the fire of the needle-gun, and every battalion which retreated was routed.
The two Prussian battalions which had been detached towards Trautenau to cover the right wing had been during this time heavily engaged. As they moved towards Trautenau, some columns were seen advancing towards them. It was uncertain at first whether these were some of the troops of the first Prussian corps, or some of the Austrians from Trautenau. The doubt was soon dispelled. As they approached, it became clear that, while three of the Austrian brigades of the corps of General Gablenz were resisting the front of the Prussian attack, the remaining brigade, that of Grivicics, had been ordered to sally from Trautenau against the Prussian right wing, and to it the advancing columns belonged—a movement which, but for the precautions of the Prince of Würtemburg, would have had an important influence on the action.
The two Prussian battalions withstood the attack of this brigade with the greatest courage. The greater part of the officers and one-third of the soldiers of these battalions were laid on the field, either dead or dying, but they held their ground until the second division of the Guards, which had been held in reserve, could hurry up to their assistance. This division com
ing up, drove the brigade of Grivicics back into Trautenau, cut it off from the main body of Gablenz’s corps, stormed the town, and captured there a stand of colours and over three thousand prisoners.
General Gablenz withdrew the rest of his corps along the road to Königinhof. The Prussians were too much fatigued to pursue in force: and the Austrian brigade of Fleischhacker, which belonged to the fourth corps, was allowed to pass the night at Soor unmolested as a rearguard, while the first division of the Prussian Guards bivouacked opposite to it at Burgersdorf. The next morning this brigade also retired at daybreak, towards Königinhof. The Guards had but eleven hundred men in killed and wounded in this action. The Austrians left behind them five thousand prisoners, three standards, and ten guns.
By the successful issue of this action the communication with the first corps which had been broken on the 27th by its failure at Trautenau, was completely re-established.
On the morning of the 29th, the crown prince caused the first corps, which had been defeated at Trautenau on the 27th, to march past before him through that town, where the victory of the Guards on the 28th had opened a free passage for it.
The Guards on the 29th moved from Burgersdorf and Trautenau, on Königinhof and Rettendorf. Early in the morning of that day, one of the regiments in issuing from Burgersdorf had a skirmish with some detachments of scattered Austrians who had been cut off from their corps, and passed the night in the woods.
As the advanced guard of the first division of the Guards approached Königinhof, it again fell in with the army, and a combat ensued which terminated in the
CAPTURE OF KÖNIGINHOF
The advanced guard of the first division of the Guards, consisting of four battalions of Fusiliers, two companies of Jägers, and two field batteries, broke up from Burgersdorf at mid-day on the 29th, and were ordered to advance and occupy the town of Königinhof. The brigade of Fleischhacker, which belonged to the fourth Austrian corps, was posted as garrison of the place, and had drawn up several infantry columns, covered by skirmishers, in the cornfields on the north of the town. The Prussian riflemen quickly engaged them: the slow shots of the muzzle-loading arms did little execution against the rapid discharges of the needle-gun, and these advanced columns were soon driven to seek shelter in flight.
The defence of the houses was entrusted to the Austrian regiment of Coranini, and here took place a hot contest, for this gallant corps defended each yard of every street, and each window of every house. The Fusiliers of the Prussian Guards pressed on, overthrew their opponents in the streets, and, dashing past the loopholed houses, occupied the bridge over the Elbe. The majority of the defenders were still in the town, and were completely surrounded. Nothing was left to them but to lay down their arms. The Prussians here captured four hundred prisoners and two standards.
The weak remnant of the Coranini regiment retreated to Miletin. The Prussian Guards were concentrated in the neighbourhood of Königinhof, and the first Prussian corps advanced to Pilnikau.
Feldzeugmeister Benedek had in the meantime drawn the second Austrian corps to the vicinity of Josephstadt It arrived, however, too late to aid in a defence of the line of the Elbe at Königinhof. That important point for the passage of the river was already in the possession of the Prussian Guards, when, on the 30th June, Count Thurn appeared with his corps on the heights south of the Elbe, at Königinhof. This Austrian general could do nothing more than open an ineffectual cannonade against the Prussian corps of the Guards, on the 30th June. That day one division of the latter corps bivouacked near Gradlitz, on the left bank of the Elbe, about two miles out of Königinhof, and the same day the first Prussian corps advanced to Arnau, on the river, about seven miles to the north of the same place.
It is now necessary to trace the passage of the left column of the crown prince’s army through the mountains, and to show how, on the 30th June, it was able to effect a junction with the right and central columns on the banks of the Elbe.
CHAPTER 3: Advance of the Left Column of the Army of Silesia
To the fifth Prussian corps, which formed the head of the left column of the army of the Crown Prince, and which he himself most closely directed, was the most difficult task given. Only one narrow road leads from the county of Glatz to Nachod, which beyond the Bohemian frontier runs in a winding course near the town of Nachod, through a difficult defile. A corps d’armée, with all its trains and baggage advancing by one road, forms a column of march twenty miles long. If only the combatants themselves and the most necessary train, such as ammunition columns and field hospitals, form the columns, it still will stretch over ten miles; so that if the head of the column is attacked as it issues from a defile where the troops cannot move off the road, the rearmost battalion will not be able to support the most advanced until four hours have passed.
