In the second battle, troops from Germany commanded by Crown Prince Frederick William and directed by his chief of staff, General Leonhard Graf von Blumenthal, defeated the French under Marshal MacMahon near the village of Wœrth in Alsace, on the Sauer River, 10 kilometres (6.2 mi) north of Haguenau.

The remnant of the force which had been engaged there, with many of its wounded still in the ranks, marched in about noon with so soldierly a bearing that, so far from their depressing the morale of the rest, their appearance actually raised it.

A sudden and violent storm broke over the bivouacs, and when it was over, the men, wet and restless, began to move about, light fires, etc.

[3] The Prussian guns, strict orders having been given to avoid all engagement that day, soon withdrew and were about to return to camp, when renewed artillery fire was heard from the south, and presently also from the north.

In the latter direction, the II Bavarian Corps, led by Jakob von Hartmann, had bivouacked along the Mattstall–Langen–Sulzbach road with orders to continue the march if artillery were heard to the south.

[3] The French, however, were quite ready and a furious fusillade broke out, the sound being multiplied out of proportion to the numbers engaged by the echoes of the forest-clad hills.

The left of the V Corps' outposts had overnight occupied Gunstett and the bank of the Sauer, and the French, shortly after daylight on 6 August 1870, sent down an unarmed party to fetch water.

Coming within sight of the enemy, they drew heavy shellfire, and, still under the impression that they were intended to attack, deployed into a line of columns and doubled down to the river, which they crossed.

The French followed with a rush, and, fording the Sauer opposite Gunstett, for a moment put the long line of German guns upon the heights in considerable danger.

At this crisis, a fresh battalion of the Prussian XI corps arrived by the road from Surbourg to Gunstett and attacked the French on one flank whilst the guns swept the other.

A fraction of the southern party maintained itself all day in the elbow of the Hagenau Chaussee, which formed a starting point for subsequent attacks.

The commander in chief of the German Third Army (Crown Prince Frederick William) now appeared on the field and ordered Kirchbach to stand fast until the pressure of the XI corps and of the Württemberg division could take effect against the French right-wing.

This deliberate acceptance of responsibility really decided the battle, for Schkopp's brigade quietly deployed as a unit and compelled the French right-wing to fall back.

Thus it came about that, without reconnoitering or manoeuvering for position, the French cavalry rode straight at the first objective which offered itself, and struck the victorious Prussians as they were crossing the hills between the Albrechtshäuserhof and Morsbronn.

But the counter-attack turned into disaster when 700 French cuirassiers were trapped inside Morsbronn and massacred within a few minutes by rapid close-range fire.

[5] By 15:00 h the Prussians were masters of the Niederwald and the ground south of it on which the French right-wing had originally stood, but they were in indescribable confusion after the prolonged fighting in the dense undergrowth.

Ordering Bonnemains's cavalry division to charge by squadrons to gain time, he brought up his reserve artillery, and sent it forward to case-shot range to cover a final counter-stroke by his last intact battalions.

To break down this last stronghold, the guns of the Prussian V and XI Corps, which had now come forward to the captured ridge of Elsasshausen, took the village as their target; the great mass of infantry, now flushed with victory but in the direst confusion, encouraged by the example of two horse artillery batteries which galloped boldly forward to case-shot range, delivered one final rush which swept all resistance before it.

Frederick William's army captured 200 officers, 9,000 enlisted men, 1 eagle, 4 Turco standards, 28 guns, 5 mitrailleuses, 91 limbers, 23 wagons of rifles and side arms, 158 other carriages and 1,193 horses.