The Sun.
London, England, 1864-03-04 00:00:00

THE SCHLESWIG-HOLSTEIN WAR.

(From the Times Special Correspondent with the Danish
Army.)
DANISH HEADQUARTERS, SONDERBORG,
FEB. 22.

There was an alarm here this morning at half.past
9 o'clock. Nothing more welcome to break through
the dulness of our garrison life. There was no "roll
of the alarm drum," for, as I told you, sheepskins
are banished from the Danish army ; but a few
notes from bugles and trumpets told us that the
enemy was up and doing, and that it was high time
for the Danes to bestir themselves in their turn.
Column after column marched beneath our windows,
almost inaudible, o❑ account of the thick layer of
fresh-fallen and fast-falling snow on which they
trod. Presently there was running of orderlies to
and fro, the muffled roiling of cannon and waggons,
the stir of thousands of men, noiseless and ominous.
We walked down the town to the bridges, crossed
over to the fete-dc-posit, and toiled up the slippery
ascent leading to the top of Dybbol-bill, Some
score of wounded men and officers passed us, on
their way to the town hospital or " Jaz iret," con-
veyed on stretchers, or in rough country carts,
which jolted them dreadfully. I do not know what
impression their wan countenances, their haggard
eyes, in some instances swimming in death, their
hands pressed on their bleeding chests, and their
dumb look of agony wrought on the fine fellows
who tramped or paced along with us outward-
bound ; but to us non-combatants the sight was
heartrending. The troops moved on with their
wonted steady look, nevertheless, the notes of their
martial air swelling up to the highest pitch, and the
ranks were only momentarily broken as some of the '
soldiers halted and addressed now this now that of
the sufferers in the carts, in whom they recognised
friends or acquaintances, or dear ones, perhaps, be-
longing to them by nearer ties, but soon fell again
into their ranks after a pressure of hands and the
exchange of a few cheering words. We were hardly
out into the open country beyond the palisades,
however, before the glorious roar of the cannon
drove all melancholy thoughts from our minds.
The Prussians, we soon learnt, had come in great
force out of their quarters at Nybol ; they had made
a vigorous onset on the Danish outposts, and, driving
them before them with much slaughter, had occu-
pied the village of Dybbol. From Sonderborg, as
the reader must by this time be aware, about half
an English mile, the road leads to the Dybbol wind-
mill ; another quarter of a mile higher and further
is the top of Dybbol-hill, and across the whole crest
of this hill, from the Vemming-bund to the Alsund,
there lies the position of Dybbol, te❑ bastions in a
row, presenting about 100 cannon on a line about
a mile further, to the village of Dybbol, the main
body of which, however, does not lie on the road,
but a little to the right—a straggling village, with
church, parsonage, and school-house, like most
other places of the same kind in this country, a
cluster of large farm houses with barns, courts, and
all manner of rustic buildings, intersected by a
variety of by-roads and lanes, a perfect maze of
broken ground not to be easily threaded by a chance
wayfarer. Between the village of Dybbol and that
of Nybol there lies a distance of about one English
mile and a half, most of it encumbered by woods on
either side, bearing the name of Stenterup Skov on
the right, and of Boffel Skov on the left. On this
same left-hand side lies also the isthmus of the
Broager Peninsula, now in the hands of the Austro-
Prussians.

Up to this morning the Danes occupied the
village of Dybbol without fortifying it, and they
threw out their advanced posts through the woods
on the right and left, quite in sight of the
Prussian pickets on the main road near Nybol,
and on the isthmus of the small peninsula on the
shore of the Vemming-bund. The inhabitants of
Dybbol, as a matter of course, have all long since
deserted their houses, a great many of which have
already been demolished, and either designed or ac-
cidentally burnt to the ground—a fate which has
equally befallen the greater number of the scattered
country houses for miles round. Even as I came
home at 7 o'clock last evening, after a long ride, myeyes were saddened by a red glare which told us too
plainly of some dreadful conflagration precisely in
the direction of this same village of Dybbol.
Well, the village of Dybbol had peen occupied by
the Prussians, and a.° Dane,li outposts had been
driven in just as we reached the summit of Dybbol-
hill, at half-past 9- But by this time the bastions
nearer to the village, Nos. 6 and 8, placed at hardly
half a mile's distance from the first houses, opened
such a well-sustained fire upon the Prussians that
these, after feebly answering with their field artillery,
began to fall hack to the woods, and were soon
hidden from iew.
The whole of the Danish army
v
had in the meantime turned out ; regiment after
regiment, closely massed together, moved forward,
but upon reaching the woods they found that the
enemy had abandoned them and, under their cover,
slunk away to their own lines at Nybol. Both
armies have thus regained their former positions.
The action was unimportant in its results—a