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Updated: June 24, 2025
In return for these important services, he observed, that the empress-queen had refused him the assistance stipulated in treaties against an invasion planned by France, whose hatred he had drawn upon himself by his friendship to that princess; and his imperial majesty even denied him the dictatorial letters which he solicited; that the court of Vienna had signed a treaty with the crown of France, in which it was stipulated that the French troops should pass the Weser, and invade the electorate of Hanover, where they were joined by the troops of the empress-queen, who ravaged his Britannic majesty's dominions with greater cruelty than even the French had practised; and the same duke of Cumberland, who had been wounded at Dettingen in the defence of her imperial majesty, was obliged to fight at Hastenbeck against the troops of that very princess, in defence of his father's dominions; that she sent commissaries to Hanover, who shared with the crown of France the contributions extorted from that electorate; rejected all proposals of peace, and dismissed from her court the minister of Brunswick-Lunenbourg; that his imperial majesty, who had sworn to protect the empire, and oppose the entrance of foreign troops destined to oppress any of the states of Germany, afterwards required the king of England to withdraw his troops from the countries which they occupied, that the French army might again have free passage into his German dominions; that the emperor had recalled these troops, released them from their allegiance to their sovereign, enjoined them to abandon their posts, their colours, and the service in which they were embarked, on pain of being punished in body, honour, and estate: and that the king of England himself was threatened with the ban of the empire.
Till August 1st; for one week, Royal Highness of Cumberland lay at Minden, some thirty odd miles from Hastenbeck; deploring that sad mistake; but unpersuadable to stand, and try amendment of it: August 1st, the French advancing on him again, he moved off northward, seaward.
The landgrave of Hesse-Cassel, soon after his territories were invaded by the French, in consequence of their advantage in the affair of Hastenbeck, had applied to the king of Sweden, as one of the guarantees of the treaty of Westphalia, desiring him to employ his good offices with the court of France, to obtain a more favourable treatment for his dominions; but his Swedish majesty, by the advice of the senate, thought proper to refuse complying with this request, alleging, that as the crown of Sweden was one of the principal guarantees of the treaty of Westphalia, it would be highly improper to take such a step in favour of a prince who had not only broke the laws and constitution of the empire, in refusing to furnish his contingent, but had even assisted, with his troops, a power known to be its declared enemy.
A day or two after, July 26, the Duke of Cumberland, who had fallen back on the village of Hastenbeck, had his intrenchments forced; he succeeded in beating a retreat without being pursued; an able movement of Prince Ferdinand of Brunswick, and a perhaps intentional mistake on the part of M. de Maillebois had caused a momentary confusion in the French army.
This reconciliation dated from the time when his Royal Highness the Duke, after having been defeated by the French, in the affair of Hastenbeck, concluded the famous capitulation with the French, which his Majesty George II. refused to ratify.
Had the allied army, after the battle of Hastenbeck, marched directly to the Leine, as it might easily have done, and then taken post on the other side of Wolfenbuttel, Halberstadt, and Magdeburgh, it might have waited securely under the cannon of the latter place for the junction of the Prussian forces; instead of which, they injudiciously turned off to the Lower Weser, retiring successively from Hamelen to Nienburgh, Verden, Rothenburgh, Buxtehude, and lastly to Stade, where, for want of subsistence and elbow-room, the troops were all made prisoners of war at large.
D'Estrees duly went to reconnoitre, but unluckily 'had mist suddenly falling. 'Well; we must attack, all the same! "And so, 26th JULY, Tuesday, there ensued a BATTLE OF HASTENBECK: the absurdest Battle in the world; and which ought, in fairness, to have been lost by BOTH, though Royal Highness alone had the ill luck.
Royal Highness, hitching back and back, had got to Hameln, a strong place of his on the safe side of the Weser; and did at last, Hanover itself being now nigh, call halt; and resolve to make a stand. Royal Highness is much swollen into obesity, into flabby torpor; a changed man since Fontenoy times; shockingly inactive, they say, in this post at Hastenbeck.
The Russians in Memel, Preussen at their feet; Soubise's French and the Reich's Army pushing on for Erfurt, to "deliver Saxony," on that western side: and from the French-English scene of operations In those same bad days Royal Highness of Cumberland has been doing a feat worth notice in the above connection! Read this, from an authentic source: "HASTENBECK, 22d-26th JULY, 1757.
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