A.D. 1631.

The city of Magdeburg, capital of a duchy of the same name in Lower Saxony, had entered into an alliance with Gustavus Adolphus, king of Sweden, and had granted him a passage over its bridge of the Elbe, by which the Imperialists were driven from the flat country. But the Austrian general Tilly returned, and blockaded the place very closely. The electors of Brandenburg and Saxony, disapproving of the conduct of the inhabitants of Magdeburg, resolved to maintain their connection with the emperor, and to assemble their arriÈre-ban, to oppose the king of Sweden. Tilly left some troops to continue the blockade, and marched with the bulk of his forces to Frankfort-on-the-Oder, where he joined Torquato-Conti; he then crossed the electorate to attack the Swedes, who were making progress in Mecklenburg. But the fortune of Gustavus Adolphus had an ascendancy over that of the imperial general. The king of Sweden left Mecklenburg, crossed the Oder, took Lanesberg and Frankfort, and then turned suddenly towards Berlin, for the purpose of succouring Magdeburg, which Tilly was now besieging in person. Gustavus Adolphus advanced beyond Potsdam, and the Imperialists, who held Brandenburg and Rathenau, fell back, at his approach, upon the army which was besieging Magdeburg. The elector of Saxony refused to grant the Swedes a passage over the bridge of the Elbe, at Wittemberg, which prevented Gustavus from succouring the city of Magdeburg, as he had intended.

This unfortunate city, which neither Tilly nor Wallenstein had been able to take by force, at length succumbed to stratagem. The Imperialists had entered into a negotiation with the Magdeburghers, by the intervention of the Hanseatic cities; and they pretended during these conferences not to fire upon the city. The Magdeburghers, at the same time credulous and negligent, slumbered in this apparent security; the citizens who had kept watch upon the ramparts, retired, in great numbers, towards morning, to their own houses. Pappenheim, who directed the siege, and who had advanced his attacks up to the counterscarp of the fosse, perceived this circumstance, and took advantage of it. He made his dispositions one morning, when there were but few people on the ramparts; he gave four assaults at once, and made himself master of them, without meeting with much resistance. At the same time, the Croats, who lay near the Elbe, whose bed was then low, proceeded along it, without departing far from its banks, and took the works on the opposite side. As soon as Tilly was master of the cannons of the rampart, he directed them in such a manner as to sweep the streets, and the numbers of the Imperialists increasing every minute, all the efforts the inhabitants could make became useless. Thus was this city, one of the most ancient and flourishing of Germany, taken when it least expected it, and barbarously given up three consecutive days to pillage. All that the unbridled license of a soldiery can invent when there is no check upon its fury; all that the most ferocious cruelty inspires men with, when blind rage takes possession of their senses, was perpetrated by the Imperialists in this desolated city. The soldiers, in troops, with arms in their hands, rushed tumultuously through the streets, massacring indifferently old men, women, and children, those who attempted to defend themselves, and those who made not the least resistance: the houses were pillaged and sacked, the streets were inundated with blood and covered with dead bodies; nothing was seen but heaps of corpses, some still palpitating, lying in perfect nakedness; the cries of the murdered and the shouts of their murderers mingled in the air, and inspired horror and disgust. In this cruel butchery perished nearly all the citizens: only fourteen hundred were saved. These had shut themselves up in the dome, and obtained their pardon of Tilly. To massacres, very naturally succeeded conflagrations; the flames arose from all parts, and in a few hours, private houses and public edifices only formed one heap of ashes. It seems scarcely credible, but only one hundred and forty houses were left standing of this noble city. Twelve hundred maidens, it is said, drowned themselves to avoid dishonour. All Germany, friends as well as enemies, pitied the fate of this city, and deplored the melancholy extirpation of its inhabitants. The cruelty of the Imperialists created the more horror, from history presenting but few examples of such shocking inhumanity.