10 Wallenstein
an ensign, the most junior officer, rather than starting as an ordinary
soldier like many other young gentlemen had to do.
The campaign was short and not particularly glorious but Wallenstein
apparently acquitted himself well and learned from the experience.
Setting out in July 1604, the Imperial army had established itself in a
fortress town on the Danube by mid-September, where it was besieged
by a larger Turkish force. Three weeks later the Turks withdrew, bat-
tered by artillery fire and after heavy losses in unsuccessful assaults,
by which time Wallenstein had attained the rank of captain. Here he
may also have met the 45-year-old Johann Tserclaes, Count Tilly, who
was to be his principal colleague and rival in the Catholic armies more
than twenty years later, as well as Count Heinrich Matthias Thurn, who
became a leader of the Bohemian revolt and commander of its forces,
and the Spaniard Count Balthasar Marradas, who was successively his
superior, subordinate and opponent in the Imperial army in the 1620s
and 1630s, all of whom were already colonels.^9
That was not the end, as a Hungarian revolt replaced the threat from
the Turks, and the force on the spot had to combat it. The resulting cam-
paign, running from autumn to well into winter, resembled much of the
Thirty Years War, with raids, skirmishing, foraging and looting expedi-
tions rather than pitched battles being the order of the day. During its
course Wallenstein sustained a wound in the hand but emerged high
enough in the confidence of his superiors to be chosen for an impor-
tant mission. Not, however, a military one, although it turned out to
be dangerous enough. The force had run out of money, the troops were
unpaid and refusing to resume campaigning in the spring, and deputa-
tions from each regiment had to be sent back to their homelands to
beg for funds. Wallenstein represented the Bohemian infantry, another
officer acted for the cavalry, and they travelled together with a small
escort, suffering numerous misadventures on this hazardous journey,
which involved a long detour through the Tatra mountains and Silesia
in mid-winter in order to avoid enemy-held territory. On arrival in
January 1605 Wallenstein was suffering from what he later described as
the Hungarian sickness, not now positively identifiable but which may
have been responsible for some of his later recurrent illnesses.^10 His
fellow-officer had to cope alone with the plea for cash, but predictably
he got nothing.
Wallenstein did not return to the army in Hungary on his recovery.
Instead his name appears as one of two put forward by the Bohemian
Estates in February 1605 for appointment as a military commissioner
to enquire into the strength, readiness and pay of the troops in its