The mayor stood next to him, pointing out in detail that things had been bad enough, this past year, without this. Namely, in December of 1631 the bishop had fled from Bamberg to Forchheim, bringing along the cathedral treasure. Then in February a Swedish colonel named Hastver who had been besieging Höchstadt an der Aisch came down with a detachment, drove away the imperials who were camped along the Regnitz, and burned the wooden supports out from under the bridge across the Regnitz. Then in March, Field Marshall Tilly had come along, marching toward Bamberg with twenty thousand men. He had stopped at Forchheim to negotiate with the bishop. While he was at it, he had requisitioned almost all of the city's reserve supplies. His army, of course, had brought disease with it. Since then, hundreds of people in Forchheim had died of hunger and typhus.
Then, in May, Duke Maximilian of Bavaria had sent the colonel and the troops he commanded to reinforce the garrison. To "help" the bishop; Duke Maximilian had said frankly that Forchheim was too valuable to let the bishop manage its defense. Just barely in time, considering that the Swedes and the Nürnbergs had attacked again not two weeks later. And again in July. Beaten back both times, of course, for which the city fathers were duly grateful.
After the Alte Veste, Wallenstein's retreating army had come through, taking more food and leaving more disease.
Then, when the bishop fled again in the fall of 1632 after Wallenstein's defeat at the Alte Veste, he had left the treasure behind. That meant that the town—which meant the colonel—was now responsible for its safety. But rations were running out. Fast. While the mayor understood, of course, that the soldiers of the garrison naturally had first claim on what food remained, nonetheless . . .
The mayor's voice trailed off.
Colonel von Schletz grunted. It wasn't as if he had not heard the whole lament before.
But what he was seeing now was something new. Not a siege. Most of what was happening outside Forchheim was in sight, but out of cannon shot. At least, out of shot of any artillery he had available in the city, which weren't bad. He could shoot as far as the Regnitz bridge or the Keller Forest. Forchheim had the only powder mill in the prince-bishopric of Bamberg. He could keep the cannon supplied with powder until they ran out of supplies to manufacture it. Which they would, soon. But, at present, he did not have anything to shoot at.
The uptimers ought to be sending a challenge. Something dramatic on the order of: "We will burn Forchheim to ashes!" That would allow him to reply something on the order of: "The city still has enough beer and wine to put out the fire without resorting to water."
It was a ritual. It wasn't for nothing that the Forchheimer had picked up the nickname of Mauerscheisser because of their mode of demonstrating that that there was still food inside the walls, too. After all, that which went in must come out. They figured that it might as well come out in a location that made a point.
At that stage, the besiegers should start to burn down the surrounding villages, forcing the farmers to take refuge in the woods, hunting them down like animals. But he had a feeling that it was not likely. Instead, the farmers who were still around were planting undisturbed. The uptimers were, apparently, even attempting to provide them with draft animals.
And they were undertaking some kind of construction.
If it were an effort to divert the stream of the Wiesent, depriving Forchheim of its water supply, he could understand it. It could be done, he thought, if they started up around Gosberg. But there was no sign of that.
The motto of von Schletz was: "I will hold this place." Which he intended to do, no matter how hardly he had to treat the townspeople.
For that matter, no matter how hardly he had to treat the gentleman canons of the Bamberg cathedral chapter. They had also fled to Forchheim and had not, most of them, managed to get out of town when the bishop did.
For most of the past year, Colonel von Schletz had managed to do more than hold Forchheim. He had responded to every attack with night-and-day cannon shots, no matter what the weather, so they got no rest. They had taken away more losses than his own men. Then, when Tilly fell, he had become de facto the imperial commander for the entire region. Well, episcopal commander, of course, if one wanted to be technical about it. Through the summer of 1632, when he wasn't dealing with the occasional besiegers, he had sent out dragoons and foraging parties, near and far, raiding through the area to deny its resources to the enemy. And, of course, bring in as much as possible, so it would be there when the next siege party came along.