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They assembled a body of troops at Hanau, under the direction of the prince de Soubise, who, it was said, had received orders to penetrate, by the way of Donawert, Ingoldstadt, and Arnberg, into Bohemia.
On the contrary, they are kept in a state of obscurity and contempt, and in a degree of indigence at times bordering on beggary. They are, in fact, little less prisoners in the village of Hanau than the royal captives who are locked up in the tower of the Temple. I am also very apprehensive that there are other circumstances which must tend to weaken the force of our declarations.
General de Wrède, although not lacking in military skill, had, however, made the serious mistake of placing his army where it had the river at its back, which deprived it of the support which it could have received from the fortifications of Hanau, with which he could not communicate except by the bridge of Lamboy, which was his only road of retreat.
He was then about to set out on foot to pay a religious visit to the members of his own profession in various parts of the country; when at home he worked at his trade, which was that of a carpenter. The party retraced their steps to Hanau, and the next day pursued their way southwards. They passed through Darmstadt and Heidelberg to Pforzheim.
On the Hanau scheme, united Teutschland, with England for soul to it, would have fallen vigorously on the throat of France, and made France disgorge: Lorraine, Elsass, the Three Bishoprics, not to think of Burgundy, and earlier plunders from the Reich, here would have been "cut and come again" for her Hungarian Majesty and everybody!
I complied, and bore his expenses; but at Hanau, waking in the morning, I found my watch, set with diamonds, a ring worth two thousand roubles, a diamond snuff-box, with my mistress's picture, and my purse, containing about eighty ducats, stolen from my bed-side, and Schenck become invisible. Little affected by the loss of money, at any time, I yet was grieved for my snuff-box.
Hearing the noise made by this attack, the Emperor sent from his position the infantry Grenadiers of his Old Guard, led by General Friant who soon overcame this last effort of the enemy, who now hastily left the field of battle to re-group under the protection of the fort of Hanau, which they abandoned during the night, leaving behind a great number of wounded. The French occupied the fort.
Prince Ferdinand of Brunswick being determined upon this enterprise, assembled all his forces near Fulda, to the amount of forty thousand choice troops, and began his march on the tenth day of April. On the thirteenth he came in sight of the enemy, whom he found strongly encamped about the village of Bergen, between Franckfort and Hanau.
Austria and England were now prepared to mature their plans for the dismemberment of France. The commissioners met at Hanau, a small fortified town, a few miles east of Frankfort. They met, however, only to quarrel fiercely. Austrian and English pride clashed in instant collision.
I cannot even now write the name of the latter town without recalling the spectacle of tumult and confusion which it presented after the glorious battle of Hanau, where the Bavarians fought so bravely on this the first occasion when they presented themselves as enemies before those in whose ranks they had so recently stood.
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