A Crazy Old Coot, but an Effective One
Unfortunately for Blucher, King Frederick the Great had a long memory, and knew how to hold a grudge. He did not forget the hotheaded officer’s rude resignation, and did not forgive. He blocked Blucher’s return to the Prussian military – a ban that remained in place for the next fifteen years. It was only a year after Frederick died in 1786, that Blucher was allowed to rejoin his regiment, the Red Hussars, as a major. Blucher was a head case and everybody knew it, but he was a great fighting officer for all that. So his superiors put up with the crazy, and continued to promote him up the ranks.
After service in the Netherlands in 1787, Blucher was a made a lieutenant colonel the following year. The year after that, he was awarded the Pour le Merite, Prussia’s then-highest military award. In the early 1790s, he distinguished himself as a cavalry officer in combat against the armies of Revolutionary France, and by 1794, he was colonel of his regiment, the Red Hussars. That same year he made another jump up the ranks to major general, and in 1801, he was promoted to lieutenant general.