Battle of Kunersdorf (1759): Prussia's Worst Defeat in the War

The Battle of Kunersdorf, fought on 12 August 1759 near Frankfurt an der Oder, was the worst defeat Frederick the Great ever suffered. A combined Russian and Austrian army destroyed about 40 per cent of his force in a single afternoon, and that night the king thought Prussia was finished. Yet the victors did not follow up, an outcome Frederick later called a miracle.

Background

By 1759 the Seven Years’ War had become a war of attrition for Prussia. Despite his victories at Rossbach and Leuthen in 1757, Frederick faced enemies with far greater resources: Austria, Russia, France and Sweden. His veteran soldiers were steadily being killed, and their replacements were less well trained.

Russia was now the most dangerous threat. The Russian army had fought Prussia to a bloody draw at Zorndorf in 1758, and in July 1759 a new commander, General Pyotr Saltykov, beat a Prussian corps at Kay (Paltzig). Saltykov then moved to the Oder and joined an Austrian corps under Ernst Gideon von Laudon. Their combined army sat less than 100 kilometres from Berlin.

The armies

Frederick gathered about 49,000 men and around 230 guns. The allies had roughly 59,000–64,000 men, about 41,000 Russians and 18,000–19,000 Austrians, with a strong artillery park. They were dug in on a line of sandy hills east of the Oder, running from the Mühlberge in the north-east through the Kuhgrund ravine to the Judenberg near Frankfurt.

The position was strong, but Frederick believed he could repeat Leuthen by attacking one end of it. After a long night march around the allied flank, he planned to strike the Russian left on the Mühlberge and roll up the line.

What happened

The attack began late in the morning of 12 August after a heavy bombardment. Prussian grenadiers stormed the Mühlberge, captured dozens of Russian guns and drove off the defenders. At this point the battle seemed won, and some reports of victory were sent towards Berlin.

Frederick, however, pressed on against the advice of some of his generals. His tired infantry had to attack across the Kuhgrund ravine and up the Spitzberg, where Russian and Austrian reserves had formed a dense new line. The broken, wooded ground and the ponds around Kunersdorf village broke up the Prussian formations, and repeated assaults failed under concentrated artillery fire.

General Friedrich Wilhelm von Seydlitz, whose cavalry had decided Rossbach, was wounded while leading charges against the Spitzberg. In the early evening Laudon launched the allied cavalry against the exhausted Prussians. Their army disintegrated into a mass of fugitives fleeing towards the Oder bridges. By nightfall Frederick could gather only about 3,000 men around him.

Key people

Frederick II (1712–1786) commanded in person and exposed himself constantly. Two horses were killed under him, and he was led off the field by a cavalry escort under Captain Joachim Bernhard von Prittwitz.

Pyotr Saltykov (1698–1772), the Russian commander, was a cautious veteran who had been given the command earlier that summer. He was promoted to field marshal after the battle.

Ernst Gideon von Laudon (1717–1790), an Austrian general born in Livonia, led the decisive counter-attack. He became one of Austria’s most celebrated commanders.

Ewald Christian von Kleist (1715–1759), a Prussian officer and well-known poet, was mortally wounded in the battle and died in Frankfurt on 24 August.

The night of despair

That evening Frederick wrote to his minister, Count Karl-Wilhelm Finck von Finckenstein, in French. He said he believed all was lost, that he would not survive the ruin of his country, and bid him farewell for ever. For a few days he handed command to General Friedrich August von Finck and spoke of abdication.

Consequences and the “miracle”

The road to Berlin lay open, but the allies did not take it. The Russians had suffered heavy losses, around 13,000–14,000 men, and Saltykov was reluctant to sacrifice more of his army for what he saw as Austrian gains. Supplies were short, and Russian and Austrian commanders disagreed over what to do next. The allied armies moved off south-east instead.

Within weeks Frederick had gathered over 30,000 men again. In a letter to his brother Prince Henry on 1 September 1759 he described the allies’ failure to finish him as the “miracle of the House of Brandenburg”. The phrase is now often applied to a second reprieve in 1762, when the death of Empress Elizabeth of Russia led her successor Peter III to make peace with Prussia.

Kunersdorf nonetheless crippled Prussia’s field army for the rest of 1759, which ended with another loss at Maxen in November. Russian troops briefly occupied Berlin in October 1760.

Timeline

• 1758, 25 August: Bloody drawn battle between Prussians and Russians at Zorndorf.
• 1759, 23 July: Saltykov defeats a Prussian corps at Kay (Paltzig).
• 1759, 3 August: Laudon’s Austrians join the Russians near Frankfurt an der Oder.
• 1759, 12 August, late morning: Prussians storm the Mühlberge.
• 1759, 12 August, evening: Laudon’s cavalry routs the Prussian army.
• 1759, 1 September: Frederick writes of the “miracle of the House of Brandenburg”.
• 1760, October: Russian and Austrian troops briefly occupy Berlin.

Why it matters

Kunersdorf showed that even Frederick the Great could be crushed, and that Russia had become a major military power in central Europe. Prussia survived not through its own strength but because its enemies could not cooperate, a lesson in the limits of coalition warfare.