Battle of Trencsén The Battle of Trencsén ( , , ) was a battle between the Hungarian Kuruc forces of Francis II Rákóczi and the Imperial Army of the Habsburgs . The battle caused great losses for the Kuruc army , forcing them to give up their plans of obtaining allies in the War of the Spanish Succession against the Habsburgs . The battle also meant that the Habsburgs maintained their positions as the Kings of Hungary . Background . In the year 1708 , Francis II Rákóczi decided to march his troops into Silesia , to pave the way for the plans of Friedrich Wilhelm I of Prussia to take the Hungarian crown , thus reinforcing the Silesian Protestants as well . His army started to march down the Váh river , and planned to pass by the town of Trencsén on their way to Moravia . However , Trencsén was in the hands of a reinforced Habsburg garrison . At first , Rákóczi had no intention to besiege Trencsén , as to not weaken his army , but under pressure of other Kuruc commanders , he decided to do so . The commander of the garrison , Sigbert Heister , found out about the moves of the Kuruc army , and started preparing his soldiers for the attack . Battle . At the morning of 3 August 1708 , 8 , 000 Habsburg - Serbian soldiers faced 15 , 000 Kuruc soldiers , with 12 cannons . The right wing of the Hungarian Kuruc army was composed of light cavalry and part of the infantry under command of Lőrinc Pekri . The middle was composed by the artillery , protected by the German cavalry , as well as with the Polish and German carabinier s under command of colonel de la Motte . The left wing was made out of the rest of the infantry . The terrain ahead of them , however , was unclear , with moats going through it . When Sigbert Heister saw the number of Kuruc troops , and their advantageous standing , he decided to retreat into Trencsén Castle . At the moment of giving this order , the Kuruc artillery started firing , with Pekri ' s wing advancing to attack the Habsburg soldiers while they were still organising . But the terrain was unsuitable for attack . The terrain was rugged , with two man - made ponds being next to each other , with an embankment between them . Pekri ' s cavalry started to go through the embankment at the trot . Meanwhile , Pekri was warned that the narrow passage might cause difficulties ; he therefore decided to retreat from those positions . While his cavalry started to turn back , it became disorganized , of which the troops of Imperial commander János Pálffy - a loyalist Hungarian - took advantage ; they counter - attacked , and caused the disorganized horsemen to flee . The middle and left wing meanwhile fought off Imperial mercenaries , but the flight of the right wing brought about uncertainty among the troops . Rákóczi tried to impress his soldiers and personally entered the fight . When jumping one of the moats , however , he fell from his horse and lost consciousness . Rumours about his death started to spread between his soldiers , and even the fighting troops started to flee . Heister ' s cavalry broke the originally three times bigger Kuruc army during the next three hours . As a result , around 3 , 000 Kuruc soldiers died or were wounded , 500 were captured , along with all of their 12 cannons ; Habsburg royalist losses were small in comparison . Aftermath . The Kuruc troops were heavily defeated in the Battle of Trencsén , revealing that they had smaller fighting capability than their foes . Heister ' s troops chased the remainder of Rákóczi ' s soldiers , captured North - Hungarian mining towns , took Nyitra , and started to besiege Érsekújvár . By the end of the year 1708 , the Kuruc rebels had lost all of North - western Hungary and part of the Kuruc soldiers joined the Habsburgs army . Soon , the rebels lost Bars , Hont , the town of Zólyom and at the beginning of 1709 , had to retreat from Liptó . In December 1708 , Rákóczi tried to save the situation of his declining army by promising freedom and land grants to the peasants who fought by his side . However , this failed to have any notable effect , as peasants , and , even more notably , compromising nobles continued deserting from his army . The growing defeatism and moral decline provoked by the defeat at Trencsén therefore marked the beginning of the ultimate defeat of Rákóczi ' s War for Independence and the perpetuation of the Kingdom of Hungary remaining subjugated to Austrian rule .