I Am the Crown Prince in France

Chapter 452: Defeat is just a new beginning

Heine hurriedly took the telescope handed by the attendant, and then saw that there were densely packed soldiers gathered in front of the Prussian defense line, and the line was so long that it was impossible to see the end.

"Quick! Alarm!" He shouted immediately, "The Prussians are about to launch an attack!"

Fortunately, although the Liegnitz front has been calm, it is a state of war between two countries after all, so the soldiers are still in a state of combat readiness on a daily basis.

Sharp whistles and drums of assembly soon sounded all around.

The Austrian soldiers complained and lined up near the defense line, and then heard dense artillery fire from the opposite side.

Along with the whistling of artillery shells, nearly 20 shells fell near the Austrian artillery positions, stirring up a lot of dust.

The Austrian artillery also hurriedly fought back, but after only firing a dozen shots, they were shocked to find that the ammunition was almost exhausted.

The Prussians began to risk pushing their cannons forward. After finding that the counterattack from the opposite side was very weak, they suddenly became bolder. Several 24-pound fortress cannons were dragged to the front by more than ten horses.

The Duke of Brunswick had originally mobilized all the cannons around, which were nearly twice as many as the cannons of the defenders in front of him. With sufficient ammunition, the Austrian artillery was soon bombarded and could not raise their heads.

Marshal Lacy also got the news and rushed to the defense zone of Davydov as quickly as possible. It was already 3 o'clock in the afternoon.

What he saw was that there were only 4 cannons left on his defense line, but the firing rate was so low that he wanted to curse.

The Prussian infantry on the opposite side had been fully deployed, just covering the entire defense zone of Davydov. There were about 14,000 people in the first infantry line alone!

At the same time, a large number of scattered soldiers had already taken advantage of the terrain to touch the place less than 400 steps away from their own defense line.

There was only a rather thin infantry line on his side, which seemed to have no more than 10,000 people. There were many troops on both sides who had just received the news, but they could not be put into battle for a while under the state of rapid march.

Marshal Lacy was sweating coldly. It was indeed risky for him to transfer the corps of Davydov and Conrad, but he did not expect that Ferdinand would launch a targeted attack so quickly. Ferdinand is the name of the Duke of Brunswick.

In fact, Lacy did not fail to supplement the defense here, but he had less than 100,000 troops left, and the entire line of defense had to be taken care of, so only more than 15,000 people were assigned to this section.

The roar of the Prussian artillery gradually weakened, followed by bursts of melodious trumpets.

Lacy hurriedly looked through the telescope and saw that the Prussian scattered soldiers had begun to harass the line formation on his side. This means that the enemy will soon launch a general attack, and a large number of infantry will come up.

"Damn it!" He cursed in a low voice, "If it weren't for that French guy, how could there be such a big hole in my defense line!"

At this time, he had completely forgotten that he came to Silesia to defeat the Prussians and regain his homeland, not to build any defense line.

If it wanted to defend, Austria could completely retreat to the Bohemian region and rely on the Sudeten Mountains for defense, which would be twice the result with half the effort.

But complaining at this time was useless. Marshal Lacy had to send a herald to desperately urge the reinforcements to speed up, and then, regardless of his subordinates' obstruction, he personally came to the front line and ran back and forth to boost morale.

Not long after, a 12-pound artillery shell passed by his side, smashing a huge gap in the infantry line, almost rolling to the second row of the line array, before being blocked by a mound of earth.

The attendants looked at the flesh and blood mixed with the soil on the ground, and hurriedly carried the marshal to the rear.

Then, the Prussian army, with four of the most elite grenadier regiments as the core, slowly pressed towards the Austrian position with a long and narrow infantry line.

Marshal Lacy's encouragement played a certain role. With the cooperation of the skirmishers, the Austrian soldiers actually withstood the approaching volleys of the opposite grenadiers, and then, under the order of the officers, they fired back with volleys at a distance of 40 steps.

In the era of infantry line battles, as long as the soldiers could stand, there was a battle to be fought.

The two sides soon fell into a situation of shooting at each other - tens of thousands of soldiers lined up in a tight formation on a front line of more than 3 kilometers, standing upright, mechanically loading and shooting continuously.

Kill the soldiers on the opposite side, or be knocked down by the bullets on the opposite side.

This is what people often call "queueing and shooting".

After the two sides fired seven or eight rounds at each other, the Prussian army, which had the advantage in numbers, could not hold on first, and some began to retreat timidly.

At this time, the Prussian army was no longer the fierce army under Frederick the Great. In terms of individual soldier quality, it was even inferior to Austria.

The first wave of Prussian infantry retreated one after another, and the Austrian position suddenly cheered excitedly.

However, Marshal Lacy did not dare to let the soldiers pursue, because he knew that the Prussians had a huge advantage in manpower.

Sure enough, the Duke of Brunswick quickly ordered the second infantry line to launch an attack, giving the Austrians no chance to breathe.

Marshal Lacy let several skirmishers harass the left wing of the Prussian army at all costs, and with the remaining three cannons, they barely kept the defense line.

The two sides were deadlocked until dark, and each retreated to the camp.

However, after most of the day's fighting, Austria had suffered heavy casualties, especially the elite skirmishers, which were extremely exhausted.

After inspecting the wounded, Lacy had already begun to arrange for the second line of defense in the west.

The next morning, the Duke of Brunswick launched a fierce attack without hesitation.

Under the repeated attacks of more than 50,000 Prussian troops, the Austrian army held out until about two o'clock in the afternoon, and was finally found a gap by a Prussian hussar team and cut into the left wing of their infantry line.

With the continuous harassment of the flank by the cavalry, the Austrian defense line collapsed immediately.

The Duke of Brunswick decisively ordered the cavalry to squeeze the Austrian Corps from both sides, and at the same time sent a large number of infantry to set up defense lines on the north and south sides to block the Austrian reinforcements.

Marshal Lacy desperately commanded the soldiers to retreat, but was still blocked by the Prussian cavalry in a depression 15 kilometers away from the front line a day later.

Fortunately, he slipped out of the encirclement before the enemy closed in. But when he looked at the huge gap in his own defense line on the map, he was already half disappointed.

At present, the best situation is to delay the Prussians, wait for his troops to withdraw from Ratibor, and then try to stabilize the front line.

However, after this disastrous defeat, it is almost impossible to recapture Silesia.

As for the more than 10,000 soldiers who were surrounded, he no longer had any hope.

However, when he was sitting on the horse and looking at the surrounded soldiers with a telescope, he suddenly widened his eyes--

In the far distance, a cavalry team was rushing towards the flank of the Prussians at a very fast speed, and those people seemed to be wearing white uniforms.