Contrary to the advice of his subordinates, he refused to believe that the typically cautious Austrian commander Leopold von Daun would bring his troops into battle.

Empress Maria Theresa of Austria had signed the treaty to gain time to rebuild her military forces and forge new alliances; she was intent upon regaining ascendancy in the Holy Roman Empire as well as recovering the Silesian province.

Seeing the opportunity to regain her lost territories and to limit Prussia's growing power, Austria put aside its old rivalry with France to form a new coalition.

Britain aligned herself with the Kingdom of Prussia; this alliance drew in not only the British king's European territories held in personal union, including Hanover, but also those of his relatives in the Electorate of Brunswick-Lüneburg and the Landgraviate of Hesse-Kassel.

Ferdinand evicted the French from Hanover and Westphalia and re-captured the port of Emden in March 1758; he crossed the Rhine, causing general alarm in France.

[13] In September and early October 1758, Lieutenant Field Marshal Count Leopold Joseph von Daun and his 80,000-man army camped near the town of Stolpen.

Frederick had tried several times to draw the Austrians out of Stolpen into a battle: Daun, who seldom attacked unless he had a perfect position, had refused the bait.

[16] On 10 October, Frederick marched on Hochkirch and established his own camp, extending from the town north, 5 km (3 mi) to the edge of the forest at the base of the Kuppritzerberg.

The weak (west) side was guarded by an outpost of nine battalions with artillery support; the principal purpose of the infantry was to maintain contact with a deployed scout unit.

[15][17] The Imperial court in Vienna criticized Daun for his failure to act; the Empress and her ministers worried that the Russians and the French would drop out of the coalition if there were no action.

[14] The Strohmberg, one of the heights abutting Hochkirch, anchored Daun's left flank, and he deployed the remainder of his force southward across the road between Bautzen and Loebau.

His men made a great production of hewing the trees in a nearby forest, action which Frederick interpreted as efforts to create field works, not, as it was actually intended, to build a road through the thick wood.

[18] Daun's plan, which he had kept secret, was an early morning sweep through the woods with 30,000 specially picked troops, around Frederick's flank, to enclose him.

[21] Initially, Frederick thought the sounds of the battle were either an outpost skirmish[22] or the Croats, who apparently started their days with regular firing of their weapons.

[19] His staff had trouble rousing him from bed, but he was soon alerted when Prussian cannons, captured by the Austrians, started to fire on his own camp.

The church yard, a walled stronghold, diverted the Austrians; Major Siegmund Moritz William von Langen's musketeers of the 19th regiment held it with determination and provided safety for retreating Prussians.

At 7:00, finding his infantry milling about in the village, Frederick ordered them to advance, sending reinforcements commanded by Prince Francis of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, his brother-in-law, with them.

[26] As Francis approached the village, Austrian cannon-fire sheared his head off his shoulders; his troops faltered, demoralized by the sight of the prince's headless body atop his spooked horse.

[28] As he withdrew, Frederick established a fighting line north of the village, and it eventually served as a rallying point for stragglers and survivors.

[28] In five hours, Frederick lost 9,400 of the 30,000 men he brought into the battle, more than 30 percent of his army, including five generals,[Note 3] 101 guns, and nearly all the tents.

[30] In addition to human losses, they lost valuable horses and draft animals, 70 munitions wagons, and, a blow to morale, 28 flags, and two standards.

[26] On the positive side, Retzow's corps of about 6,000 men, which had not arrived in time to participate in the fighting, remained intact; Frederick had pulled his troops together for an orderly retreat; and the King retained the confidence of his soldiers.

Notification of the battle arrived in Vienna during the celebration of the Empress's name day, to the delight of Maria Theresa and her court, gathered at Schönbrunn Palace.

Daun received a blessed sword and hat from Pope Clement XIII, a reward usually granted for defeating "infidels".

[32] For Daun and Lacy, it was a victory of mixed emotions; upon the discovery of Keith's body in the village church, they both broke down in tears of grief.

At one point, he showed his librarian a small box of opium capsules, 18 in total, that he could use to "journey to a dark place from which there was no return."

[33] Although Frederick demonstrated good leadership by rallying his troops against the surprise attack, Hochkirch is considered one of his worst losses, and it badly shook his equanimity.

[30] That winter, Mitchell described the 46-year-old Frederick as "an old man lacking half of his teeth, with greying hair, without gaiety or spark or imagination."

Frederick suffered from gout and influenza, and refused to change his uniform, which was moth-eaten and covered in food and snuff stains.

[32] A granite monument, inlaid with a bronze plaque, was erected by the inhabitants of Hochkirch in memory of "Generalfeldmarschall Jacob von Keith" and his achievement.