The Green Ghost

To His Excellency Generalmajor Karl Philipp von Wrede Commanding the Bavarian Forces in the Tyrol, Stationed near Innsbruck From Hauptmann Johann Matthias Falkenried 1st Line Infantry Regiment “König” In Service to His Electoral Highness, Maximilian IV Joseph Army of Bavaria November, 1805 Your Excellency, I take the liberty of submitting to you several consistent reports gathered from patrols operating along the wooded approaches between the Inn valley and the southern passes. These accounts concern a solitary combatant who has on multiple occasions engaged Bavarian detachments and Tyrolean irregulars alike with an effectiveness altogether disproportionate to his number. The individual is known to carry colours of black and green, though these correspond to no regiment presently serving under His Electoral Highness, nor under the Emperor of the French. The man travels lightly and without companions, yet attacks with a boldness that suggests either remarkable confidence or a temperament bordering upon violent mania, though not of the disordered sort. Rather, it appears to be the colder species of mania sometimes observed in certain duelists and frontier fighters - men who treat combat less as chaos than as a contest to be patiently solved. His methods are of particular note. The man seldom commits himself to a full engagement. Instead he appears, strikes swiftly, and withdraws before our detachments can properly organize pursuit. Several patrol leaders have remarked upon his uncanny judgment of distance and timing, abandoning a skirmish at the exact moment when numbers would otherwise overwhelm him, only to return again from some unseen direction and reopen the fight. Thus a single man has contrived to occupy groups of ten or fifteen soldiers for the better part of an hour. One sergeant of the Tyrolean Jäger attached to our column reported that the fellow fought with such composure that the engagement felt less like battle than like being hunted. For this reason the soldiers have begun referring to him by a curious sobriquet. They say that he moves through the forests like a phantasm, appearing from dark timber or stone as though the ground itself had produced him. Muskets are brought to bear upon him, yet when the smoke clears he is gone again, leaving behind only the evidence of his passing. Among the men he is therefore called simply the Green Ghost. A number of additional peculiarities have been remarked upon. The man is said to display an unsettling calm even when surrounded, and in one encounter he reportedly laughed aloud during the exchange of fire - not in mockery, but in the manner of a man who seems to relish the contest itself. Another patrol claimed he deliberately prolonged a skirmish by withdrawing repeatedly to nearby cover, re-engaging again and again as if measuring the endurance of his opponents. Such behaviour suggests not mere banditry but a fighter who regards the field almost as a game of endurance and cunning, one played against many adversaries at once. It is my belief that the fellow may be either a renegade soldier of uncommon skill or some foreign adventurer who has attached himself loosely to the disturbances presently spreading through the Tyrol. Whatever the case, the effect upon the men should not be underestimated. Tales of a lone warrior harrying entire patrols have already begun to circulate widely through the ranks. Some soldiers dismiss the story as exaggeration, yet those who have faced him appear deeply unsettled by the encounter. Your Excellency will forgive the candour of this remark, but I must confess that if even half these accounts are accurate, the man represents a rare phenomenon upon the field: a solitary combatant capable of operating as effectively as a small detachment. Should he be captured, I would strongly advise that he be examined closely before any final judgment is passed. For a man who fights as though he were many men at once, and who moves like a ghost through the forest, may prove a dangerous enemy - but perhaps an even more valuable ally. With respect and obedience, Hauptmann Johann Matthias Falkenried 1st Line Infantry Regiment “König” Army of Bavaria