The Wars of Louis XIV, 1667 - 1714 by John A. Lynn

Their movement skirted the mountains and was hidden from view of the enemy because of the terrain. With Imperial eye riveted on these two parts of the front, Turenne, then, led a third of his army marched around to his left flank. Marshal Turenne feigned an attack from the center and then another from his right. The ensuing battle did not follow the standards of the 17th century. However, the Imperial forces had not yet gelled completely so as to be ready for battle.

Turenne with 30,000 troops found the Imperial army very well positioned with 30,000 to 40,000 men under the command of Frederick William, the Elector of Brandenburg-Prussia, on the afternoon of 5 January 1675. The highly surprised Imperials hastily fell back on Turckheim. Finding no resistance, he reached Mulhouse on the 29th.

Using the Vosges mountains as a curtain of protection, he moved west and then south, reappearing in Belfort, south of his opponent, on 27 December 1674. Turenne, however, decided not to follow this custom. Īccording to the conventions of war at the time, the military operations should have been halted during the winter until the return of the spring. With the arrival of year's end 1n 1674, the Imperials went into their winter quarters in the region of Colmar, a few miles south of the French winter barracks, situated in Haguenau. In 1674 Marshal Turenne, French commander in that sector, failed to prevent the invasion of Alsace by a part of the imperial army. Their intervention had brought the war into the upper Rhine, creating a threat to French territory. The aggressive campaign of Louis XIV against the Netherlands, since 1672, had provoked a hostile reaction of other European states like Austria (who controlled the Holy Roman Empire) and Brandenburg.

The Wars of Louis XIV, 1667 - 1714 by John A. Lynn