History of Friedrich II of Prussia — Volume 12Carlyle, Thomas
History
History of Friedrich II of Prussia — Volume 12
Carlyle, Thomas
Frederick II, King of Prussia, 1712-1786; Prussia (Germany) -- History -- Frederick II, 1740-1786; Social problems
"If my destiny is finished, remember a friend, who loves thee always
tenderly: if Heaven prolong my days, I will write to thee after
to-morrow, and thou wilt hear of our victory. Adieu, dear friend; I
shall love thee till death.
"FEDERIC." [Ib. xvii. 98.]
The King, we incidentally discover somewhere, "had no sleep that night;"
none, "nor the next night either,"--such a crisis coming, still not
come.
Chapter X. -- BATTLE OF MOLLWITZ.
"To-morrow," Sunday, did not prove the Day of Fight, after all. Being a
day of wild drifting snow, so that you could not see twenty paces,
there was nothing for it but to sit quiet. The King makes all his
dispositions; sketches out punctually, to the last item, where each is
to station himself, how the Army is to advance in Four Columns, ready
for Neipperg wherever he may be,--towards Ohlau at any rate, whither
it is not doubted Neipperg is bent. These snowy six-and-thirty hours
at Pogarell were probably, since the Custrin time, the most anxious of
Friedrich's life.
Neipperg, for his part, struggles forward a few miles, this Sunday,
April 9th; the Prussians rest under shelter in the wild weather.
Neipperg's head-quarters, this night, are a small Village or Hamlet,
called Mollwitz: there and in the adjacent Hamlets, chiefly in Laugwitz
and Gruningen, his Army lodges itself:--he is now fairly got between us
and Ohlau,--if, in the blowing drift, we knew it, or he knew it. But,
in this confusion of the elements, neither party knows of the other:
Neipperg has appointed that to-morrow, Monday, 10th, shall be a
rest-day:--appointment which could by no means be kept, as it turned
out!
Friedrich had despatched messengers to Ohlau, that the force there
should join him; messengers are all captured. The like message had
already gone to Brieg, some days before, and the Blockading Body, a
good few thousand strong, quitted Brieg, as we saw, and effected their
junction with him. All day, this Sunday, 9th, it still snows and blows;
you cannot see a yard before you. No hope now of Holstein-Beck. Not the
least news from any quarter; Ohlau uncertain, too likely the wrong
way: What is to be done? We are cut off from our Magazines, have only
provision for one other day. "Had this weather lasted," says an Austrian
reporter of these things, "his Majesty would have passed his time
very ill." [_Feldzuge der Preussen_ (the complete Title is, _Sammlung
ungedruckter Nachrichten so die Geschichte der Feldzuge der Preussen von
1740 bis 1779 erlautern,_ or in English words, _Collection of unprinted
Narratives which elucidate the Prussian Campaigns from 1740 to 1779:_
5 vols. Dresden, 1782-1785), i. 33. Excellent Narratives, modest, brief,
effective (from Private Diaries and the like; many of them given also
in SEYFARTH); well worth perusal by the studious military man, and
creditably characteristic of the Prussian writers of them and actors in
them.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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