Austria, when preparing for war in 1809, could therefore confidently reckon upon a general rising in the Tyrol. Andrew Hofer, the host of the Sand at Passeyr (the Sandwirth), went to Vienna, where the revolt was concerted.[2] A conspiracy was entered into by the whole of the Tyrolese peasantry. Sixty thousand men, on a moderate calculation, were intrusted with the secret, which was sacredly kept, not a single townsman being allowed to participate in it. Kinkel, the Bavarian general, who was stationed at Innsbruck and narrowly watched the Tyrol, remained perfectly unconscious of the mine beneath his feet. Colonel Wrede, his inferior in command, had been directed to blow up the important bridges in the Pusterthal at St. Lorenzo, in order to check the advance of the Austrians, in case of an invasion. Several thousand French were expected to pass through the Tyrol on their route from Italy to join the army under Napoleon. No suspicion of the approach of a popular outbreak existed. On the 9th of April, the signal was suddenly given; planks bearing little red flags floated down the Inn; on the 10th, the storm burst. Several of the Bavarian sappers sent at daybreak to blow up the bridges of St. Lorenzo being killed by the bullets of an invisible foe, the rest took to flight. Wrede, enraged at the incident, hastened to the spot at the head of two battalions, supported by a body of cavalry and some field-pieces. The whole of the Pusterthal had, however, already risen at the summons of Peter Kemnater, the host of Schabs,[3] in defence of the bridges. Wrede's artillery was captured by the enraged peasantry and cast, together with the artillerymen, into the river. Wrede, after suffering a terrible loss, owing to the skill of the Tyrolean riflemen, who never missed their aim, was completely put to rout, and, although he fell in with a body of three thousand French under Brisson on their route from Italy, resolved, instead of returning to the Pusterthal, to withdraw with the French to Innsbruck. The passage through the valley of the Eisack had, however, been already closed against them by the host of Lechner, and the fine old Roman bridge at Laditsch been blown up. In the pass of the Brixen, where the valley closes, the French and Bavarians suffered immense loss; rocks and trees were rolled on the heads of the appalled soldiery, numbers of whom were also picked off by the unerring rifles of the unseen peasantry. Favored by the open ground at the bridge of Laditsch, they constructed a temporary bridge, across which they succeeded in forcing their way on the 11th of April. Hofer had, meanwhile, placed himself, early on the 10th, at the head of the brave peasantry of Passeyr, Algund, and Meran, and had thrown himself on the same road, somewhat to the north, near Sterzing, where a Bavarian battalion was stationed under the command of Colonel Bärnklau, who, on being attacked by him, on the 11th, retreated to the