Battle of Nördlingen (1634)

Background

By 1634 Sweden's war in Germany had lost its king and its momentum. Gustavus Adolphus had died at Lützen in November 1632, and the Swedish cause was carried by the Heilbronn League of Protestant states, never as strong as intended, and by commanders who rarely agreed: the cautious Field Marshal Gustav Horn and the daring Duke Bernhard of Saxe-Weimar. The Swedish armies had split into half a dozen occupation forces with their own interests.

The Catholic side had grown more united. After Wallenstein's murder in February 1634 the Imperial army passed to the Emperor's son, Ferdinand, King of Hungary, who brought the Bavarian army of the Catholic League under the same command and persuaded Spain to intervene directly. His cousin the Cardinal-Infante Ferdinand was marching a Spanish army from Italy to the Netherlands, where he was to be governor, and agreed to join him on the way.

In July Ferdinand retook Regensburg before Horn and Bernhard could relieve it, then marched west to meet the Spanish. The Swedish armies followed in heavy rain and reached Augsburg on 6 August exhausted, having lost men, horses and equipment. Donauwörth fell on 16 August, and on 18 August the Imperialists and Bavarians laid siege to Nördlingen, a Protestant imperial city held by about 400 Swedish soldiers and 600 townsmen, to which Bernhard had promised protection.

Horn and Bernhard gathered about 20,000 men at Bopfingen, 12 km to the west, and waited for reinforcements. The Spanish army arrived on 2 or 3 September, and on 4 September the defenders beat off seven assaults on breaches in the wall. With the town close to falling, the Swedish commanders resolved to act.

The armies

The Swedish side brought about 25,000 men, roughly 16,000 foot and 9,000 horse. They were a mixed army: Swedish, Scottish and German regiments of the line, the veteran brigades of Thurn and Vitzthum, a Scottish brigade under Colonel William Gunn, Cratz's newly arrived Franconian troops, and several thousand Württemberg militia, who guarded the baggage. Horn led the right wing, Bernhard the left and the bulk of the cavalry.

Their opponents were three armies under a single command: the Imperial army of the King of Hungary, with Gallas and Piccolomini as his generals; the Bavarian army; and the Cardinal-Infante's Spanish army with the Marquis of Leganés. Estimates of the whole range from 33,000 to about 50,000, and they were certainly the larger force. The Swedish leaders did not believe it. A captured Spanish officer, Escobar, told them the Spanish alone had 14,000 foot and 3,500 horse; Bernhard thought he faced 5,000 foot and 2,000 horse.

The Spanish army was the core of the battle. Its tercios, Spanish and Italian veterans including those of Idiáquez, Toraldo and Fuenclara, fought in small firing units, delivered volleys by platoon and counter-attacked downhill, and their engineers under the artillery general Gian Maria Serbelloni could dig a defensible position in a single night. The Imperial and Bavarian cavalry, including Croat light horse and Johann von Werth's regiments, were numerous and well handled.

The battle

The fighting took place on low hills about 2–7 km south of Nördlingen, between the Eger and Rezenbach streams. From west to east lay the Himmelreich, the Ländle, the Lachberg, the wooded Heselberg and the bare, rocky Albuch, which covered the Catholic camp on the Schönefeld and its left flank. CDB90 records one engagement, number 10 (NORDLINGEN I), from 05:30 to 12:30 on 6 September: the main assault on the Albuch and the collapse. It leaves out the first day and the pursuit. Times below follow German Wikipedia's detailed account; English Wikipedia's differs in places.

5 September: the approach. The Swedes left Bopfingen in the morning, swinging south through Dehlingen to approach along the Ulm road. Bernhard's vanguard took the easy route and in the afternoon met Catholic outposts between Ederheim and Holheim. The Catholic commanders hurried about 500 infantry each onto the Albuch and the Heselberg. Cavalry fights followed, with up to 6,000 horse on each side, and by 18:00 Bernhard's foot held the Lachberg, Himmelreich and Ländle. Before sunset some 4,000 of his infantry attacked the Heselberg, held by Spanish veterans of the Tercio of Fuenclara. The Spanish fed in reinforcements and the wood was not cleared until about midnight.

Horn's column, with the rearguard and heavy guns, had taken an eastern route over the Arnsberg and fallen into confusion descending into the Rezenbach valley, horse, foot and guns jammed together. It reached the field only at midnight, too late to attack the Albuch, then held by only a few men. Bernhard's success had overtaken the defensive plan the two had agreed, and they decided to storm the Albuch at dawn.

The night. Serbelloni's men fortified the Albuch with three half-moon redoubts behind earth banks, armed them with 14 guns and put Gallas in command of the hill. By morning it held about 3,900 infantry from all three armies and 2,700 horse, with Idiáquez's tercio of about 1,500 in reserve behind it.

