Westphalia, Hesse and Lower Saxony Electoral Saxony Brandenburg Silesia East Prussia Pomerania Iberian Peninsula Naval Operations The Battle of Leuthen /ˈlɔɪtən/ was fought on 5 December 1757 between Frederick the Great's Prussian Army and an Austrian army commanded by Prince Charles of Lorraine and Count Leopold Joseph von Daun.

By exploiting the training of his troops and his superior knowledge of the terrain, Frederick created a diversion at one end of the battlefield and moved most of his smaller army behind a series of low hillocks.

The surprise attack in oblique order on the unsuspecting Austrian flank baffled Prince Charles, who took several hours to realize that the main action was to his left, not his right.

Maria Theresa had signed the treaty to gain time to rebuild her military forces and forge new alliances and intended to regain her ascendancy in the Holy Roman Empire and to reacquire Silesia.

In 1754, escalating tensions between Britain and France in North America offered the Empress the opportunity to regain her lost territories and to limit Prussia's ever-growing power.

Between the Oder river and the foot of the Sudeten Mountains, it has mild climate, fertile soils and extensive water network, which made it a coveted agricultural resource.

[7] In the area northwest of Breslau, the absence of steep hills makes the observation of an approaching enemy easy, and the relative flatness limited hiding manoeuvers.

The presence of alluvial soil guaranteed relatively-soft ground, less than what Frederick would face at Kunersdorf in 1758 but enough to provide the occasional natural bogs to bar the passage of troops in some locations or to muffle the sound of marching and horses' hooves.

[8] Aware of Frederick's approach, Charles and his second-in-command, Count Leopold Joseph von Daun, positioned the army facing west on a 8 km (5 mi) front in country of undulating plains.

On 4 December 1757, from his position on the Schönberg, a knoll about 1.5 km (1 mi) west of Borne, he surveyed the familiar landscape with his generals, and a plan emerged.

The visible distraction screened Frederick's intent of executing an oblique maneuver like the one that he had used successfully only weeks earlier at the Battle of Rossbach.

That not only weakened the left flank but also stretched his front from Leuthen past Frobelwitz and on to Nypern and extended it well beyond its original 4 km (2 mi).

The Prussian artillery perched on the reverse slopes of the Butterberg and was hidden from the Austrians' view while it prepared to move to the crest to time their bombardment with the infantry's attack.

[12] The first wave of Prussian infantry, supported by Frederick's artillery, which now pounded away from the crest of one of the hillocks, pushed steadily toward Leuthen.

Charles-Joseph Lamoral, eventually Prince de Ligne, was then a captain in an Austrian regiment of foot:[16] Our Lieutenant-Colonel fell[,] killed almost at the first; beyond this we lost our Major, and indeed all the Officers but three.... We had crossed two successive ditches, which lay in an orchard to the left of the first houses in Leuthen; and were beginning to form in front of the village.

Eventually, the Prussian Life Guards, commanded by Captain Wichard Joachim Heinrich von Möllendorf broke through the village cemetery and forced them to abandon their post.

"[16] After a day of rest, on 7 December, Frederick sent half his cavalry with Zieten, chasing Charles's retreating army, now heading toward Königgrätz by Schweidnitz and captured another 2,000 men and their baggage.

The Austrians were determined to hold Breslau not only because losing it would cost them control of Silesia and considerable diminution of prestige but also because of the immense quantities of stores that the city held.

The Austrian commander, recognizing his grim plight, posted placards on gallows and poles throughout the city and warned that anyone who spoke of surrender would be hanged immediately.

[23] Charles lost entire regiments, which scattered in the first attacks or overrun at the end; they simply dissolved in the waves of Prussian blue coats.

Charles and his second-in-command, Count Leopold Joseph von Daun, sank "in the depths of despondency", and the prince could not fathom what had happened.

The cavalry that Frederick had left demonstrating in front of the northernmost position of the Austrian line was simply a diversion to hide his real movements.

Nádasdy's omission of outposts on his open flank south of Leuthen was a surprising oversight for an officer with his long years of experience against the Prussians.

At Leuthen, ammunition wagons moved with the advancing lines of grenadiers and infantry battalions, which allowed the troops to be resupplied quickly without losing momentum.

The cavalry also provided tactically important charges, disrupting Austrian attempts to reform, which eventually turned the defeat into a rout.

In addition to the physical damage they wrought, the distinctive sound of the horse artillery's 12-pounder cannon, sometimes called Brummers, heightened Prussian morale and reduced that of the Austrians.

Before the battle, he was often referred to in an unflattering, even demeaning, manner, but after Leuthen, he was widely called the King of Prussia in both polite and popular conversation.

The victories at Leuthen and Rossbach earned Frederick respect and fear, which even his bitter enemies held for the rest of the war and the subsequent peace.

The Berlin architect Friedrich August Stüler provided the design for the monument, and Christian Daniel Rauch created the goddess of victory.

Befitting its importance in the establishment of the Prussian state and the mythos of Frederick the Great, the monument reached 20 meters (66 ft).