bigger problem, however, came to light concerning recruits of non-Hungarian origin—they proved to be unreliable. Early in August Commander of the Dráva guarding line, Major-General Ferenc Ottinger, instructed his soldiers not to resist but rather to retreat without fighting in case the Croats occupied Muraköz. Royal commissioner Csányi had not been informed about the order and, consequently, resigned from his post in protest, although he had not even dispatched his letter of resignation when Ottinger himself resigned. Until early August Jelačić did not seriously consider launching an attack against Hungary. He deployed only a few battalions at the border and occupied Varasd early June. Most of the 1st and 2nd battalions of the border guard regiments were in Italy and serious officer and armament shortages appeared in the rest of the battalions. In July Jelačić went on a tour of Slavonia and the Szerémség and won over the border guard regiments one after the other. Between August 8 and 10, afte. his return to Croatia, his troops occupied Virovitica County (Verőce) and then Szerém county in mid-August. According to the recollections of one of his generals, by then, Jelačić had decided to be the first to attack, before the Hungarians would. On August 9 Jelačić sent to Major-General Roth, commander of the Bród Border Guard Regiment, orders relating both to Roth’s border guard regiments and to details of preparations for a general attack. Between August 17 and 20 the Ban visited all the borderlands under his command and prompted 28,576 people to rise against the Hungarians. General Neustadter was sent to Slavonia to make preparations there. In the second half of August the Slavonian- Szerémség border guard regiments formally declared that they intended to follow Jelačić’s commands.9 On August 21 Jelačić instructed Roth and his troops to push forward to the Dráva River and to occupy Eszék. After Ottinger’s departure the Hungarian side of the Dráva line was left without a commander for a while. In his appeal of August 25 Batthyány informed the Transdanubian authorities that “we ought to expect a factual violation of our country’s borders any minute.” On August 31 the Eszék garrison announced that in case the expected Hungarian-Croatian conflict occurred they would remain neutral and keep the fortress for His Majesty, Ferdinand V. This dealt a disadvantage to both the Hungarians and the Croats since, according to the Eszék declaration, the Croats were forbidden from