Assault at Dassow
The attack near Dassow on September 4, 1813 was a skirmish in front of Dassow during the Wars of Liberation between a Holstein (Danish) squadron under French command and Prussian hussars and Mecklenburg volunteer hunters who were part of the Northern Army under Swedish command.
For the beginning of the autumn campaign in 1813 , the Northern Army had positioned itself according to the Trachenberg Plan between the Baltic Sea and the Elbe in Mecklenburg and Western Pomerania. The Russian-German Legion under Ludwig von Wallmoden-Gimborn and the Hanseatic Legion united with it . The division in Mecklenburg was under the command of Eberhard Ernst Gotthard von Vegesack . It faced the left wing of Napoleon's armies under Louis-Nicolas Davout , François Antoine Lallemand and Louis Henri Loison , who had advanced to Mecklenburg in the summer of 1813 but now came under pressure after the Battle of Großbeeren on August 23, 1813 .
In the night of September 2nd to 3rd, the French troops evacuated Wismar . The Loison division withdrew to Gadebusch . The Lallemand Brigade soon separated from her and turned to Grevesmühlen . On the evening of September 3, she reached Schönberg (Mecklenburg) . On the morning of September 4, 1813, there was a skirmish with soldiers of the Hanseatic Legion under Major Friedrich Wilhelm Ludwig von Arnim-Suckow . The French troops destroyed the bridge over the Maurine and set the houses on the street that led to the bridge on fire. 21 houses were destroyed. However, with the support of the local population, von Arnim managed to lead his troops south via Groß Siemz to Selmsdorf . He fell the next day near Wesloe near Lübeck .
The Danish Colonel Waldeck moved from Grevesmühlen to Dassow on September 3, covered by two squadrons of Holstein horsemen, the first battalion of Holstein snipers and two cannons. Here they occupied the strategically important Dassower Bridge over the Stepenitz . A squadron of Holstein horsemen under Rittmeister Baron von Wedel-Jarlsberg took over the guard east of the Stepenitz.
At daybreak they were victims of a coup of 28 Schill hussars under Lieutenant of pipe and about 20 Mecklenburg-riding hunters under the Lieutenant Ernst von Blucher (1793-1863), who at 3am by Börzow were broken.
The Holstein riders, very tired from the marches of the last few days, were surprised in their bivouac before they could saddle their horses and defend themselves.
The brief skirmish ended when the Waldeck detachment stationed at the other end of Dassow behind the bridge was alerted. It claimed about 30 dead and seriously wounded people on the part of Holstein, including Rittmeister von Wedel, who died a little later in Kiel.
The hussars and hunters captured the standard of the 4th squadron and about 50 horses and took about 40 prisoners. 6 men and horses were wounded by Rohr's command.
The adjutant of the commander of the Mecklenburg hunters, Colonel von Müller, staff officer Carl von Rantzau , brought the captured standard to the headquarters of the Crown Prince of Sweden . It ended up in the Swedish trophy collection and is now part of the collection of the Armémuseum in Stockholm.
After Colonel Waldeck had reunited with General Lallemand on the Selmsdorfer Höhe, the retreat to Lübeck was continued. The Napoleonic troops completely evacuated Mecklenburg. On the same day they fought south-east of Mölln on the Lütauer See with the Lützow hunters under Friedrich Ludwig Jahn . The front line ran for a quarter of a year from immediately east of Lübeck along the Wakenitz via Ratzeburg, Mölln and the Stecknitz Canal to Lauenburg / Elbe . Lübeck's French period did not end until December 5, 1813. The Danes were forced to peace in Kiel with the invasion of the Northern Army in Schleswig-Holstein , the Battle of Sehestedt on December 10, 1813 and the Cossack winter .
Honors
Lieutenant von Rohr, Unteroffizier Friedrich Roß from Nordenburg and the hunter Ludwig Strebel from Friedeberg in the Neumark received the Iron Cross on October 20th . Lieutenant von Blücher was awarded the Swedish Order of the Sword Medal.
literature
- Christian Ludwig Enoch Zander : History of the war on the Lower Elbe in 1813: with 7 plans. Lüneburg: Herold & Wahlstab 1839 ( digitized version )
- Hugo von Boddien: The Mecklenburg volunteer hunter regiments: Memories from the years 1813 and 1814. Rostock: Hinstorff 1863 ( digitized version )
Individual evidence
- ^ Zander (lit.), pp. 195f.
- ^ The numbers according to Friedrich Wigger: History of the von Blücher family. Volume 2, Schwerin: Stiller 1878, digitized version, p. 174f; a contemporary report printed in Berlinische Nachrichten von Staats- und schehrte Dinge of September 13, 1813, supplement, speaks of 30 hussars and 40 Mecklenburg hunters
- ↑ Berlinische Nachrichten von Staats- und schehrte Dinge ( Berlin News from State and Learned Things) of September 13, 1813, supplement
- ^ Barthold von Quistorp : History of the Northern Army in 1813. 3 volumes, Berlin: Mittler & Sohn 1894, p. 354 ( digitized version )
- ↑ Berlinische Nachrichten von Staats- und learned things. dated November 9, 1813, supplement