The Battle of Hochkirch was a major battle of the Seven Years' War that was fought in 1758 between the armies of Prussian king Frederick the Great and the Austrian Field Marshal Leopold Joseph von Daun.
Following the battles of Rossbach and Leuthen in late 1757, Frederick recaptured much of Silesia from the Austrians and pressed south into Austrian Moravia. In 1758, however, the Russians defeated Frederick's army at the Battle of Zorndorf, and the Swedes defeated the Prussians at the Battle of Tornow a month later. In late 1758, Leopold Joseph von Daun led an Austrian army of 80,000 troops into Saxony, where Frederick moved with his 36,000-strong Prussian army to confront him. The two armies met at Hochkirch, where Frederick underestimated the typically cautious Von Daun and did not believe that Daun would attack. The Austrians launched a pre-dawn attack and inflicted 30% losses on Frederick's army, including five killed generals and the loss of his artillery and supplies. The Austrian surprise attack inflicted one of Frederick's worst defeats, but he failed to pursue and destroy Frederick's army, and Frederick built a new army over the winter.