hand, made them superior to all others in the proportion of five to three (see AUSTRIAN SUCCESSION, WAR OF THE).  He was essentially an infantry soldier; in his time artillery did not decide battles, but he suffered the cavalry service, in which he felt little interest, to be comparatively neglected, with results which appeared at Mollwitz.  Frederick the Great formed the cavalry of Hohenfriedberg and Leuthen himself, but had it not been for the incomparable infantry trained by the “Old Dessauer” he would never have had the opportunity of doing so.  Thus Leopold, heartily supported by Frederick William, who was himself called the great drill-master of Europe, turned to good account the twenty years following the peace with Sweden.  During this time two incidents in his career call for special mention:  first, his intervention in the case of the crown prince Frederick, who was condemned to death for desertion, and his continued and finally successful efforts to secure Frederick’s reinstatement in the Prussian army; and secondly, his part in the War of the Polish Succession on the Rhine, where he served under his old chief Eugene and held the office of field marshal of the Empire.

[v.02 p.0047]

With the death of Frederick William in 1740, Frederick succeeded to the Prussian throne, and a few months later took place the invasion and conquest of Silesia, the first act in the long Silesian wars and the test of the work of the “Old Dessauer’s” lifetime.  The prince himself was not often employed in the king’s own army, though his sons held high commands under Frederick.  The king, indeed, found Leopold, who was reputed, since the death of Eugene, the greatest of living soldiers, somewhat difficult to manage, and the prince spent most of the campaigning years up to 1745 in command of an army of observation on the Saxon frontier.  Early in that year his wife died.  He was now over seventy, but his last campaign was destined to be the most brilliant of his long career.  A combined effort of the Austrians and Saxons to retrieve the disasters of the summer by a winter campaign towards Berlin itself led to a hurried concentration of the Prussians.  Frederick from Silesia checked the Austrian main army and hastened towards Dresden.  But before he had arrived, Leopold, no longer in observation, had decided the war by his overwhelming victory of Kesselsdorf (December 14, 1745).  It was his habit to pray before battle, for he was a devout Lutheran.  On this last field his words were, “O Lord God, let me not be disgraced in my old days.  Or if Thou wilt not help me, do not help these scoundrels, but leave us to try it ourselves.”  With this great victory Leopold’s career ended.  He retired from active service, and the short remainder of his life was spent at Dessau, where he died on the 7th of April 1747.

He was succeeded by his son, LEOPOLD II., MAXIMILIAN, PRINCE OF ANHALT-DESSAU (1700-1751), who was one of the best of Frederick’s subordinate generals, and especially distinguished himself by the capture of Glogau in 1741, and his generalship at Mollwitz, Chotusitz (where he was made general field marshal on the field of battle), Hohenfriedberg and Soor.