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Siege of Kolberg (1807)
Part of the War of the Fourth Coalition
Former battle memorial with statues of Nettelbeck and Gneisenau in Kolberg
Date March to 2 July 1807 Location Kolberg (Colberg; now Kołobrzeg), Prussian Province of Pomerania Result Inconclusive, siege lifted by peace treaty
Belligerents
French Empire Polish rebels against Prussia French Empire clients: Italy Holland Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg Saxe-Meiningen Saxe-Hildburghausen Saxe-Weimar Württemberg Nassau	Prussia Naval support: Sweden Great Britain
Commanders and leaders
Victor-Perrin Teulié † Loison Mortier	Lucadou Gneisenau Nettelbeck Schill

The Siege of Kolberg was a siege of Kolberg (Kołobrzeg) in the Prussian province of Pomerania from March to July 2, 1807, during the Napoleonic Wars.

After Prussia lost the Battle of Jena-Auerstedt in late 1806, French troops marched north into Pomerania. Fortified Stettin (Szczecin) surrendered without battle, and the province became occupied by the French forces. Only fortified Kolberg resisted, and the French laid a siege in March 1807. Ferdinand von Schill was among the defendants. The Kolberg bourgeoisie also actively participated led by Joachim Nettelbeck. In late April, major August Neidhardt von Gneisenau replaced Lucadou's command. The troops in the town were supplied and via Kolberg's port, which was successfully defended. The siege was not successful and was lifted only when Prussia surrendered to Napoleon Bonaparte in the Peace of Tilsit on July 2. .

Prelude

Within two weeks after the Battle of Jena-Auerstedt (14 October 1806), Napoleon's Grande Armée had pursued the defeated Royal Prussian Army to Pasewalk in Prussian Pomerania. The provincial capital Stettin (now Szczecin), one of twenty Prussian fortresses, capitulated on 29 October. Pierre Thouvenout was appointed French governor of Pomerania and sent his envoy Mestram to the fortress of Kolberg to accept its capitulation and take control of it. Kolberg at that time had about 5,000 inhabitants. On 8 November 1806 Mestram met with the Prussian commander of Kolberg Louis Maurice de Lucadou (Ludwig Moritz von Lucadou) before its walls. Lucadou's refusal to hand over the fortress came as a surprise to the French generals and the Prussian administration in Stettin, who had already plegded allegiance to the French; it further led part of the defeated Prussian army to take refuge in Kolberg and reinforce the two musketeer batallions of the von Owstien and von Borcke regiments and the 72 guns garrisoned there. Lucadou ordered the Persante (Parseta) river west of Kolberg to be dammed up to flood the area around the fortress, and arranged the construction of Wolfsberg sconce east of the town. Coordination of these measures with Joachim Nettelbeck, representative of the Kolberg citizens, was however impaired by the latter's personal grievances against Lucadou.

Among the Prussian soldiers who had retreated to Kolberg after Jena and Auerstedt was secondelieutenant Ferdinand von Schill, who after his recovery from a severe head injury in the house of Kolberg senator Westphal was ordered to patrol the areas west of the fortress with a small cavalry unit. Supplied with information about French movements by local peasants, he succeeded in capturing a number of French officers and soldiers, gathering food and financial supplies in neighboring towns and villages, and recruiting volunteers to his unit from inside and outside Kolberg.

Schill's victory in the skirmish of Gülzow, though insignificant from a military point of view, was widely noted as the first Prussian success against the French army - while Prussian king Frederick William III praised Schill as the "kind of man now valued by the fatherland", Napoleon referred to him as a "miserable kind of brigand". As a consequence of these successes and Schill's increasing fame, Prussian king Frederick William III ordered him to establish a freikorps on 12 January 1807, which in the following months defended the fortress against French attacks allowing its defendants to complete their preparations for the expected siege with Swedish and British support via the Baltic.

