Characters

"A crown is merely a hat that lets the rain in."

The 28-year-old Frederick seized Silesia within weeks of Emperor Charles VI's death — an act of naked opportunism he later described as following ambition, youthfulness, and a desire to make my name. His tactical genius developed across Mollwitz, Chotusitz, Hohenfriedberg, and Soor, transforming early embarrassments into a military legend. The war made Prussia a great power, and Frederick its defining monarch. He ruled for another 46 years, becoming the model of the enlightened despot — a philosopher king who corresponded with Voltaire while drilling his infantry to a mechanical perfection no other army could match.

"Everything but the soul I hold to be negotiable. The soul belongs to God, and I will give it to no one."

At 23, Maria Theresa inherited the Habsburg dominions and faced the immediate dissolution of her empire as Prussia seized Silesia and France, Bavaria, and Spain joined the feeding frenzy. Refused help by her council, she travelled to Pressburg and appeared before the Hungarian Diet in person — reportedly holding her infant son — and won their passionate support. Her combination of personal charisma, steely determination, and political intelligence held the Habsburg state together. She never accepted the loss of Silesia and spent the rest of her reign engineering revenge.

"The human heart is the starting point of all matters pertaining to war."

The illegitimate son of Augustus the Strong of Saxony and the Countess von Königsmarck, Maurice de Saxe was one of the most remarkable soldiers of any era. He never lost a battle he commanded. At Fontenoy, Rocoux, and Lauffeld he displayed a mastery of defensive positioning, artillery coordination, and timing that left his opponents — including the Duke of Cumberland — without answers. He directed Fontenoy from a wicker litter while dying of dropsy. His theoretical treatise, Mes Rêveries, is still read in military academies.

"My God, I have no hope but in God and my brave English soldiers — let them advance."

George II was the last British monarch to personally command troops in battle, at Dettingen in 1743. Sword drawn, hat in hand, and reportedly unable to control his frightened horse, he nonetheless rallied his infantry under murderous French fire and turned near-encirclement into breakout. His reign saw British power expand globally, but his relationship with his son Frederick, Prince of Wales (who died before him) was a byword for Hanoverian family dysfunction. He detested Frederick the Great for abandoning the alliance in 1745.

"Après moi, le déluge. (After me, the flood.)"

Louis XV entered the war opportunistically, seeing Charles VI's death as a chance to dismember the Habsburg empire and assert French primacy in Europe. He had the finest army and the finest marshal (Saxe) in Europe — and yet at Aix-la-Chapelle he returned all his conquests in exchange for essentially nothing, a diplomatic humiliation remembered as bête comme la paix (stupid as the peace). His failure to capitalize on military success accelerated the decline of royal prestige that his grandson Louis XVI would pay for with his head.

"In war, as in hunting, the quarry does not always behave as planned."

Maria Theresa's brother-in-law (husband of her sister Maria Anna) and her principal military commander for much of the war, Charles of Lorraine was a loyal, courageous, and ultimately outclassed general. He was defeated by Frederick at Chotusitz, Hohenfriedberg, and Soor, and by Saxe at Rocoux. Maria Theresa never lost faith in him — their bond was familial and political — though her army paid a heavy price for her loyalty. He later served as Governor-General of the Austrian Netherlands and became a competent peacetime administrator.

"The art of politics is to make the inevitable appear to be a deliberate choice."

Kaunitz served as Austrian plenipotentiary at Aix-la-Chapelle in 1748 — a humiliating assignment given that Austria lost Silesia and gained little. He drew the correct lesson: Austria could never recover Silesia without breaking the old anti-French alliance system and engineering a new one with France against Prussia. Over the next eight years he patiently built relationships in Paris, eventually producing the Diplomatic Revolution of 1756 that aligned France and Austria against Prussia — an alliance system that had seemed unthinkable a decade earlier. He served as State Chancellor under Maria Theresa and Joseph II for nearly 40 years.

"The great art of war is to change plans as often as the enemy changes his."

A Scottish Jacobite who fought at Sheriffmuir (1715) and fled Scotland after the rising failed, Keith served Russia before entering Frederick the Great's service in 1747. By then a seasoned professional, Keith quickly became Frederick's most dependable commander — the general Frederick trusted to execute complex operations independently. He died at the Battle of Hochkirch in 1758, during the Seven Years' War, which Frederick considered a personal loss as much as a military one. Frederick built him a statue in Berlin that still stands.

"I am come home, sir, and I will entertain no notion at all of returning to that country from which I came."

The grandson of James II and claimant to the British throne, Bonnie Prince Charlie was directly enabled by France's war with Britain. French support — ships, money, and Irish Brigade troops — backed his 1745 landing in Scotland. The rising nearly succeeded: he reached Derby before his council forced retreat. Culloden ended it in April 1746, and France's support evaporated at Aix-la-Chapelle. He spent the rest of his life in melancholy exile. His campaign absorbed British military resources that might otherwise have reinforced Cumberland in Flanders.

"I am the husband of the greatest woman in the world."

Francis Stephen of Lorraine married Maria Theresa in 1736 and became Holy Roman Emperor in 1745, the title that gave the Habsburg dynasty its imperial prestige. He was a competent if unspectacular administrator and a genuinely successful businessman — his personal investments helped finance the war. He was also, by all accounts, a loving if unfaithful husband. Maria Theresa adored him with a passion she devoted to no one else; his sudden death in 1765 left her in mourning black for the rest of her life.