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Oder River Raids

During the Summer of 1759, the commander of Swedish forces in Pomerania, General Gustaf David Hamilton, was tasked to take more of Pomerania or invade Brandenburg, yet was given little in the way of funds and men to do so. Sweden was at least committing men to the blockade and eventual sieging of Kolberg, but such plans would not be carried out until fall.

Reinforcements from Mecklenbrg had greatly helped in freeing troops up for maneuvering, but without reforms and more support Hamilton knew he could not really press for any real long-lasting offensives. So he decided to eliminate two problems at once.

A serious lack of bridging equipment had hurt is mobility across the Oder river the prior year, and nothing was really coming forth to fix that problem yet. Hamilton thus decided to capture and seize as many Prussian civilian riverine craft along the Oder as he could and formed a river fleet out of that could reach further up the Oder than the Swedish Navy could, as well as be usable for transport across the Oder as needed for his troops.

The other objective with this makeshift river fleet was to shut down Prussian usage of the lower Oder River, and raid Prussian towns that were within easy reach of the river. To this end it was successful.

During the summer and fall, Sweden shut down the lower Oder River, attacking and destroying bridges they couldn’t capture. The cities of Gartz and Gripenhagen were raided, as was Swedtz which proved to be the furthest south the attacks and control over the Oder reached.

Battle of Posen

Similar to the prior year, as soon as Fredrick beat back one army, he found himself in need of racing off to take on another. Fredrick’s army had only a few months to recover from his victory at against Austria at Jauer on May 3rd, before they had to face off against the Russians again. While Fredrick was busy against the Austrians, Russia advanced, while he was busy against the Russians, Austria advanced.

During the spring and early summer, the Russian army had pushed past the Vistula on a drive toward Berlin and along the Baltic coast toward Kolberg. They had already taken Thorn and Bromberg, and again, Fredrick had to meet them to prevent them from joining with the Austrian army to his south.

Fredrick commanded the bulk of his forces, some 45,000 soldiers, after having left behind what he hoped was enough to maintain garrisons in lower Silesia met the 50,000 strong Russian army led by Vasily Lopukhin. The stakes were high; a loss here would be disastrous for Fredrick.

On July 20th, the Prussian army met the Russia one outside of Posen. Fredrick had what he considered was a better trained and disciplined army with a good core of veterans, but yet still had large number of fresh recruits in it as his core of multi-battle veteran soldiers dwindled with each battle. Lopukhin and the Russian forces again proved their tenacity and ability to take damage but unlike last time they didn’t have quite the numbers as they did before. Despite the risk of leaving forces weak in other areas, he had brought the largest army he felt he could risk to meet them.

Russian Forces: 10,000 dead and wounded, 22 guns captured.
Prussian Forces: 4,250 dead and wounded.

Decisive Prussian Victory.

Fredrick’s gamble had paid off. By the end of a day of fighting the Russian army was routed. It wasn’t quite as destroyed as Fredrick hoped though, and like the prior year, he could not afford to pursue the at length or attempt to retake East Prussia. Doing so would mean leaving lower Silesia and Brandenburg exposed to Austrian invasion.

Lopukhin, bristled at the loss, re-gathered his forces and retreated back to Thorn, their campaigns for this year effectively over. Russia was not out of the war though; he knew a second army was already being raised in Russia, and that Fredrick could not last forever.

Battle of Leipzig

As expected, while Fredrick was busy with Russia, Austrian and Saxon forces pushed into western Saxony.

On July 26th, a 10,000 strong Austrian-Saxon army battles a 3,000 strong Prussian army at Leipzig after retaking most of Western Saxony between the Elbe and Salle rivers.

Prussian Forces: 1,000 dead, wounded or captured. 10 guns captured.
Austrian-Saxon Forces: 600 dead and wounded.

Clear Austrian Victory.

Cut off from retreating east, Prussian forces retreat back to Halle with the Austrian-Saxon army in pursuit.

Siege of Kolberg

Count Fermor led 5,000 Russian to the city of Kolberg with intent to besiege the city, while Sweden sent an additional 3,000. Only a 1000 strong Prussians were present to defend the city.

The siege officially began on October 4th, and was beset with problem from severe storms, which severely hampered the construction of siege-works and wrecked 21 out of 27 Russian ships during the month of October. The Swedish fleet fared little better and lost 8 out of 12 ships to the October storms.

A desperate Fredrick sent 2,000 soldiers against the besieging army, who faced only a small, victorious skirmish on November 1st, as the Russians and Swedes were already preparing to lift the siege.

Swedish-Russian Forces: 300 dead and wounded (of only 3000 engaged)
Prussian Forces: 100 dead and wounded.

Prussian Victory

Siege of Halle & Battle of Nordhausen

After the formal surrender of Hasse-Kassel in October, and after being reinforced with Austrian and Bavarian troops from the south and west, Austrian-Saxon forces would make plans to Siege the city of Halle. By October, the restored Saxon government had established control over all of Saxony west of the Elbe.

16,000 Austrian, Saxon and Bavarian troops laid Siege to a 2,000 strong Prussian garrison at Halle on October 16th. Fredrick, having already sent troops off to defend Kolberg, made a desperate plea for reinforcements from the Duke of Brunswick, who reluctantly sent a 5,000 strong relief force despite his wariness over de Broglie’s nearby army preparing to winter in Kassel.

Brunswick was right to worry at a French-Hesse Damschadt force of 10,000 intercepted and defeated the Hanover-Brunswick-Wolfembuttel relief force near the city of Nordhausen on October 21st.

French-Hesse Damschadt Forces: 800 dead and wounded.
Hanoverian-Brunswick-Wolfenbuttel Forces: 1,000 dead wounded or captured. 7 guns captured.

Clear French Victory.

Despite no relief forces, Halle held out for six weeks before finally surrendering to an Austrian assault on December 7th.

Siege of Halle:
Prussian Forces: 500 casualties, 1500 captured.
Austrian-Saxon-Bavarian Forces: 400 dead and wounded.

Clear Austrian victory.