Ottavio Piccolomini - As A Commanding Officer

As A Commanding Officer

Piccolomini's efforts at Lützen were recognised by his contemporaries too - on reading the official report of the battle, the emperor made him General-Feldwachtmeister (a rank equivalent to Major-General). At the same time, however, Holk, who had played an even more crucial role in holding the Imperial army together at Lützen, was promoted to Field marshal at Wallenstein's insistence, much to Piccolomini's chagrin.

In the campaign of 1633 Piccolomini was appointed commander of a detachment posted at Königgratz assigned to bar the enemy's advance from Silesia into Bohemia. In May, Wallenstein entered Silesia with the main army in an attempt to compel the electors of Brandenburg and Saxony to join the Holy Roman Empire against the Swedes. Piccolomini was with Wallenstein but disapproved of his policy and joined in the military conspiracy to oust the Duke. The conspiracy developed into a plot to assassinate the Duke; Wallenstein was killed on 25 February 1634 at Cheb Castle. His reward was his marshal's baton, 100,000 gulden and the estate of Náchod in the Orlické mountains in East Bohemia. Piccolomini's part in the assassination was set out in fictionalised form in Friedrich Schiller's play, Wallenstein.

On 5 and 6 September of that same year, Piccolomini distinguished himself at the Battle of Nördlingen. By 1635, Piccolomini was again allied with a Spanish army but complained that their laziness and caution ruined every strategy he developed.

In 1638 he was made a Count of the Empire. In 1639, having won a great victory over the French (at the relief of Thionville, on 7 July), he was rewarded with elevation to the office of privy councillor and the dukedom of Amalfi from King Philip IV of Spain.

Following these illustrious rewards, Piccolomini had expected to be appointed as successor to Matthias Gallas. Instead of being appointed, though, he was called in to act as an assistant to Archduke Leopold Wilhelm of Austria, with whom he served in the second battle of Breitenfeld in 1642. Thereafter he spent several years in the Spanish service and received the title of grandee and induction into the Order of the Golden Fleece.