Bühl-Stollhofen line

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The Bühl-Stollhofener line was a defensive line of the Imperial Army in the War of the Spanish Succession . It was laid out by Margrave Ludwig Wilhelm I of Baden-Baden , also known as "Türkenlouis", from 1701 to protect northern Baden opposite the French fortress Fort-Louis, which was newly built on the Rhine .

The ten kilometer long and only partially fortified line began in the east near Obertal (today part of Bühlertal ), ran west over the heights to Bühl and then to the northwest in the Rhine Valley via Vimbuch (now part of Bühl), Leiberstung (now part of Sinzheim ) and Stollhofen to the Rhine . It consisted of ski jumps in the area, individual star jumps , horn works, small forts and fortified places and used the watercourses in the Rhine plain to flood the fore area through weirs .

By including the towns of Bühl and Stollhofen with Stollhofen Castle , control over the old Basel – Frankfurt trade routes (now Bundesstrasse 3 ) near Bühl and Strasbourg – Frankfurt (former Römerstrasse, later Bundesstrasse 36 ) was made possible. The line limited the area of ​​operations of the French troops until 1707 and blocked the easiest route via Pforzheim to Bavaria .

  • Overall plan around 1720

  • Bühl-Stollhofen lines northern section

  • Bühl-Stollhofen lines middle section

  • Bühl-Stollhofen lines southern section

After Marshal Villars crossed the Rhine in mid-February 1703, the passes through the Black Forest were still impassable due to the snow. He therefore occupied the Kehl fortress as a base on the right bank of the Rhine on March 12th and, after joining forces with Marshal Tallard's army , began the attack on the Bühl-Stollhofen line on April 19, 1703. He shelled the line south of Kappelwindeck and tried to bypass the line in the east with 25 battalions under Maréchal de camp Blainville . Both attempts on April 19 and 24 failed because the French could not overcome the fortifications at Obertal . On April 25, Villars withdrew. Thereupon the French advance into the Kinzig valley , where they conquered the entrenchments near Haslach and Hausach , which were defended with only 400 men by the Feldzeugmeister of the Swabian Empire , Count von Fürstenberg. Margrave Ludwig Wilhelm could not prevent the march of Villars in the summer of 1703 through the Kinzig valley and on to Bavaria. There Villars won the First Battle of Höchstädt . Likewise, Tallard was able to cross the Black Forest unhindered through the Dreisamtal in 1704 . While the war in Bavaria was going on, 13,000 men guarded the Stollhofen lines and the French kept the Kinzig valley occupied.

After the death of Margrave Ludwig Wilhelm on January 4, 1707, Villars was able to take the Bühl-Stollhofener line without a fight in May of the same year after a fateful decision by the newly appointed Commander-in-Chief Christian Ernst von Brandenburg and then had it destroyed. The French were also aware of the weak points of the line through the espionage activities of Bernese Colonel Hieronymus von Erlach, who was under the command of Ludwig Wilhelm . As a result, Villars occupied Ortenau and had contributions imposed on the occupied territories . As early as May 23, Villars had the new residential town of Rastatt , built from 1697, occupied by the Margrave of Baden and its fortifications razed. The wide open front enabled the French troops to march into Swabia and forays into Bavaria and Franconia. Until the peace of 1714 there were annual French raids from Strasbourg and Fort-Louis .

Due to the straightening of the Rhine in Tulla in the 19th century and the construction of roads and settlements in the last century, remnants of the line are now only partially visible in the forest area east of Bühl. The Bühl City Museum has a map of the Bühl-Stollhofener line drawn by Major Elster in 1703.

References

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  • Main State Archives Stuttgart, inventory L 6, Bü 1696, 1707

See also

literature

  • Ernst Gutmann: Stadtgeschichte Stollhofen: The history of the former official town and fortress , Sozia-Verlag, Freiburg [Breisgau], 1995
  • Eugen von Müller: The Bühl-Stollhofener Line in 1706 , in Hrsg .: Badische Historische Kommission: Zeitschrift für die Geschichte des Oberrheins , Volume 21 1906, Carl Winter's Universitätsbuchhandlung, Heidelberg, 1906
  • Hugo Schneider: The Stollhofen Lines . In: Historischer Verein für Mittelbaden (Hrsg.): Castles and palaces in Mittelbaden (=  Die Ortenau : Journal of the Historischer Verein für Mittelbaden . Volume 64 ). Verlag des Historisches Verein für Mittelbaden, Offenburg 1984, p. 507–509 ( Freiburg historical holdings - digital ).
  • Wilhelm-Nathan Calvin Sons: The Fall of the Stollhofener Lines , 2011 PDF online
  • Hans Zelter: The Stollhofener Line , in Fortification No. 9, 1995, pp. 20-24

Web links

  • Isaac van der Kloot (Ed.): De Lini, by Stolhof, in der Elsas, tussghen Straatsburg en het Fort Louis, Door de Franse aangetast op Den 23 April 1703 . [Amsterdam], [1729] urn : nbn: de: bsz: 31-78280

References and comments

  1. ↑ Together around 50,000 men in 72 battalions and 109 squadrons with 70 guns
  2. ↑ a b c The War of the Spanish Succession Ortenau (history, genealogy)
  3. ^ Prosper Ferdinand Philipp Graf zu Fürstenberg, Feldzeugmeister of the Swabian District, 1662-1704 Baden-Württemberg State Bibliography online
  4. ↑ Manfred Hildenbrand: The terrible time during the War of the Spanish Succession in: Die Ortenau , Publications of the Historical Association for Middle Baden, 52nd annual volume 1972 p. 81
  5. ^ Hugo Schneider: Die Stollhofener Linien (1984), p. 509 .
  6. ↑ Heinz Musall and Arnold Scheuerbrand: Destruction of settlements and fortifications in the late 17th and early 18th centuries (1674-1714) in: HISTORICAL ATLAS OF BADEN-WÜRTTEMBERG 6.12 p.17
  7. ↑ See description of the pictures
  8. ^ City Museum Bühl

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