Battle
The Protestant troops came from the east and reached Eric's troops, who were entrenched on the dunes. The Schmalkaldic attackers availed themselves of a tactic attributed to Brun von Bothmer, a captain from Brunswick. He knew the area well as he lived there as a child and proposed a pincer movement with a second offensive at the Catholics' rear. Bothmer led about one thousand mounted arquebusiers to attack from the north covertly. Both parties began the battle with simultaneous shelling and assaults. In doing so, Eric's battle formation faltered. Additionally, the Protestant cavalry divided the imperial forces by riding in between the hills. In the chaos, Eric's cavalry fled, inflicting losses upon their own infantry. The Catholic forces' escape route had been cut off by the Schmalkaldic forces as well as the nearby swampland. The only escape was the Weser River, which was flooded with spring runoff. Approximately 1,000 imperial mercenaries drowned while looking for a ford. Duke Eric II swam across the river with great difficulty, but survived.
Read more about this topic: Battle Of Drakenburg
Famous quotes containing the word battle:
“Up from the South at break of day,
Bringing to Winchester fresh dismay,
The affrighted air with a shudder bore,
Like a herald in haste, to the chieftain’s door,
The terrible grumble, and rumble, and roar,
Telling the battle was on once more,
And Sheridan twenty miles away.”
—Thomas Buchanan Read (1822–1872)
“Forty years after a battle it is easy for a noncombatant to reason about how it ought to have been fought. It is another thing personally and under fire to have to direct the fighting while involved in the obscuring smoke of it.”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)
“In a time of war the nation is always of one mind, eager to hear something good of themselves and ill of the enemy. At this time the task of news-writers is easy, they have nothing to do but to tell that a battle is expected, and afterwards that a battle has been fought, in which we and our friends, whether conquering or conquered, did all, and our enemies did nothing.”
—Samuel Johnson (1709–1784)