The sequences of the night’s events, as I now understand it, was as follows. A council of war advised Archduke Maximilian that Vienna could not be defended and that troops should be withdrawn under cover of darkness. In light of his claims of impending victory mere days ago, the archduke held firm to his belief that counterattack was the better option. He considered our enemies weak near the Lusthaus and ordered they be joined in battle there. By the time this attack commenced, the French had reinforced their troops in that area with artillery and infantry, and the Austrian troops were quickly defeated. As news of this came in, or perhaps even before it, word was received that no more Austrian reserves would be arriving. The archduke immediately ordered all regular troops to leave Vienna. This order was not conveyed to full effect around the city and, with the evacuation wrongly deemed complete, the Tabor Bridge was set alight, with Uncle Andrew and three thousand troops remaining in Vienna.

As my uncle put it to me, a right hames had been made of the evacuation, and he currently has a deputation, led by Hauptmann Koestler, with the French, discussing the form of the negotiations to follow. Vienna is lost, or at the very least about to be. There will be French in our streets soon, hungry soldiers with their war-rage not spent, spoiling for a feed or a fight or the company of a woman.

This awful prospect had turned the mood of the citizens by the time I made my way home. There was weeping and renting of clothes and, in most streets, burning pyres of anti-French propaganda and patriotic sheet music. I saw windows smashed and shops looted; Viennese robbing Viennese before the French came to do the same. This city has been abandoned by law, decency and civility, the three of them absconding hand-in-hand over the Tabor Bridge before it turned to ash.

I arrived back at Doctor Haydn’s house to be told by Fraulein Kremnitzer that he had taken to his bed, awaiting the arrival of a priest. I went to him immediately and, knowing he had taken no breakfast, urged him to eat. Food supplies are running low and he must eat while he can. We have some old bread, but no new flour, and we have hard biscuits. Our milk will not last beyond the day.