Life of Being a Crown Prince in France - Chapter 1350: 1255: The Last Prussian Army

Chapter 1350: Chapter 1255: The Last Prussian Army

In the Duke of Brunswick’s mind, the French Army should be rushing to attack Anhalt, yet it suddenly appeared here.

It must be Surt leaving his troops to delay us. He immediately made a judgment and instructed the officer beside him, “General Boen, quickly lead the hussars to support…”

Before he finished speaking, he saw a courier galloping towards them, loudly shouting from a distance: “Marshal, over twenty thousand French troops are closing in on us from Wiesenhousen!”

Wiesenhousen is 4 kilometers to the west of the Prussian Army, which means he is now caught in a situation of being attacked from both sides.

Uncontrollably, a scene from a few years ago in Luxembourg when he was captured flashed through the Duke of Brunswick’s mind.

He shook his head forcefully to dispel those bothersome thoughts and said to the order officer, “Tell General Rechtingen to do everything possible to hold off the enemy!”

Rechtingen is his lead army commander.

Then the Duke of Brunswick looked at Boen again: “The hussar regiment doesn’t need to reinforce. We will have our decisive battle with the French here!”

The Prussian Army hadn’t fully regrouped from the marching state, and Surt had already led the main force of the Second Army to appear on their left wing.

First, the Mounted Artillery quickly advanced, and with twelve Six-pound Cannons, rained down shells on the Prussian Army.

Then, a scattered soldier cluster composed of tens of thousands of French soldiers quickly advanced, engaging in a firefight with the hastily arranged infantry line of the Duke of Brunswick.

The Duke of Brunswick had heard about a new formation used by the French on the Northern Italy battlefield, but he always thought it was simply due to the superior shooting skills of the French Army — how could the shooting density of scattered soldiers possibly compare to an infantry line?

He always believed that as long as the density of the infantry line was increased, the firepower would be sufficient to crush any scattered soldiers.

However, the current battle situation completely shattered his confidence.

The seemingly fierce volleys from the four rows of the Prussian infantry line mostly flew into the air, as the French, except for loading, were crouching among the dry grass.

On the contrary, the sporadic and scattered shooting from the French Army caused significant casualties.

The firefight lasted less than 15 minutes before the Duke of Brunswick had to send in the reserve troops to fill the huge casualties in the infantry line.

At this moment, another courier rushed over, handed him an encrypted letter, and said urgently, “Marshal, General Rechtingen requests you to quickly send reinforcement troops; he can’t hold on much longer.”

Despite having 14,000 more troops than Surt, the Brunswick Corps was caught off guard by the ambush and was far less combat-effective than the French Army, thus ending up unable to resist in either direction.

The Duke of Brunswick’s face turned iron-blue. He hesitated for a few seconds and said to the order officer, “Order the hussar regiment to launch a surprise attack on the enemy’s flank.

“The Bozeverna Corps will be responsible for blocking the enemy, and the rest will retreat to Essen Hener.”

At this moment, it was very unfavorable for the cavalry to launch an attack when the enemy infantry formation was intact, but the Duke of Brunswick couldn’t care anymore. He had to find a way to capture the attention of the French main force to have a chance to retreat to Essen Hener and hold the position.

Ten minutes later, Boen led nearly 4,000 hussars charging towards the French right wing from the side of the southern woods.

Meanwhile, the main force of the Prussian Army began rapidly retreating.

In front of the French temporary command post, Surt quickly received reports from hot air balloons about spotting a large number of enemy cavalry — the hot air balloon equipment on his side was intact, so the balloons quickly ascended after the battle began.

Beside him, Grouchy immediately said to Surt, “General, let me stop them.”

The latter stopped him, “Let the infantry handle it.”

He had only brought over 2,500 cavalry, and confronting the superior enemy would definitely result in heavy casualties.

Grouchy quickly reminded, “But this will affect the frontal attack.”

“It’s okay,” Surt responded, “General Lefebvre should be arriving soon.”

The Sharp Signal Car behind the French scattered soldier cluster quickly transmitted orders to each battalion, and the four regiments on the right wing quickly reformed into two hollow squares.

Boen first came under several rounds of artillery fire from a distance, and then saw the despair-inducing square formation ahead.

He bit his teeth, drew his horse saber, and commanded loudly, “Launch a frontal assault!”

It proved that the impact of the Prussian hussars was not much stronger than that of the Mamluk Cavalry.

They prowled around the hollow square, looking for opportunities, but could not make a breakthrough.

Meanwhile, the cannons and rifles within the square continued to take a toll on the Prussian cavalry.

In just over 20 minutes, the Prussian Cavalry Regiment suffered nearly one-third casualties, and no matter how Boen scolded, the remaining soldiers stood still, unwilling to run to their deaths.

Only then did Grouchy charge in with the Chest Armor Cavalry.

But the Duke of Brunswick, due to the short time Boen managed to buy, had the chance to retreat his main force from the battlefield.

However, he did not know that at this moment, the Lefevre Corps and thousands of “former Walloon Police” were waiting for him a few kilometers away.

…

Baden.

East side of the French Karlsruhe defensive line.

Previdish turned back to look at the Dolphin and Iris Flag not far away, his heart racing with excitement.

He knew that the Crown Prince was watching him under that flag.

Since the victory in Schneid Town, the new recruits of the Sixth and Seventh Armies had become enamored with bayonet charges.

Even though the Crown Prince had repeatedly ordered that unless there was an order from a brigade commander, hand-to-hand combat was prohibited, it was still impossible to completely stop them from doing so.

Recently, the recruits’ bayonet charges had indeed swiftly repelled enemy attacks several times but also caused them very serious casualties.

This led to a shortage of troops on the Baden Line when a large number of forces were transferred from Freiburg by the Allied Forces.

Today at noon, the Graham Corps launched a fierce attack on the east side of the line, creating a gap over a hundred meters wide, and General Bertier could not immediately gather enough soldiers to seal it.

So the Crown Prince led the trusted aide Grenadier Battalion into the battlefield.

Inside the French command post a few kilometers away, Duke Karl Friedrich of Baden clutched the window ledge and looked into the distance forcefully.

Although he couldn’t see anything from here, his tense expression made it seem as if he were experiencing the battle firsthand.

Just an hour ago, the Crown Prince of France had led his guards to the front line.

For a moment, Carl Friedrich even doubted whether he was making a mistake by betting all his chips on France.

But he immediately recalled the miracles created by the Son of Divine Favor, and his eyes became firm once again.