There was arguably no leader in the Seven Years War that preformed with such consistent brilliance as Johann Nickolaus Luckner. No one in any army carried on "la petite guerre" with such effectiveness and value to his army commander. He provided Ferdinand with all the elements expected of a leader of light troops - reconnaissance, screening and interdiction of the enemy's rear areas. Although written in an uneducated dialect, his reports were informative and not lacking in a directness which was unusual in the eighteenth century.

Luckner was born the son of an innkeeper and hop dealer on January 12, 1722 in Charn. located in the poor forested Upper Palatinate of Bavaria. In Passau, his Jesuit teachers described him as a boy of a reckless and wild nature. At the university in Ingolstadt he acquired the name "Libertinus" foreshadowing his later career.

In 1737, he gave up the study of law and joined the Bavarian Army as a cadet. He served in Hungary with the Infantry Regiment Morawitzky in the campaign against the Turks. He gained notice during the War of the Austrian Succession at the defense of Straubing; in 1742. hi the same year Luckner fought with distinction at Noerdlingen, and immediately thereafter at Ismaning, where he saved his friend Michael Gschray's life. Gschray later commanded the famous corps of light troops in the French, and later the Prussian, armies. Luckner served briefly with the mounted Free Company of Gschray from July 1744.

In 1745 he was an Oberleutnant in the Ferrari Hussars. In August of 1745, Luckner went into the service of the Netherlands with the Hussar Regiment Frangipani formed from many from the Ferrari Hussars. In the campaign of 1748, the new Major Luckner came to the notice of the Duke of Cumberland and was not forgotten.

With the outbreak of the Seven Years War, the ever-adventurous Luckner entered the Hanoverian army. In 1757, as a Rittmeister, he raised a troop of hussars, which took his name. Prince Ferdinand immediately put Luckner to work and formed a reliance on him and his hussars which was to last throughout the war. The story of this unit and its growth to the strength of a regiment would be the story of the entire war and a lengthy study. Luckner rose in rank each year, to lieutenant-colonel in 1758, colonel in 1759, major-general in January of 1760 (adding the title "von" along the way) and lieutenant-general in November of 1761. With each promotion came more responsibility and notoriety. He more often than not remained in the role of an independent commander undertaking many "long-penetration" operations generally with a mixed- arms force.

As his fame spread, he received several offers of employment form various countries. After the war in 1763, he accepted an appointment in the French Army as a lieutenant-general and command of the Regiment Burgundy. With the French Revolution, Luckner was promoted to Marshal of France and took command of the Revolution's Northern Army in the Flanders. Although initially popular with the men, he served half-heartedly. After some early success, he was ridiculed by his soldiers and resigned. He pressed his claim for pension on the bankrupt regime and made the mistake of going to Paris in 1792. Already having come under suspicion with the radicals coming to power, and having become a Danish Count in 1784, he soon suffered the fate of many who held a title. Prosecuted by the notorious Fouquier Tinville, he met the guillotine on January 4, 1794.

For further reading I suggest the classic His Britannic Majesty's Army in Germany during the Seven Years War by Sir Reginald Savory, Oxford, 1966; and, Graf Luckner: der Marschall aus der Oberpflatz by Engelbert Schwartzenbeck~ Regensburg: Buchverl. Der Mittelbayerischen Zeitung, 1993.

This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web.
Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com