From the Fury of the Norsemen Deliver Us 167to Weissenfels, a few miles from Naumburg, on the following day, but
Gustavus stayed firmly behind his defences. In a letter of 12 November
he explained to his Saxon ally that it had been his intention in com-
ing north to attack Wallenstein immediately, but now, finding himself
‘a good deal weaker than the enemy’, particularly in cavalry, he
needed to wait for reinforcements. Another of his allies, Duke Georg
of Brunswick-Lüneburg, was heading towards him from Lower Saxony,
and his cavalry had reached the fortress of Torgau, on the River Elbe 60
miles to the north-east, while his infantry were two days march behind.
Lüneburg’s forces, 8000 strong, so Gustavus hoped, although other
sources say 6000, should reach him soon, but in the meantime ‘we
intend to stay here in Naumburg and strengthen our position’.^23
At this point, so historians have commonly stated, Wallenstein con-
cluded that Gustavus would do nothing more that year and that he
intended to winter in Naumburg. Hence he immediately started to dis-
perse his own men into their winter quarters, thus giving the king the
opportunity to attack his remaining forces at Lützen shortly afterwards.
These writers do not, however, offer any credible explanation as to why
the habitually cautious Wallenstein should have made such a careless
mistake. The fact is that he did not, as although he was undoubtedly
planning his winter dispositions both these and the more immediate
moves he made were calculated responses to the military situation,
albeit in so doing he made a near-fatal error.
Gustavus was in a difficult position, one quite similar to his first
encounter with Wallenstein. Again he had moved hastily but in insuffi-
cient strength, had failed to head off the Imperialist reinforcements, and
had been forced to take shelter in a fortified position. As at Nuremberg
this was too strong to be taken by assault, but his refuge was neverthe-
less a potential trap. This time it was too late in the season to gather
reinforcements from far and wide, while despite his optimistic letter to
the Saxons it would be difficult for Lüneburg to reach him from Torgau,
with Wallenstein’s much larger army directly in between. Wintering
in Naumburg was scarcely an option. The town, with a population of
only a couple of thousand, was too small for his army of 19,000 men
and their dependants over an extended period. Nor could he disperse
his troops into the towns and villages across a wider area – the usual
practice for winter quarters – as long as the Imperialist army remained
within striking distance. Wallenstein was sure to occupy and place
strong garrisons in all the surrounding towns he did not already hold,
both denying them to the Swedes and enabling his cavalry to control
the territory over the winter. Were he to be blockaded in Naumburg,