12 Caroline Lucretia Herschd. |U57-i760. 



of her filth cr ; the sister's unhappiness at being home- 

 less when about to become a mother; all these circum- 

 stances combined to sadden the personal recollections 

 of a time of almost unsurpassed national calamity. 

 After the loss of the battle at Hastenbeck, the Recol- 

 lections thus conclude this period. 



"Nothing but distressing reports came from our army, 

 and we were almost immediately in the power of the 

 French troops,* each house being crammed with men. 

 In that in which we were obliged to bewail in silence 

 our cruel fate, no less than 16 privates were quartered, 

 besides some officers who occupied the best apartments, and 

 this lasted for about two } r ears [a note of later date says 

 " not so long "j before the town was liberated." 



A gap occurs here, between the years 1757 and 

 1760, several pages having been torn out in both the 

 original " Recollections " and the unfinished memoir 

 commenced in 1840. In the former, a sentence be- 

 ginning " the next time I saw him [Jacob] was when 

 he came running to my mother with a letter, the 



* "While the King of Prussia was waning in the south of Germany, an 

 army of 60,000 Frenchmen under Marshal il'Estives was directed upon 

 Hanover, and occupied in the first place the Prussian dominions lying upon 



the Rhine d'EstnVs had ''<;n to a certain degree successful in an 



action at Hastenbeck, on the Weser, and had forced Cumberland to retreat. 

 That commander continued to yield ground incessantly, leaving Hanover and 



Magdeburg unprotected He concluded with Richelieu the convention 



of Closter Severn, by which lie engaged that .... the Hanoverian troops 

 should continue inactive in their quarters near Stade. Hostilities were to be 

 suspended, and no stipulation was made respecting the Electorate of Hanover. 

 That country was accordingly plundered without mercy, and subjected to 

 enormous contributions." Annals of France, Encyclopaedia Metropolttama. 



