THE ADVENTURES OF A FREIKORPS COMMANDER: MEMOIRS OF FREDERICK THE GREAT'S SWEDISH ADVENTURER VOLUME 1: 1697-1746

Facsimile of the 1806 edition but with new 18pp.introduction by Stephen Summerfield, 272pp., 6 maps, additional illustrations in text. 2022.

General De Hordt will be familiar to many because of his famous Freikorps Regiment. His story, as elaborated in his extraordinarily rare memoir (in all my years as a military bookseller I only came across one copy, which I grabbed for myself!), is a uniquely readable personal study of his life and times. It is rich with diplomacy at the highest level (De Hordt was well known at the courts of Sweden, Prussia and Russia) as well as remarkable insights into campaigning in the field. He left Sweden to join Dutch service in 1744; under the Duke of Cumberland he fought in the Fontenoy Campaign, then the Low Countries against Marshal De Saxe; after a short retirement he fled Sweden after a failed palace coup & accepted service under Frederick the Great forming his famous regiment. In 1758 he was taken prisoner by Cossacks & confined in the Peter-Paul Fortress until released by Tsar Peter III. His ended his career as a valuable companion for Prince Henry of Prussia on his missions abroad. Please note this is a facsimile of the original text.