Claude Victor-Perrin, whom Napoleon Bonaparte had entrusted with taking Kolberg, was captured by Schill's forces in Arnswalde, detained in Kolberg and later exchanged against Prussian general Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher. With Perrin captured, the attack on Kolberg was to be led by Pietro (Pierre) Teulié's Italian division, who in February began the march on the fortress from Stettin. Schill's freikorps further delayed the French advance by provoking several skirmishes and battles, the largest of which took place near Naugard. Teulié reached the Kolberg area by early March, and by the mid of the month had cleared the surrounding villages of Schill's forces and encircled the fortress.

Siege

When the French encirclement of Kolberg rendered Schill's strategy moot, Lucadou sent three cavalry units to aid the Krockow freikorps in the defense of Danzig, while Schill departed to aid in the defense of Stralsund in Swedish Pomerania. The surburbs, most notably Geldernerviertel, were burned down as it was customary.

Because of the delay in the French advance, Napoleon replaced Teulié as the commander of the siege forces with division general Louis Henri Loison; Frederick William III replaced Lucadou as the commander of the fortress with major August Neidhardt von Gneisenau after complaints by Nettelbeck and out of considerations for an envisioned British landfall at Kolberg - he feared that a French-born commander might irritate his British supporters, while on the other hand Gneisenau had been in British service during the American Revolutionary War.

The French siege army was reinforced by troops from Württemberg and Saxony as well as a Polish regiment. In April, Napoleon withdrew the forces of Edouard Mortier from the siege of Stralsund and sent them to take Kolberg, however, Mortier soon had to return when the defendants of Stralsund pushed the remaining French troops out of Swedish Pomerania. In early May, the siege forces numbered more than 8,000 troops and were divided into four brigades: the first brigade was commanded by Berndes and included one Polish regiment counting 1200 Polish troops (Sułkowski) and two Württemberg regiments (Seckendorff, Romig); the second brigade was commanded by Fontane and included the 1st Italian line infantry regiment and the infantry regiment Saxe-Weimar; the third brigade was commanded by Castaldini and included the 2nd Italian light regiment; the fourth brigade was commanded by general Bonfanti and included the 1st Italian light regiment.

Schill returned to the town in early May, but left for Stralsund again after discord with Gneisenau, taking most of his freikorps with him. On 30 May, Napoleon ordered the redeployment of Jean Boudet's division to enable it to reach Kolberg on demand within 36 hours, one regiment of the division was ordered to reinforce the siege forces. Throughout May and June, the siege was characterized by heavy fighting around Wolfsberg sconce east of Kolberg. Among others, vice commander of the fortress Karl Wilhelm Ernst von Waldenfels was killed there. Also, Teulié was lethally injured when a cannonball hit his leg - according to the French Biographie universelle, he died five days later, on 12 May, and his death caused the parties to agree on a 24-hour truce in his honor; according to Höpfner's History of the Prussian Army however, Teuliè was hit when a 24-hour truce on 11/12 June was concluded after the capitulation of the Wolfsberg sconce, but not observed; and according to the Italian Biografie di Pietro Teulie however, the cannonball hit Teuliè after 13 June, and five to six days later, he died in Loison's arms in the nearby village of Tramm.

Temporarily, the defendants were supported by the British corvette Phyleria and the Swedish frigate af Chapmann. Also, three fishing boats had been armed with guns and supported the defendants from the sea.

In mid-June, the siege forces were reinforced by two Nassau bataillons with a strength of 1,500 to 1,600. Napoleon ordered the narrowing of the encirclement to cut off Kolberg from its port. By the end of June, Napoleon sent in battle-tried French regiments and heavy guns to bring about a decision: on 21 June arrived further artillery pieces and the 4th Holland line infantry regiment (Anthing) with a strength of 1,600 to 1,700; on 30 June arrived the 3rd light, 56th line and 93th line regiments of the Boudet division with a strength of 7,000. The French forces took the Maikuhle forest held by the remaining soldiers of Schill's freikorps.

