236 THE SEVEN YEARS WAR, 1756-63Once again Frederick looked to Wied's corps as the key with
which to unlock the Austrian positions. He reinforced Wied to a
strength of more than 20,000 men, and told him to continue his
advance as a grand diversion into north-eastern Bohemia, where
Daun had his magazines. On 9 July Wied moved across the border at
Friedland, and he sent Lieutenant-General Reitzenstein in the direc-
tion of Koniggratz with a swarm of light cavalry. These gentry soon
ran amuck, and Reitzenstein had to report that 'the disorder among
the Cossacks is so great that no honest man could be associated with
these men without losing his honour and good name' (Wengen, 1890,
405). Many of the Cossacks made back to Poland with their plunder
and were never seen again. The raiders ruined a small depot at
Jaromiersch, but Brentano managed to interpose himself between
Wied's main force and the magazine at Braunau. This little adven-
ture appeared to have produced no effect on Daun's host, and
Frederick recalled all but 5,000 of the force to the Silesian plain. On 13
July Zieten and part of the main army pushed to Hoch-Giersdorf, in
the immediate proximity of the Austrians, but Frederick had come to
the end of his repertoire of feints and diversions, and Daun was
entrenched as immovably as ever in the Burkersdorf camp.
If the Seven Years War had been a story, no respectable novelist
would have dared to raise tension at this stage of affairs by a device as
crude as that now arranged by Providence, which decreed that
Frederick must now be deprived of nearly one-third of his army. On 18
July Chernyshev came to him with the news that his new-found
friend Peter III had been dethroned in a palace revolution and that
the Russian corps was under orders to leave the theatre of war. There
were even indications that Peter's formidable wife Catherine, the
leader of the coup d'etat, was ready to resume hostilities against the
Prussians.
Frederick engaged Chernyshev in an earnest private conversa-
tion, and the Russian came out of the room weeping. 'What a
wonderful man is your king,' he exclaimed, 'and that would I not give
to be in his service! He is utterly irresistible when he speaks!' He had
agreed to postpone the departure of the Russian corps for three days,
and meanwhile to allow it to fill out the line of battle, though in a
non-combatant role. The royal secretary Eichel noted: 'His Majesty
must be extremely pleased with the conduct of Count Chernyshev,
for he is going to give him a rich present' (PC 13880).
Frederick could no longer put off a direct assault on the Burkers-
dorf camp, since it was vital to make use of the three days in which
Chernyshev remained with the army, and he could not be sure how
long the Austrians would remain in ignorance of the revolution in
Russia.