In order to ensure the safe issue from the mountain passes, the advanced guard of the fifth corps, under General von Löwenfeld, was pushed forward as far as Nachod on the evening of the 26th June. The Austrians held the defile with a very weak force, and did not stand obstinately in the Castle of Nachod, so that the Prussian advanced guard occupied that strong post with very slight opposition. General Ramming, who had been posted with the sixth Austrian corps and a portion of the first division of reserve cavalry at Opocna, about ten miles to the south of Nachod, marched on the 26th towards Skalitz, by order of Feldzeugmeister Benedek. He was intended next day to fall upon the head of the Prussian fifth corps as it issued from the pass, and drive it back into the defile. At the same time the eighth Austrian corps under the command of the Archduke Leopold was posted on the railway to Josephstadt, in order to act as a reserve to General Ramming. The next day the advanced guard of the Prussian fifth corps brought on the
ACTION OF NACHOD
On the 27th, the same day that the first corps was defeated at Trautenau, as the advanced guard of the fifth Prussian corps d’armée was, about ten o’clock in the morning, moving out of Nachod towards Skalitz, in order to take up a position covering the strategical point where the roads to Josephstadt and Neustadt branch, its patrols observed heavy Austrian columns advancing by the road from Neustadt, and two Austrian cuirass regiments drew up across the road to bar the way against the Prussian infantry. These were supported by two Austrian infantry brigades, while a third stood in the rear as a reserve. The Prussians were then in a dangerous position, for the road through the defile of Nachod behind them was choked with the carriages of the artillery, and only a few battalions and two squadrons had gained the open ground.
General von Löwenfeld, who commanded the advanced guard, threw his infantry into a wood which was beside the road, where, protected by the trees to a certain extent from the shells of the Austrian guns, they maintained their position until their artillery had cleared the defile. At the same time the small body of Prussian cavalry who were with the infantry charged straight down the road against the centre of the line of the cuirass regiments. The Austrians numbered eight times as many sabres as the Prussians, and their cavalry bore the highest reputation in Europe. All expected to see the Prussians hurled back, broken and destroyed, by their collision with the Austrian line, but the result was far different; the Prussian squadrons thundered down the road, and seemed merely by the speed at which they were galloping to cut clean through the centre of the line of Cuirassiers; but, though they were thus successful in their first onslaught, they were quickly assailed in flank and rear by overwhelming numbers, and with difficulty escaped without being cut to pieces.
Many, however, managed to shake themselves free from the mêlée, and, galloping back, rallied under the protection of the fire of their infantry in the wood; but the Austrians pressed forward, and they had to retire; and it seemed that the issue of the defile would be lost, for Austrian infantry were quickly coming up, and were preparing to attack the wood held by the Prussians. At the first intelligence of the advance of the enemy the crown prince in person hurried up to the front. Then upon Löwenfeld’s battalio
ns depended not only the safe passage of the fifth corps through the defile, but also the preservation of the whole of the artillery, for so crowded with carriages was the road that, had the Austrians pressed on, every gun and waggon must have fallen into their hands. But the infantry proved worthy of the trust placed in them, and nothing availed to dislodge them from the trees, though the shells went whistling in quick succession through the trunks, and the splinters carried away the branches above the heads of the soldiers, and tore up the turf beneath their feet.
The crown prince was in Nachod when the firing commenced, but he pushed his way with difficulty through the crowded defile, and came to his advanced guard in order himself to be with his soldiers in their time of trial. Behind him followed as quickly as possible the battalions of the main body of the corps, and the guns of the artillery were also pushed forward; but the road was long and crowded, and both regiments and guns made their way with difficulty. In the meantime the Austrians pressed hard upon the little band in the wood, and seemed as though they would pass it by, and close the defile with their columns. But before they could do so the battalions of the main body gained the end of the defile, and the Prussian guns began to come quickly forward, for waggons and all encumbrances had been pushed off the road into the ditches to facilitate the free passage of the troops going into action.
The newly-arrived troops reinforced those in the wood, and the artillery replied to the Austrian batteries; but at noon the battle was still stationary, and the Prussians had not advanced their position since the beginning of the fight, for the Austrian cavalry stood prepared to charge the Prussian infantry if it attempted to move forward on the open ground. The crown prince knew that on breaking that cavalry line depended the passage of the fifth corps into Bohemia, and he sent against it the Eighth Prussian regiment of Dragoons, and the First Uhlan regiment. It was as exciting moment. The Prussians, nerved by the importance of the issue of their charge, and with the eyes of their infantry upon them, sprang forward readily: the Austrian horsemen, proud of their high renown, and eager to wipe out the memory of the former skirmish, also bounded forward as soon as they saw the Prussians approaching. The two lines met about half way, for one moment formed a tangled struggling crowd, and then the Prussian Uhlans, with their lance-points low and heads bent down, were seen pursuing.