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Yet so it was: how the thing came about, and what an important part young Conrad, the carpenter's apprentice, played in these great events, will be found narrated in the following pages. On the 1st of November in the year 1642, a carpenter's apprentice, Conrad Schmidt by name, passed out at the Erbis Gate of Freiberg, pushing before him a covered hand-truck.
As he did so, he caught the sound of a groan, and a feeble voice murmured: 'Ah, merciful Father, do not let the arch-enemy prevail against me, or what will become of my three boys, all of them stampers at the Prince's Shaft. If I must die, do Thou take under Thy care my wife and my four poor girls. They are at the coppersmith's house in the Erbis Street.
'The enemy is pressing hard on the Meissen and Erbis Gates, shouted a breathless messenger, sent in haste to summon assistance from the town hall, and immediately detachments of the auxiliaries drawn up there started at the double to strengthen the threatened points. As they went they uttered loud shouts of joy, and clashed their weapons till the market-place rang again.
Two companies of infantry, under Captain von Arnim, had charge of the Peter Gate; Major Müffel, with his own men and some others, mounted guard at the Erbis and Donat Gates; Captain Badehorn, with the City Guard, garrisoned the Electoral Castle and the Kreuz Gate, together with the works and space that lay between.
At these words the man let his weapon sink, and stood staring at the boy, who was again cautiously approaching him holding out the paper. 'Why, bless me! said the man at last, 'isn't this Conrad Schmidt from the Erbis Street? 'What! is it you, Master Prieme? said Conrad joyfully. 'What are at least, how came you here? asked Prieme. 'I came out with the sortie, said Conrad.
He hastened to reach the Münzbach, which flows into the town in two streams between the Erbis and Donat Gates. In the year 1297, an enemy had made treacherous use of this river to enter and plunder the town; and the points of its entrance and exit had from that time been guarded against surprise by strong towers, beneath the arched foundations of which the river now flowed.
While the battle still raged round the Peter, Meissen, and Erbis Gates, and the Swedes fancied the Freibergers a prey to anxiety and fear, the undismayed miners made a sortie through the Donat Gate, destroyed the Swedish siege-works that lay in that quarter, slew a number of the enemy, and returned into the city, bringing with them several prisoners.
Here were the vigorous journeymen of the different trades, and the stalwart country-people; there the trusty miners, some with nondescript weapons, others armed with pick-axes, mattocks, and long guns, or provided with ladders and great buckets of water, in readiness for an alarm of fire. In the streets adjoining the Erbis and Kreuz Gates, bustling activity was the order of the day.
Although successive volleys of balls decimated the Swedish ranks, their losses did not in the least deter them from pursuing their object with the most supreme indifference to death. Fresh men continually took the place of those that fell, and the forces of the besieged being thus either divided or broken, the Erbis and Meissen Gates were both assaulted at once.
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