V&F – Battle of Konzer Bridge, July 1675.

Background

The Battle of the Konzer Bridge was an episode of the Dutch War. On the 11th In August 1675, troops allied with Emperor Leopold I fought a victory over an army of the French Sun King Louis XIV. The triumph thwarted the attempt of a French army to break the siege of the French-occupied city of Trier by the imperial military. As a result, the besieged surrendered on the 6th. September 1675.

Commander of the French Army was Marshal François de Créquy (also: de Créqui). The imperial coalition army was commanded by Duke Georg Wilhelm of Braunschweig-Lüneburg. His brother, the Prince-Bishop of Osnabrück Ernst August, and Duke Karl IV of Lorraine (Georg Wilhelm’s and Ernst August’s brothers Johann Friedrich were a French partisan as Duke of Braunschweig-Calenberg (Hannover) had his brother. The imperial general guard Otto de Grana played a decisive role in the battle.

The slaughterhouse is located not far from Trier, between Wasserliesch and Konz below the Granahöhe, near the mouth of the Saar into the Moselle.

In May 1672, Brandenburg-Prussia had joined the Netherlands under the Great Elector (which he dropped again in 1673 with the Treaty of Vossem), in June 1672 the emperor followed. The year 1674 brought the decisive turnaround: Austria-Habsburg forged an anti-French coalition with Spain, Denmark, Brandenburg, the Electorate of Saxony, Wolfenbüttel and Lüneburg (Celle), Kassel and Kurtrier. The Prince-Bishop of Münster Galen changed sides and closed on 22. April 1674 a separate peace with the Netherlands. On the 11th Until then, the Cologne Elector Maximilian Heinrich, who had been allied with Ludwig, followed. He had already lost his most important fortress Bonn in November 1673 after a nine-day siege and was now forced to change alliance. This paralyzed the French supply route via the Moselle and the Lower Rhine. With the Peace of Westminster (1674), England fell from France and moved to Habsburg. When on the 24th In May 1674, the Reichstag declared the imperial war against France, Brandenburg and Osnabrück, hitherto allied with the Sun King, also pushed into the anti-French camp. Bavaria and Calenberg were among the few parts of the empire that remained loyal to France.

Initially, an action against the Swedes standing on the side of France in Bremen-Verden was planned. A powerful word from the emperor then directed the company into the Moselle region against Trier, in order to advance from there towards Lorraine or Alsace, where strong French forces had penetrated as far as Tauber and Main. Three armies were concentrated in the spring of 1675 for deployment against France, one of them near Cologne for deployment on the Moselle. The largest contingents were Lüneburg (5,000 infantrymen, 3,000 horsemen, and with 14 guns the entire artillery) and Osnabrück (3,000 foot troops, 800 horsemen). Münster and Trier were involved with 3000 foot troops each, plus imperial-Austrian troops (2000 infantrymen, 1500 horsemen) and those of the Spanish Netherlands (2000 infantrymen). Duke Charles IV of Lorraine commanded with 2 500 horsemen the bulk of the cavalry. In total, the Imperial Army had about 25,800 men, including 18,000 infantry and 7,800 cavalry. In addition, 2000 men of foot troops from Mainz were on the way, but they arrived only after the battle.

The armed forces broke on the 14th. July in Oberhausen and Bergheim and reached Schweich at the beginning of August. After the construction of a wooden makeshift bridge near Pfalzel over the Moselle, the Allies stood on the 4th. August in front of the walls of the city of Trier and began with their enclosure. Louis XIV then had an army of marching with about 10,800 man of infantry, 5400 man of cavalry and 11 cannons. The order was held by Marshal Créquy. Originally scheduled to support Condés in Alsace, he now turned back at Zabern and arrived at Tawern, coming via the Saargau, not far from the later battlefield. After that, the French moved further and now kept the plain below the (later so-called) Granahöhe, this itself and the low terraces adjacent to it on the edge of the Liescher mountain occupied.

The Imperial Army was then forced to loosen the siege of Trier and attack the French still in storage beyond the Saar. On the night of the 10th to the 11th In August, they and the bulk of their forces advanced to the Konzer Bridge, about an hour and a half away, and took the only weakly guarded river crossing in a stroke. A French counterattack undertaken shortly afterwards was aborted in view of the numerically superior Allies. They immediately began to create an additional possibility for river crossing with the help of a pontoon bridge.

Between Karthaus and Trier, 4,500 infantrymen and 600 horsemen remained in order to prevent a failure of the French lying in Trier; in fact, one of them was soon presented and rejected by about 700 men. Northwest of Trier, near Pfalzel, 3,600 men and 700 horsemen had been left behind to protect the siege guns. The remaining 16,000 men turned themselves in on the 11th. August 1675 to the Battle of the Konzer Bridge. They were confronted by more than 15,000 French people, who were completely surprised by the presence of the enemy. Around 10 a.m. (some sources also indicate 8 a.m.) the Allies crossed the Saar in three places: The infantry and artillery passed over the stone Konzer Bridge and the new Pionier Bridge, the cavalry used two fords to the left and right of the bridges. Generalwachtmeister Otto de Grana commanded the right wing and shortly after crossing the Saar captured two French suppot ships lying near Reinig (today a district of Wasserliesch) on the Moselle. He then conquered the strategically important northern terrace of the Liescher Berg (the Granahöhe later named after him); this offered an excellent view over the later battlefield and an ideal firing field.

At 11 a.m., the entire Allies were on the southern banks of the Saar; half an hour later, the French were attacked in general. Nevertheless, the fight was initially undecided. Créquy organized energetic counterattacks, which temporarily brought the Allies to the brink of defeat. The intervention of General Granas turned the war luck. With the help of the entire Lorraine cavalry (about 2,200 horsemen), 600 dragons (each consisting of half of Lorraine and half imperial) as well as about 4,500 infantry and 3 guns, he conquered the Liescher Berg and the Kehlberg against only half as strong French forces. After about an hour, Grana had occupied the heights of Tawern around 2 o’clock in the afternoon and thus grabbed the French main army in its side and back. It was this action that “decided the defeat of the enemies after three hours of fighting”, according to the inscription of the grenade monument. For Crequy’s troops, the situation was now hopeless, they turned to flee. In the end, they had suffered heavy losses: about 2000 dead and 1600 prisoners. In addition to 80 flags and standards, the imperial troops captured all 11 cannons and 200 wagons with supplies. Of the anti-French allies, more than 1,000 soldiers had lost their lives.

A contemporary report describes an impression of the fierceness of the battle: “In this position, the Keyser troops attacked the peoples [of the French] so violently that they beat these regiments completely and chopped them into the pan, insuing such a horror to the whole French camp that everyone thought more about escape than fencing”. The Imperials followed the French about 50 kilometers to the Sierck fortress on the border with French-occupied Lorraine. Another advance seemed too risky to the pursuers, so they turned around and turned against the French troops lying in the city of Trier.

The Game

A buddy of mine put this whole affair together. All the troops and terrain are part of his collection. He tweeted the ECW army sheets to represent the Dutch War forces in this game. Each unit of three 40mm bases was a unit in the game. We had pikes, shot, cavalry, dragoons and artillery.

The game was pretty much a smash up affair. Truth be told, I have taken too long to write up this battle report and do not remember exactly what happened! Getting old is great….

In short, the Dutch pushed forward are were able to turn both flanks of the French and push forward. The French lost enough units on the flanks to the Dutch and had a good number of Waiver test failures. So, it was a historic victory.

• Manteuffel