17 May in military history: Battle of Chotusitz, 1742

17 May 1742 · 284 years ago

A race for Kuttenberg

In the spring of 1742, during the First Silesian War, back in Bohemia after a campaign in Moravia, Frederick's army lay in quarters around Chrudim, with its magazines along the Elbe. Prince Charles of Lorraine, with Field Marshal Königsegg at his side, marched out of Moravia into Bohemia. Frederick writes that Königsegg meant to march straight on Prague and fight the Prussians on the way, believing them only 15,000 strong; Carlyle adds that the court at Vienna pressed both commanders to attack. The King chose to march to meet them, Frederick writes, because the peace talks already under way needed a decisive blow.¹

The army assembled at Chrudim on 13 May. On the 15th Frederick set off with a vanguard of foot, dragoons and hussars to reach Kuttenberg (Kutná Hora) before the enemy, leaving Prince Leopold of Anhalt-Dessau to follow with the main army. At Kuttenberg the Prussians found bread baked for the Austrians.²

The main army fell behind. In the General Staff history, Leopold learned that Čáslav was already held by the enemy, turned aside and camped north of Chotusitz; the last troops came in at about ten at night after almost 18 hours on the road. Carlyle has the rear guard arriving at eleven. Frederick later blamed Leopold for refusing to believe that the enemy meant to attack until he saw their columns deploying in front of him.³

Dust and a burning village

Frederick left Kuttenberg on 17 May at four in the morning in his history and in Carlyle, at five in his official account. The Austrian army was advancing in four columns. The General Staff history estimates each army at about 28,000 men and the Austrian guns at some 40; for the Prussian artillery it follows Frederick, who gives 82 guns. Carlyle gives the Austrians 30,000, "they say", and Frederick about 28,000.⁴

On the Prussian right, cavalry under Buddenbrock outflanked the Austrian horse and overthrew its first line. Then, Frederick writes, the dust was so prodigious that the cavalry could not make the most of its success; Bronikowski's newly formed hussars, dressed in green and unknown to the cavalry, were taken for the enemy; a cry went up, «nous sommes coupés!» ("we are cut off!", our translation), and the victorious first line fled. Carlyle, who blames the dust for the mistake, gives the cry as "Enemy to rear!". Count Rothenburg's dragoons broke into the Austrian infantry, and Rothenburg was wounded.⁵

Meanwhile the Austrian infantry attacked the Prussian left at Chotusitz, held by the regiment of Schwerin. The village went up in flames; Frederick writes that the Austrians set it on fire and calls it «une grande sottise» ("a great folly", our translation), since the flames kept them out of the place they wanted. The General Staff history has the Prussians driven from the village at about nine, and Generals Werdeck and Wedell among the dead. Austrian horsemen, hussars among them, rode on to the Prussian camp and plundered it. According to the General Staff history, the cabinet secretary Eichel kept the King's papers from the enemy by destroying his whole correspondence.⁶

In the General Staff history, Frederick ordered his infantry on the right, which had not yet fired a shot, forward at about half past ten and wheeled it to the left; Frederick and Carlyle both make his attack on the flank of the Austrian infantry the decisive moment. The Austrians fell back through Čáslav, with Buddenbrock's cavalry in pursuit. In Frederick's account they did not halt until they reached Habr.⁷

"As critical as Mollwitz"

That same day Eichel wrote to the minister Podewils, in a report the General Staff history quotes: "Und können Ew. Excellenz glauben, daß die umstände der Bataille so critique gewesen als jemahlen die von Mollwitz, daß, sub rosa zu schreiben wir uhrsach haben, Gottes Gnade zu preihsen, der uns den Sieg gegeben. Die Oesterreicher haben gewiß gethan, was nicht geglaubet." ("And Your Excellency may believe that the circumstances of the battle were as critical as ever those of Mollwitz were, so that, to write sub rosa, we have cause to praise the grace of God, who gave us the victory. The Austrians certainly did what no one would have believed.", our translation). Mollwitz has its own article.⁸

The official account of the battle, which Carlyle says the King wrote himself, gave the enemy his due: "on doit rendre justice à l'ennemi, que ce n'est pas faute de valeur qu'il a perdu la bataille" ("one must do the enemy justice: it was not for want of courage that he lost the battle", our translation).⁹

Counting the dead

The General Staff history counts Prussian losses of 128 officers and 3,946 men killed and wounded, with 18 officers and 701 men missing, most of them probably taken prisoner. For the Austrians it gives 39 officers and 1,012 men killed, 115 officers and 1,796 men wounded, and 41 officers and 3,325 men missing, a figure that includes deserters.¹⁰

Frederick's history puts the Prussian dead at 900 cavalrymen and 700 infantrymen, with a good 2,000 wounded, and says the Austrian loss, counting dead, prisoners, wounded and deserters, could be put at 7,000 without exaggeration. Carlyle gives 1,052 Austrians and 1,905 Prussians killed, and total losses of nearly 7,000 Austrians and between 4,000 and 5,000 Prussians. Frederick and the General Staff history agree on about 1,200 prisoners. Frederick claims 18 Austrian guns; the General Staff history counts 16 cannon and a howitzer, and records that the Prussians lost one flag and 11 cavalry standards.¹¹

Citing the chronicle of Čáslav, the General Staff history says the King had a plot near Chotusitz bought to bury the dead, on condition that it stay unploughed for 25 years. Carlyle writes of nine acres for 25 years.¹²

Silesia for peace

Frederick judged that Mollwitz had been fiercer and more important, but wrote that "si les Prussiens avaient été battus à Chotusitz, l'État n'était pas sans ressources; mais en emportant la victoire, c'était se procurer la paix" ("if the Prussians had been beaten at Chotusitz, the state was not without resources; but by winning, one secured peace", our translation). His reasons for making it included distrust of Cardinal Fleury of France and a treasury holding barely 150,000 écus.¹³

Prussia's Count Podewils and the British envoy Lord Hyndford, holding full powers from Vienna, signed preliminaries at Breslau on 11 June 1742. The Queen of Hungary ceded almost all of Upper and Lower Silesia and the County of Glatz, and Frederick took over a debt secured on Silesia. The terms were confirmed at Berlin on 28 July, and the Prussian troops marched out of Bohemia. Carlyle judges that the battle decided little in men or ground, but that its effect in discrediting the beaten side was considerable. According to Carlyle, the French army in Prague under Marshal Belle-Isle broke out on 16 December 1742, and the garrison left behind under Chevert later marched out under escort on agreed terms.¹⁴