6 September, 05:00–08:00: the middle redoubt. The attack began badly. Horn's own regiment mistook his reconnaissance for the signal to charge, was drawn into a cavalry fight and had to be rescued at a cost. The Scottish and Vitzthum brigades then stormed the middle redoubt, cut up a raw Bavarian regiment and took its guns. A powder explosion inside the work threw the victors into disorder, Spanish cavalry struck their flank, and Idiáquez's tercio retook the redoubt. Horn had no cavalry ready to hold it. A great cavalry fight on the plateau went against the Swedes before 08:00.

08:00–12:00: the assaults fail. Bernhard sent Thurn's brigade of 1,600 veterans against the northern redoubt held by Toraldo's Neapolitans; it broke in, was checked by 1,300 Spanish musketeers and fell back to the edge of the Heselwald. On the left, Bernhard's cavalry under Taupadel and Cratz tried to turn Werth's Bavarians near Herkheim; the Bavarian commander Billehe was killed, but two Imperial cuirassier regiments drove the Swedes back about a kilometre. Bernhard's attempts to force a boggy pass between the Heselberg and the Lachberg, held by Colonel Butler's dragoons, failed. Horn's infantry made about fifteen more attacks on the Albuch, all thrown back, while the Spanish north of the hill grew from about 900 men at 05:00 to 5,200 by 10:00.

Noon: the rout. Around midday Horn agreed with Bernhard to withdraw west through Ederheim towards the Arnsberg, Bernhard covering him. Spanish, Imperial and Bavarian troops pushed through the Heselwald, Bavarian foot took the Lachberg and turned its guns on the Swedes, and the Catholic cavalry charged Bernhard's line. His infantry broke and his fleeing horse ran into Horn's column in the Rezenbach valley. The retreat became a rout, with Croat horse cutting down fugitives and falling on the baggage. Horn was captured with his deputy Cratz; Bernhard escaped only on a borrowed horse.

Aftermath

The Swedish and League army was destroyed. It lost about 12,000 men killed, wounded and captured, at a cost of perhaps 1,200 to the victors, along with all its artillery and its baggage, war chancery and pay chest. Horn remained a prisoner until 1642. Cratz, a former Bavarian general who had changed sides, was executed for treason. Bernhard reached Heilbronn a few days later with the survivors.

Nördlingen surrendered, and before the spring of 1635 nearly all of southern Germany was back in Catholic hands. Bernhard's Duchy of Franconia vanished, and Württemberg's duke fled to Strasbourg while his lands were plundered and parcelled out. The Cardinal-Infante went on to Brussels.

The strategic results were larger still. Saxony, Sweden's most important German ally, opened talks with the Emperor and made the Peace of Prague in May 1635, which most Protestant estates then joined. With Sweden's German system collapsing, Richelieu moved from paying for the war to fighting it: France allied with the Dutch and Sweden and declared war on Spain in 1635, turning a German war into a European one and opening its bloodiest phase. Henry Kamen has called Nördlingen arguably the most important battle of the war.

Arguments centre on the Swedish command: whether Bernhard's eagerness or Horn's caution was to blame, why the two underestimated the enemy so badly, and whether waiting for reinforcements would have forced the Spanish to move on. A memorial stone has stood on the Albuch since 1896.

Wargaming it

Nördlingen is a large pike-and-shot battle with a strong attack-and-defence shape: roughly 25,000 attacking 33,000 or more, around a single fortified hill. It works best with units of a brigade, tercio or a few squadrons and 20–30 minute turns, either as the decisive morning of 6 September (05:00–13:00) or as a two-day game.

The key terrain is compact and readable. The Albuch with its three redoubts is the objective; the wooded Heselberg, the Lachberg and the Ländle form Bernhard's base; the boggy pass between Heselberg and Lachberg and the open ground towards Herkheim are where the cavalry fight. The Spanish player's game is reserves: feeding tercios and cuirassiers onto the hill as each assault falls. The Swedish player has to break in before that happens, and to time a withdrawal that does not collapse.

The decisions and what-ifs are good ones. Could Horn's column, had it not jammed in the Rezenbach valley, have taken the Albuch on the evening of 5 September before it was fortified? Should the Swedes have stood on the defensive, as planned, until the Rhinegrave's 5,000 arrived? Hidden or uncertain strengths suit the battle well, since the Swedish commanders badly misjudged how many Spanish they faced. Chance events such as the powder explosion in the middle redoubt and Horn's premature regimental charge make good random-event cards. A first-day scenario of meeting engagement and night assault on the Heselberg is a change from the usual set-piece.

Maps and pictures