Battle of Prague, 1757: Frederick the Great's bloodiest victory

Frederick the Great won the Battle of Prague, but the day is remembered as much for its cost as for its result. Each army lost more than 12,000 men, the Prussians lost their most famous field marshal, and in Czech memory the battle carries the name of the one village where the Austrians held their ground: Štěrboholy.²

Into Bohemia

The Seven Years' War had begun in late August 1756, when Frederick invaded Saxony. In the spring of 1757 he struck at Bohemia in three columns: one under his own command, one under the Duke of Bevern and one from Silesia under Field Marshal Schwerin. The Austrians fell back on Prague and took up a strong position on the heights east of the city, between the Vítkov hill and the village of Kyje.³ › Battle of Lobositz, 1756

Their command was divided. Maria Theresa had placed her brother-in-law, Prince Charles of Lorraine, at the head of the army, with the more experienced Field Marshal Browne under him. Carlyle tells how Frederick, at the monastery where the two had lodged the night before, was told that they had been heard in violent altercation.⁴

A march around the flank

On 5 May Frederick crossed the Vltava north of the city on a pontoon bridge, and early on 6 May he joined Schwerin; Field Marshal Keith stayed on the west bank, with 30,000 men by Carlyle's count. Frederick, Schwerin and Winterfeldt looked over the Austrian lines while Austrian outposts fired on them. Schwerin asked for a day's rest for his men, who had been marching since midnight; Frederick refused, and the attack was to go in round the Austrian right flank. Carlyle repeats the anecdote that Frederick was very ill that day and swallowed some medicine after mounting his horse.⁵

The flank march went badly. The Prussians came on past Dolní Počernice toward Štěrboholy, and the infantry had to struggle through a chain of fish ponds which had been drained and looked like green pasture but were deep mud. The Austrians saw the movement and wheeled their right wing round to face it.⁶

Schwerin takes the colors

The Prussian infantry attacked toward Štěrboholy. Carlyle gives the order of the day as an advance with the bayonet and no firing until close range, and has the Prussians marching straight into the Austrian guns on the Homole hill. The attack was thrown back again and again. Winterfeldt, at the head of the vanguard with Schwerin's own regiment, was shot in the neck and fell.⁷

The Czech magazine Reflex tells how Frederick had cursed Schwerin's infantry as cowards. The old field marshal gave the wounded Winterfeldt a horse, seized the color of his regiment and led it forward again. He is usually credited with the cry "At them, my children!" A blast of canister struck him in the head, chest and stomach and killed him on the spot. On the Austrian side Field Marshal Browne was hit by a cannonball in the leg; he was carried into Prague and later died of the wound.⁸

The gap at Kyje

The battle was decided by what Carlyle calls a volunteer exploit. In wheeling their right wing round to face the flank attack, the Austrians had opened a gap near Kyje, at the angle between the wheeled wing and their original line. General Manstein attacked into it, and Prince Henry and Ferdinand of Brunswick brought their troops up in support; Carlyle writes that Frederick blamed Manstein for rashness, while Winterfeldt and later judges held that the attack settled the battle.⁹

At the same time, at the southern end of the field, the Prussian cavalry, Zieten's hussars among them, charged the Austrian cavalry on the far right of the Austrian line again and again and drove it from the field. The Austrian position collapsed, and the Austrians withdrew into Prague. The Prussian attempt to cut off the retreat failed: Prince Moritz of Dessau, who was to cross the Vltava with 15,000 men and fall on the Austrian rear, could not get over because his pontoon bridge was too short. Kam po Česku has Prince Charles take refuge behind the walls of Prague after three in the afternoon. Longman writes that the fighting was not all over until eight o'clock.¹⁰

Victory and its price

Carlyle gives 12,500 Prussians killed, wounded and missing and Longman at least 12,500; both give 13,000 Austrian losses, prisoners included; Kam po Česku puts the loss on each side at about 13,500. Reflex counts 375 Austrian officers and 12,912 men lost plus 4,000 to 4,500 prisoners, against 340 Prussian officers and 12,169 men and 3,000 Saxon deserters. It was among the bloodiest battles of the eighteenth century. It may not have been Frederick's costliest victory: an EBSCO reference article by Louis P. Towles puts the Prussian loss at Torgau in 1760 at about 24,000.¹¹

Frederick laid siege to Prague, but the victory did not last. Field Marshal Daun came to relieve the city, and on 18 June Frederick attacked him at Kolín, with about 34,000 men against 54,000 by Kam po Česku's count, and was badly beaten. He raised the siege on 20 June. Kam po Česku has him withdraw to Saxony; Carlyle follows him to Leitmeritz (Litoměřice) on the Elbe, where he waited for about a month, and Longman has him back in Saxony shortly before the end of July. That is why, Reflex notes, the bloody victory at Štěrboholy was soon overshadowed in Czech memory by the brilliant Austrian victory at Kolín.¹²