The crown prince of Sweden and Bulow had meanwhile pursued Oudinot's retreating corps in the direction of the Elbe. Napoleon despatched Ney against them, but he met with the fate of his predecessor, at Dennewitz, on the 6th of September. The Prussians, on this occasion, again triumphed, unaided by their confederates.[5] Bulow and Tauenzien, with twenty thousand men, defeated the French army, seventy thousand strong. The crown prince of Sweden not only remained to the rear with the whole of his troops, but gave perfectly useless orders to the advancing Prussian squadron under General Borstel, who, without attending to them, hurried on to Bulow's assistance, and the French were, notwithstanding their numerical superiority, completely driven off the field, which the crown prince reached just in time to witness the dispersion of his countrymen. The French lost eighteen thousand men and eighty guns. The rout was complete. The rearguard, consisting of the Wurtembergers under Franquemont, was again overtaken at the head of the bridge at Zwettau, and, after a frightful carnage, driven in wild confusion across the dam to Torgau. The Bavarians under Raglowich, who, probably owing to secret orders, had remained, during the battle, almost in a state of inactivity, withdrew in another direction and escaped.[6] Davoust also again retired upon Hamburg, and his rearguard under Pecheux was attacked by Wallmoden, on the 16th of September, on the Gorde, and suffered a trifling loss. On the 29th of September, eight thousand French were also defeated by Platow, the Hetman of the Cossacks, at Zeitz: on the 30th, Czernitscheff penetrated into Cassel and expelled Jerome. Thielemann, the Saxon general, also infested the country to Napoleon's rear, intercepted his convoys at Leipzig, and at Weissenfels took one thousand two hundred, at Merseburg two thousand, French prisoners; he was, however, deprived of his booty by a strong force under Lefebvre-Desnouettes, by whom he was incessantly harassed until Platow's arrival with the Cossacks, who, in conjunction with Thielemann, repulsed Lefebvre with great slaughter at Altenburg. On this occasion, a Baden battalion, that had been drawn up apart from the French, turned their fire upon their unnatural confederates and aided in their dispersion.[7]