Qualla: Battle of Lübeck

Battle of Lübeck: Introduction

Sat, 05 Sep 2026 12:30:41 GMT

Photo credit Djmaschek, CC BY-SA 3.0. Standing in Lübeck's Rathaus on 5 November 1806, Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher demanded food, drink, fodder and money from the senate of a neutral city his army had just forced its way into - and promised he would not fight inside the walls. The next morning, when a delegation of city fathers reminded him of that promise, he brushed them aside and said he would fight. He did. By half past three on 6 November the French held Lübeck, and for hours afterward the people who lived there paid for a battle that was never theirs.

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Image: Djmaschek | CC BY-SA 3.0

Battle of Lübeck: After Jena

Sat, 05 Sep 2026 12:30:41 GMT

Photo credit François Gérard, Public domain. Three weeks earlier, on 14 October 1806, Napoleon had destroyed the Prussian field armies at Jena-Auerstedt, and what followed was less a campaign than a manhunt. As the Grande Armée pursued the wreckage north and east, the surrenders came one after another. Ney's corps bottled u...

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Image: François Gérard | Public domain

Battle of Lübeck: The Chase

Sat, 05 Sep 2026 12:30:41 GMT

Photo credit Concord, CC BY-SA 4.0. Some 47,252 Frenchmen were hunting him: Bernadotte's I Corps, Soult's IV Corps, and dragoons, hussars and cuirassiers from Murat's cavalry reserve. Blücher's own column, about 21,000 strong on 1 November, fought a series of creditable rearguard actions as it fell back. At Crivitz...

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Image: Concord | CC BY-SA 4.0

Battle of Lübeck: Six November

Sat, 05 Sep 2026 12:30:41 GMT

Photo credit Benjamin Zix (1772-1811), Public domain. Lübeck's medieval defences were half dismantled by 1806, but the wet ditches in front of the old walls were still a real obstacle. Blücher packed ten guns around the northern Burgtor and four more on the Bellevue bastion across the Trave to catch attackers in crossfire; in all, s...

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Image: Benjamin Zix (1772-1811) | Public domain

Battle of Lübeck: The Sack

Sat, 05 Sep 2026 12:30:41 GMT

Photo credit User:Ulamm, CC BY-SA 3.0. What happened next is the part that belongs to Lübeck rather than to either army. The victorious troops plundered the city thoroughly, and contemporaries did not pretend otherwise - the phrase that survives from the accounts is "pillage, rape, and murder." Bernadotte and other se...

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Image: User:Ulamm | CC BY-SA 3.0

Battle of Lübeck: Ratekau, and a Crown

Sat, 05 Sep 2026 12:30:41 GMT

Photo credit MartinDieter, CC BY-SA 3.0. At daybreak on 7 November, Blücher stood at Ratekau north of the city with 4,050 infantry and 3,760 cavalry - what was left of 21,000. The Trave lay to his left, the Baltic behind him, and to his right the Danish frontier, held by Johann Ewald's troops under orders to defend Dani...

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Image: MartinDieter | CC BY-SA 3.0