Trenck, THE BARONS. The cousins Franz and Friedrich, Freiherrn (or Barons) von der Trenck, soldiers and adventurers, were descended from an ancient house of East Prussia. The elder, Freiherr Franz, was born at Reggio, in Calabria, on 1st January 1711, where his father was an Austrian general. When he was seventeen he received a commission as a cavalry officer, but he fought duels and indulged in such adventures that he had to flee in consequence, and went to Russia, where he was made a captain of hussars. Cashiered and imprisoned for insub- ordination, he returned to settle on his estates in Slavonia. At the outbreak of the Austrian war of succession (1740) he obtained from Maria Theresa permission to raise at his own cost a body of 1000 Pandours (q.v.), who, increased to 5000, formed the advanced guard of the imperial army in Silesia. But Trenck and his Pandours were even more distinguished for outrageous cruelty than for reckless daring; there had been no such monster, says Carlyle, since Attila and Genghiz. On the 7th of September 1742 he attacked Čam, a town in neutral territory, this act being, of course, in defiance of all law and discipline; and he completely annihilated it. After the battle of Sohr, in September 1745, he offered to capture Frederick the Great and bring him a prisoner to the Austrian camp. He failed in the enterprise, with great loss of men, but he secured the king's tent and much valuable booty. Suspicions were, however, entertained that he had allowed the king to escape, or even that he was in communication with the enemy, and he was tried by court-martial. He was imprisoned at Vienna, but made his escape with the assistance of a lady of rank; he was however captured, and condemned to life-long imprisonment in the Spielberg at Brünn, where he poisoned himself, 14th October 1749.
See his Autobiography (1748; new ed. 1807); the Life by Hübner (1788); a monograph, Freiherr Franz von der Trenck (3d ed. Celle, 1868); and Carlyle's Frederick the Great.
Freiherr Friedrich was born at Königsberg, 16th February 1726, the son of a Prussian major-general, and distinguished himself at the university. At sixteen he became a cornet in the guards; and two years afterwards he attempted some kind of intrigue with the Princess Amalia, and fell into disfavour. The discovery of a correspondence (itself innocent enough) with his Austrian cousin led to his imprisonment at Glatz, whence in 1747 he escaped to take service in the Austrian army at Vienna. Having returned to Prussian territory on family business, he was clapped in prison by Frederick the Great, and on his attempting to escape from the fortress of Magdeburg was heavily ironed—hands, feet, and waist. He was released on 24th December 1763, and afterwards settled at Aix-la-Chapelle, where he married the burgo-master's daughter, and went into business as a wine-merchant. He published his Memoirs in 1787. The book was translated into all languages, and Trenck became more famous than his famous cousin; several plays founded on his adventures were brought out on the French stage. In 1774-77 he had travelled in England and France, and the restless man received again his confiscated Prussian estate. But having gone to Paris during the Revolution, he was imprisoned by Robespierre as a secret political agent, and guillotined near the Barrière du Trône, 25th July 1794.
See Carlyle's Frederick the Great; Trenck's Autobiography (full of exaggerations, 1787); the Life by Wahrmann (1837); and the monograph, Freiherr Friedrich von der Trenck (3d ed. Celle, 1868). A complete edition of Trenck's collected works, containing his poems, was published in 8 vols. in 1786.