Gottfried Heinrich Graf von Pappenheim (1594-1632)

Letter from Wallenstein to Pappenheim, requesting his presence at Lutzen, where Pappenheim was killed in action against the Swedes.

A Catholic convert, Pappenheim was perhaps the most famous mercenary cavalry leader of the Thirty Years' War (q.v.). He had learnt his trade with the Poles, and from them he borrowed their favoured tactic of the charge with cold steel as opposed to the convoluted cavalry firearm tactics of the caracole, that were favoured in Western Europe at the time. Pappenheim was a truculent subordinate whose appetite for plunder made him difficult to control. However in 1623 he gained his own cuirassier regiment, whose black armour and dashing commander soon gained them a fearsome reputation. He went on to play a leading part in the brutal sack of Magdeburg (q.v.).

At Breitenfeld (q.v.) Pappenheim came up against the Swedish horse for the first time and found them tough and disciplined opponents, particularly since skirmishing units of commanded shot supporting the Finnish cavalry blew his troopers out of the saddle. Pappenheim's horse went on to cover the retreat from Breitenfeld and in 1632 he became an Imperial General under Wallenstein (q.v.). At Lützen (q.v.), Pappenheim found himself detached from the main army, and urgently summoned to Wallenstein's assistance. Riding pell-mell into the thick of the action, his men began to force the Swedes back, but Pappenheim was hit by a cannonball at the height of the fighting and carted off to the rear. His cuirassiers retired much dispirited by his death, and heartened only by the consolation that the Swedish King, Gustavus, too had been killed at virtually the same moment.