The Sun.
London, England, 1864-02-19 00:00:00

THE SCHLESWIG-HOLSTEIN WAR.

(From the Times Special Correspondent with the Danish
Army.)
DANISH HEADQUARTERS, SONDEREURG, ISLE
OF ALSEN, Feb. 8.
A week has barely expired since I landed at this
place from Korsor and Copenhagen, on my way to
the headquarters of the Danish army, with a hope
to be still in time to witness some of the incidents
of the fight for the D•nnewerk, and here I am,
already, back again at the end of six days, after
seeing the close of that fight.
I was at Schleswig on Friday evening, the sth,
somewhat disposed to lay aside all expectation of
any great events for the night, although there was
a talk about a contemplated attack on the part of
the enemy, when an artillery officer, with whom I
had become intimate, and with whom I had dined
and sat after dinner that very day, oame back after
a few minutes' absence, and with an altered voice
and under the strictest reserve told me that " the
Council of War, upon receiving positive intelligence
that the enemy had been that very day reinforced
to the full extent of 35,000 men, had resolved upon
the sudden abandonment of the position of the D tn-
newerk and an immediate retreat upon Flensburg
and Aleen. He asked my word of honour not to
telegraph the sad news for the whole of that night,
but it was a superfluous precaution ; the whole tele-
graphic establishment at Schleswig was already
picked up in vans at the he'd of the retreating
columns, and I since found the same measures had
been taken at Flensburg and every where on the
road till I came to this place, where I am assured all

telegraphic communicgtion With Englant. is inter-
rupted, not only at Sonderburg, but at Copenhagen