On 2 July at noon, fighting ceased upon the anouncement of the Prusso-French agreement to the Peace of Tilsit. Kolberg was one of the few Prussian fortresses which withstood Napoleon's forces until the peace was signed - the other ones were Danzig, Glatz and Graudenz.

Aftermath

The Nazi propaganda movie Kolberg, which was begun in 1943 and released in 1945 near the end of World War II was based on this event.

Today a street is named after Antoni Sułkowski, the commander of the Polish troops taking part in the siege.

References

1. ^ Wörner, Nadine (2004). Süddeutschland in den Revolutions- und napoleonischen Kriegen (in German). p. 15. ISBN 978-3-640-28651-5.
2. ^ Rühle von Lilienstern, Helga (2008). ISBN 3939611190 http://books.google.com/books?ei=C2p_TereEs_xsga82tz8Bg&ct=result&sqi=2&hl=de&id=8M4jAQAAIAAJ&q=Coburg-Saalfeld+#search_anchor. {{cite book}}: Missing or empty |title= (help); Text "Das grosse Geheimnis von Hildburghausen" ignored (help)
3. Erkenbrecher, Hans, ed. (1998). Die Residenzstadt Gotha in der Goethe-Zeit. Palmbaum Texte: Kulturgeschichte. Vol. 5. p. 15.
4. Burgdorf, Wolfgang (2006). Ein Weltbild verliert seine Welt (in German). Oldenbourg. p. 58. ISBN 978-3-486-581101-2. {{cite book}}: Check |isbn= value: length (help)
5. Werner Buchholz, Pommern, Siedler, 1999, p.360, ISBN 3886802728
6. Kroczyński, Hieronim (2009). "Ferdinand von Schills Mitwirkung an der Verteidigung der Festung Kolberg im Jahre 1807". In Veltzke, Veit (ed.). Für die Freiheit, gegen Napoleon. Ferdinand von Schill, Preussen und die deutsche Nation. Köln/Weimar: Böhlau. pp. 59–64, p. 59. ISBN 3412203408.
7. ^ Jessen, Olaf (2009). "„Das Volk steht auf, der Sturm bricht los!" Kolberg 1807 - Bündnis zwischen Bürger und Soldat?". In Veltzke, Veit (ed.). Für die Freiheit, gegen Napoleon. Ferdinand von Schill, Preussen und die deutsche Nation. Köln/Weimar: Böhlau. pp. 39–58, p. 50. ISBN 3412203408.
8. Jessen, Olaf (2009). "„Das Volk steht auf, der Sturm bricht los!" Kolberg 1807 - Bündnis zwischen Bürger und Soldat?". In Veltzke, Veit (ed.). Für die Freiheit, gegen Napoleon. Ferdinand von Schill, Preussen und die deutsche Nation. Köln/Weimar: Böhlau. pp. 39–58, p. 46. ISBN 3412203408.
9. ^ Kroczyński, Hieronim (2009). "Ferdinand von Schills Mitwirkung an der Verteidigung der Festung Kolberg im Jahre 1807". In Veltzke, Veit (ed.). Für die Freiheit, gegen Napoleon. Ferdinand von Schill, Preussen und die deutsche Nation. Köln/Weimar: Böhlau. pp. 59–64, p. 60. ISBN 3412203408.
10. Jessen, Olaf (2009). "„Das Volk steht auf, der Sturm bricht los!" Kolberg 1807 - Bündnis zwischen Bürger und Soldat?". In Veltzke, Veit (ed.). Für die Freiheit, gegen Napoleon. Ferdinand von Schill, Preussen und die deutsche Nation. Köln/Weimar: Böhlau. pp. 39–58, p. 48. ISBN 3412203408.
11. ^ Jessen, Olaf (2009). "„Das Volk steht auf, der Sturm bricht los!" Kolberg 1807 - Bündnis zwischen Bürger und Soldat?". In Veltzke, Veit (ed.). Für die Freiheit, gegen Napoleon. Ferdinand von Schill, Preussen und die deutsche Nation. Köln/Weimar: Böhlau. pp. 39–58, p. 50. ISBN 3412203408.
