Rossback and Leuthen 1757 ─ Prussia's Eagle Resurgent

Osprey's examination of Prussia's feats during the Seven Years' War (1756-1763). By the autumn of 1757 Frederick the Great was beset by enemies on all sides. The French had invaded the territory of his Anglo-Hanoverian allies, a Franco-Imperial army was threatening Saxony, an Austrian army 110,000-strong had marched into Silesia and even the ponderous Russians had moved against him. Then within a month Frederick transformed his fortunes. At Rossbach on 5 November he smashed the Franco-Imperial army in barely 11/2 hours. Force-marching to Silesia he won perhaps his greatest victory exactly a month later, crushing the Austrian Army at Leuthen. The Emperor Napoleon considered Frederick’s lightning campaign ‘a masterpiece of manoeuvre and resolution’.

Simon Millar was born in Malaysia in 1957. He joined the army in 1977 and having retired in 1994, subsequently rejoined his regiment, the Irish Guards, in 2001. He is presently serving in Germany. He has previously written Kolin 1757 – Frederick the Great’s first defeat in the Campaign series.