I was not the earliest, but certainly by no means
the latest, to receive a hint of the inteneed back-
ward move of the Danish army. One of the brigs-
diers in command placed himself at the head of his
column at 10 o'clock in the evening with the full
underetinding that he was to march to the advaeced
posts at Fredericksburg and Bustrup, when, on the
very ground, he received orders to take the road to
F'ensburg. fhe surprise, the humiliation, the rage
of the Denish officers may better be conceived than
described. I did not see them breaking their sword
blades on the ground, as I saw French officers do
on the marble tables at the Milan cafes atter the
armistice and Peace otVillafranca, but the indigna-
tion of these Nerthmen, although less demonstrative,
was no less heartfelt and genuine. They all asked,
" Wny was not the D:nnewerk given up on the
first summons by Wrangel it D ntnerk was tint
sufficiently strong to defend it with honour; and it
there was a chance of a generous, however ultimately
unsuccessful, resistance, why were we not at least
allowed to strike a blow fur that costly line of
citadels; why were we made to quit the spot like a
duellist who refuses to condescend to any reasonable
apology before appearing on the ground, then flies
the ground just as the time has come when there
Can be no retreat without ignominy ?" They ail° wed
indeed that the line was too long, the defending army
too small, the disproportion with the enemy too
great, and that by tarrying on their position the
Danish army might have been taken in the rear by
some of the Austro-Prussians breaking throueh the
line of the Schlei ; but all these difficulties could
and shou'Al have been foreseen from the beginning,
more than 10 days ago. Nothing, since Wrangel's
intimation had been met with such bold defiance,
had occurred to alter the position. Either that posi-
tion was too weak to attempt any defence whatever,
or such defence should have been pushed up to the
broadest exigencies of honour, regardless of conse-
quences; the Dantiewerk should not have been
eiven up without at least some deed of arms worthy
of the high respect with which the world had been
taught to pronounce the name of that etronghola.
The conduct of the Grrvernment and of the Com-
mander-in-enief appeared to the T) .nes inexplica-
ble, and they thought that their warlike fame had
been sacrificed to the pitiful shifts of a craven home
policy or to the treacherous intrigues of a remorse-
Less foreign diplomacy.
I had nothing to fear for myself had I made up my
mind quietly to await the arrival of the Austro-
Prussians at Schleswig, but I was, in a certain man-
n
a fortunes,r my , and v
hmear
ed
ve
eirt
they
tplu
inn
gehf t h
bo:.o uAel
tier, attached as a correspondent to the Danish
i
tltoh et. omi ionwe s itst
Potosi, I felt sure, could not at that pinch have
nelped me to a horse or a conveyance; but ,he
friendly captain, to whom I was already indebted
if I ever got a chair to sleep in or a table to write at
since I had come to headquarters, off red me a sect
on his military van, aed I have been travelling
with him ever since. Taey had given nice the post
)f honour at the rearguard, and it was past 10
when we set out with leis battery on the road to
Ftensburg.
Tne weather bad been soft and sloppy for the lest
five or six days at Schleswig, but the allow, which I
cad been falling in large slu4gish flakes on Friday
morning, began to gain consistency before we set out
in the evening ; the wind rose, keen and boisterous,
'rom the nortn-eest, and at its very first reast tr e
state of the atmosphere and the look of the country
,vere changed as it by magic. The snow tnickeueo
Ind hardened on tneground,the road became smooth
and bright as glass, torses and !nen slipped dread-
fally, end fell almost at every step. Not one horse
in the whole Danish army was roughshod that
!,igte—on the contrary, the shoes both of saddle
and draught horses were worn smooth by the last
five or six days' incessant march on muddy ground,
and the progress of the army met with terriole hin-
drance at the outset. The wind was so chill and
violent, the melting snow in our faces was so blind-
ing, that in spite of my multitudinous wrappings I
soon found my seat in the open van intolerable, and
alighted, together with the motley crowd from thou-
sands of vehicles (not two of which were covered),
and took my place in the line of march by the side
of my brave captain, who had also quitted his saddle
and was tramping along, now at the bead, now at
the rear of his battery.
It was not long before our march began to exhibit,
on a small scale, some of the horrors of the famous
retreat of the French from Moscow. The night was
dark, the cold terrible ; the thermometer, I dare say,
did not mark more than four or five degrees below
the freezing point, but the chill in our veins told a
very different tale, and the slipperiness of the road
was perfectly awful. Tee snow, which was falling
thick and fast at frequent intervals, lay in the
fields three or four inches deep, nod fringed the
:rees in the forests with the most plcturesque fret-
work; but it was trodden to the thinnest layer by
all the feet, hoofs, arid wheels of a whole host, till
it glistened like ice in the occasional gleam of some
pale star, as one or two peeped out in the sky
through the gaps opened in the mass of clouds by the
fitful 131"t' Dragoons, artillerymen, all who travel
on saddle, were dismounted, even led-horses were
put to the direct exertions to keep their tooting ;
draught horses bad to be held up, and cannon's,
o.ieeons, and ammunition or luggage waggons to
be dragged by the shear strength of men, whose
read was no steadier. The falling of men and
heasts, the crackin-
g of wheels and axletrees, was
prodigious. It took us all nine hours to go er
he first Danish mile and a half (less than seven
English) of ground. Morning broke upon us long
nefore we were half way between Schleswig and
Fensburg, and we reached the latter place about
4 o'clock p.m. on Saturday, having accomplished
rhe whole distance of 22 E glish miles in 18 hour s.
Die halt at Flensburg was of only two hours. Soon
after dark we were agein toilingonto/
,rds in the
direction of Kt asap and Graveuetein ; we reached
the latter place at about 8 den., atter a second uieht
rehearieng all the horrors of t he previous one in an
aggravated form, and only cern., to the end of our
journey here at sunset last evening. after little less
than 48 hours' unmitigeeed suffering. The cut, ing
wind, the drifting snow, the darkness, the slipperi-
ness of the roads, were the sae e throughout. Even
at Sonderburg, even in the streets and open places
of the town and environs, where horses had to be
picketed and the soldiers to lie by their side as they
best could, men and cattle had to strive hard with
the treacherous ground, they had to weather the
furious storm as Heaven sent it, not a few of them
cursing in their hearts the avidness of Kings who
must needs go to war and must needs wage war
in
deep winter!
I have touched, in of few Yf orde, and without the