12. Jessen, Olaf (2009). "„Das Volk steht auf, der Sturm bricht los!" Kolberg 1807 - Bündnis zwischen Bürger und Soldat?". In Veltzke, Veit (ed.). Für die Freiheit, gegen Napoleon. Ferdinand von Schill, Preussen und die deutsche Nation. Köln/Weimar: Böhlau. pp. 39–58, p. 49, p. 56: "ce miserable, qui est une espèce de brigand". ISBN 3412203408.
13. ^ Kroczyński, Hieronim (2009). "Ferdinand von Schills Mitwirkung an der Verteidigung der Festung Kolberg im Jahre 1807". In Veltzke, Veit (ed.). Für die Freiheit, gegen Napoleon. Ferdinand von Schill, Preussen und die deutsche Nation. Köln/Weimar: Böhlau. pp. 59–64, p. 61. ISBN 3412203408.
14. ^ Kroczyński, Hieronim (2009). "Ferdinand von Schills Mitwirkung an der Verteidigung der Festung Kolberg im Jahre 1807". In Veltzke, Veit (ed.). Für die Freiheit, gegen Napoleon. Ferdinand von Schill, Preussen und die deutsche Nation. Köln/Weimar: Böhlau. pp. 59–64, p. 62. ISBN 3412203408.
15. Historia Gdańska Edmund Cieślak Tom 3 page 115, Wydawnictwo Morskie 1993
16. ^ Pfister, Albert (1868). Denkwürdigkeiten aus der württembergischen Kriegsgeschichte des 18. und 19. Jahrhunderts. p. 349.
17. Aiding the siege were troops from the Polish state of Duchy of Warsaw from the 3rd Infantry Division under the leadership of Colonel Antoni Paweł Sułkowski. Sulkowski in his diaries wrote that Polish soldiers were highly excited about the prospect of taking the city, as it was once part of Poland during the Piast dynasty. He wrote "our soldiers burn with the enthusiasm to move our borders to the pillars of Bolesław", and noted that the chaplain of the Polish soldiers Ignacy Przybylski called upon them Polish soldiers. We are camped under Kołobrzeg. Since the time of Chrobry our regiment formed in Poznan and Gniezno Voivodeships is the first to show its banners here. Napis. Tom poświęcony literaturze użytkowej i okolicznościowej Janusz Maciejewski Latona, 2005 pages 159-160
18. ^ Höpfner, Eduard (1851). Der Krieg von 1806 und 1807. Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der Preußischen Armee nach den Quellen des Kriegsarchivs, part II. Vol. 4. p. 634.
19. "Teulié" in Michaud (ed) (1843): Biographie universelle ancienne et moderne, vol. 41, p. 209.
20. Höpfner, Eduard (1851). Der Krieg von 1806 und 1807. Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der Preußischen Armee nach den Quellen des Kriegsarchivs, part II. Vol. 4. p. 621.
21. Jacopetti, Maggiore (1845). Biografie di Achille Fontanelli, di Francesco Teodoro Arese e di Pietro Teuliè. pp. 93–94.
22. ^ Röhr, Albert (1963). Handbuch der deutschen Marinegeschichte. p. 33.
23. Neugebauer, Karl-Volker, ed. (2009). Die Zeit bis 1914 - Vom Kriegshaufen zum Massenheer. Grundkurs deutsche Militärgeschichte. Vol. 1 (2 ed.). Oldenbourg Wissenschaftsverlag. p. 190. ISBN 348659009. {{cite book}}: Check |isbn= value: length (help)

• Misplaced Pages neutral point of view disputes from March 2011
• History of Pomerania
• Conflicts in 1807
• Sieges involving Poland
• Sieges involving France
• Sieges involving Prussia
• Battles of the Napoleonic Wars
• Battles of the War of the Fourth Coalition
• Kołobrzeg