page_title: Siege of Godesberg
section_title: Destruction of the fortress (17 December 1583)
hierarchical_section_title: Siege of Godesberg / Investment of the Godesburg / Destruction of the fortress (17 December 1583)
caption_attribution_description: Deutsch: Kupferstich "Godesberg" aus Matthäus Merians "Topographia Archiepiscopatuum Moguntinensis etc." English: Copperplate engraving of the (fortress) by Matthäus Merian, from "Topographia Archiepiscopatuum Moguntinensis etc.
context_page_description: The Siege of Godesberg, 18 November – 17 December 1583, was the first major siege of the Cologne War. Seeking to wrest control of an important fortification, Bavarian and mercenary soldiers surrounded the Godesberg, and the village then of the same name, now Bad Godesberg, located at its foot. On top of the mountain sat a formidable fortress, similarly named Godesburg, built in the early 13th century during a contest over the election of two competing archbishops.
  Towering over the Rhine valley, the Godesburg's strategic position commanded the roads leading to and from Bonn, the Elector of Cologne's capital city, and Cologne, the region's economic powerhouse. Over time, the Electors strengthened its walls and heightened its towers. They added a small residence in the 14th century and the donjon developed as a stronghold of the Electoral archives and valuables. By the mid-16th century, the Godesburg was considered nearly impregnable and had become a symbol of the dual power of the Prince-electors and Archbishops of Cologne, one of the wealthiest ecclesiastical territories in the Holy Roman Empire.
context_section_description: On 17 December, Ferdinand again asked the castle's defenders to surrender. They replied that they did not know the meaning of the word and would hold the Godesburg to the last man. A report dated 23 December 1583 relates that, having given Ferdinand a rude reply, the defenders went back to lunch.
  Ferdinand ordered 400 men to enter the saps; these men would storm the castle once the mine had been detonated. The remainder of his cavalry and foot soldiers were to wait in the fields below. Some sources assert that the fuse was lit at around 1:00 pm, although the 19th-century local historian Heinrich Joseph Floß argued that these sources are mistaken, and that the explosion clearly occurred in the morning. All sources agree that the explosion, with a dreadful crack, propelled chunks of the towers and walls high into the air. Almost half the Godesburg collapsed instantly. According to a newspaper report dated 13 January 1584, debris raining on the valley below damaged several houses, and destroyed some of them completely.
  Amidst the flames and rubble, Arenberg's and Ferdinand's troops tried to storm the castle, but found their way blocked by masses of debris created by their own explosives. Furthermore, although close to half of the garrison had perished in the explosion and subsequent collapse of the fortifications, those who remained offered staunch resistance by throwing rocks on the approaching attackers, causing a large number of casualties. In frustration, 40 or 50 of the attackers tied together two ladders and crawled through the sluice-ways of the garderobe (latrines) that emptied on the hillside, thus gaining access to the interior of the castle. There they killed around 20 of the defenders in fierce fighting; the remaining defenders, approximately 70 men, among them Buchner and Sudermann, the garrison commander and his lieutenant, sought refuge in the castle's keep. In this way, Ferdinand's infantry at last gained unopposed access to the fortress. Storming the castle had taken about two hours.
  Out of options, Buchner opened negotiations, using those interned in the castle as hostages. Presenting them at the keep's door, he made clear that they would be killed unless Ferdinand promised to spare his, his wife's and Sudermann's lives. Ferdinand acceded to Buchner's demand; some sources maintain that the Abbot of Heisterbach, one of the prisoners, had been treated decently by Buchner throughout his imprisonment in the castle and himself asked for Buchner's life to be spared. The prisoners were released. With much difficulty, given the state of mind of the besiegers, Ferdinand and Arenberg brought the Buchners and Sudermann out of the castle alive. Once the Buchners, Sudermann, and the hostages were clear of the fortress, Ferdinand released his troops, who were in an ugly mood and hungry for blood and plunder. All those who remained in the keep—soldiers, men, women and children—were killed, some inside the keep, some in the courtyard below; the slaughter lasted well into the night. The castle's 178 dead were buried in two mass graves whose locations remain unknown. Among those who perished in the destruction and storming of the castle was also one of the prisoners, a vicar from Hildesheim. The Hildesheim suffragan, too, was not among the rescued prisoners; he had died during his incarceration, a short while before the castle was stormed.
  Gebhard lost an important stronghold in the Oberstift and Ernst's forces had acquired a ruin. The residence was unusable, and the fortifications were mere rubble. The keep had survived the blast and various armies used it as a watch tower in the Thirty Years' War. Ernst's troops, under his brother's command, saturated the region, and the 7.3 kilometers (4.5 mi) between Godesberg and Bonn bore a greater resemblance to a military camp than to a road. Walloon riders and squadrons of Italian cavalry, paid for by the pope, galloped back and forth. Forty companies of infantry trudged toward Bonn, including Walloons and Bavarians. They looked forward to besieging Bonn, the Elector's capital city
caption: This engraving by the Swiss artist Matthäus Merian the Elder (1593–1650) depicts a view of the fortress prior to its destruction
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