102 THE SEVEN YEARS WAR, 1756-63
soldiers as amicably as among children' (Ewald von Kleist to Gleim,
in Volz, 1926-7, II, 4).
Both the armies were anxious not to take the initiative in
opening hostilities, and indeed the first Prussian soldier was not killed
until 12 September - the victim of a minor skirmish. Historians have
wondered ever since why Frederick, having gone to so much trouble
to secure a strategic surprise, now seemed oblivious of the passage of
time. Perhaps he hoped from one day to the next that starvation was
about to force the Saxons to surrender, and so yield him a rich prize of
hungry but intact troops.
Frederick pushed the first troops across the border into nearby
Bohemia on 13 September. He wished to open fresh foraging country
to his cavalry, and he was anxious to know of the exact whereabouts
of the Austrian field-marshal Browne, who was assembling the
enemy troops somewhere in north Bohemia. Frederick became dis-
satisfied with the quality of the reports he was receiving from Keith,
who was in charge of the growing Prussian force in Bohemia, and so
on the 28th he betook himself to the camp of Johnsdorf and assumed
personal command.On 30 September Frederick directed the 28,500 men of the army on a
forced march up the stony roads of the Bohemian Mittel-Gebirge and
over the pass of Paschkopole to Wellemin, just short of the Bohemian
plain. The departure had been delayed by one of the heavy autumn
fogs that are so common in those parts, and in order to make up the
time the troops had to hurry through the afternoon and well into the
night, which fell at seven in the evening.
Frederick was taken by the resemblance between the name of
Wellemin and that of his favourite sister Wilhelmine, and he was in a
good humour as he settled for the night in the relative comfort of his
travelling coach. His generals and staff officers lay around him under
the open sky: 'They served, as it were, as a protection for the greatest
treasure which Providence has bestowed upon mankind in this pre-
sent age' (Pauli, 1758-64, V, 55).
At 5.30 on the misty morning of 1 October Frederick and his
generals set out to join the six battalions of the advance guard at the
southern exit of the last valley of the Mittel-Gebirge. On the way he
was met by an officer who reported that, as far as could be distin-
guished in the fog, the Austrian army appeared to be deploying on the
plain below. Frederick rode on a little further, then abruptly turned
his horse around and hastened back to rejoin his main force. At six he
advanced the infantry down the valley in two columns, while the
cavalry moved up close behind in three lines, taking up almost the
entire width of the valley floor.