Battle of Matrand The Battle of Matrand was a military battle on 5 August 1814 between Norwegian and Swedish forces as part of the Swedish - Norwegian War of 1814 . It was the bloodiest battle of the entire war , where the Swedish lost 340 men , of which 270 captured ; the Norwegians lost around 50 men with 90 wounded and 15 captured . Background . After the defeat at Lier the Swedish army retreated first to Malmer and from there back to Matrand , where the rest of the army was stationed . At Matrand they took care of the wounded and it is said that they used the local church there as a field hospital . At Matrand , Major General Carl Pontus Gahn would let the troops rest and resupply themselves with new ammunition , before they again should attempt an offensive towards Kongsvinger . But on 4 August , Gahn received a message that Norwegian reinforcements were sent from Høland to Kongsvinger in order to reinforce the Norwegian posisions . Gahn therefore decided to withdraw back across the border to Sweden instead of attempting an offensive . Norwegian plan . Through the Norwegian farmers who visited the Swedish camp at Matrand , Lt . Colonel Andreas Samuel Krebs had received good information about what the Swedish troops undertook . When he got the message that Gahn intended to march the army back across the border , he decided to strike against the Swedish in the early morning of August the 5th . The Battle . At 22 : 00 , 4 August , Krebs started his march against the Swedish forces at Matrand . The troops marched together to Åbogen where Captain Dons , with about 1 , 000 men , was sent to Pramhus from where he could attack the enemy from behind at Skotterud . The rest of the troops , together with Lt . Colonel Krebs , continued to Malmer , where Krebs sent off 250 men to Skinpungrud to attack the enemys flanks . The rest of the troops continued on to Matrand , but it was a weak force of only about 700 - 800 men . The Norwegian and Swedish vanguards met quickly close to Matrand , and the Swedes where forced to retreat back to stronger defensive positions . There , the Swedish vanguard also got reinforced , and they managed to keep the Norwegian troops back for about an hour . Gahn used this opportunity to try to speed up the withdrawal and get the Swedish troops into the security of the home country , but the Swedish were eventually quickly pushed back towards the rest of the brigade who had taken positions on both sides of the road , east of the river at Matrand . After being reinforced by the column that had passed by Skinpungrud , Krebs ' forces continued their advance under heavy fire . Krebs did , at this time , not know if Dons and his troops were in position at Skotterud and for this reason he would not continue to move forward against the enemy . But after a while the Norwegians had grouped themselves so that they were about to encircle the Swedish defenders , and Gahn therefore decided to withdraw to Skotterud with one battalion and two cannons to keep the escape route open . While all this was going on , Captain Dons and his troops were on the march towards Skotterud . When they heard musket fire coming from Matrand , they were concerned that they would not arrive in time to take part in the battle and the last few kilometers they ran . Many of Dons ' soldiers could not keep up and thus did not participate in the early stages of the attack on the Swedish withdrawal . When Dons ' troops came to the main road at Ilag , who the Swedish used for their withdrawal . Some Swedish supply troops were about to pass , but many of their horses were shot down by the Norwegians so that the road was blocked for those who came behind . Originally Dons should have created a roadblock to prevent the Swedish troops to withdrawn by Ilag , but this was impossible since the time was too short . The Swedish forces were now under attack from two sides and were also about to run out of ammunition . Gahn saw that they would have to break through Norwegian lines if they were to avoid being captured . However , with only bayonet s , some of the Swedish troops managed to fight their way back to Sweden . Aftermath . Lt . Colonel Krebs was hailed as a hero and promoted for the victory at Matrand as well as the prior Battle of Lier . His victories were the only ones in an otherwise despondently campaign and obtained for Norwegian envoys a valuable starting point for negotiations leading to the Swedes accepted the Norwegian Constituent Assembly of Eidsvoll .