And yet again there was a war - this time the Austrian War of Succession. In the autumn of 1744, as allies of Frederick the Great of Prussia, the French once again took Freiburg. Louis XV himself observed how the siege of the city was progressing from the vantage point of the Lorettoberg (Loretto Hill) and was almost hit by a stray cannonball fired by the forces defending the city. One year later Freiburg was returned to the Habsburgs, in the Treaty of Dresden. Before the French troops departed, however, they destroyed Vauban's system of ramparts so thoroughly that for several decades a vast field of rubble spread over the Schlossberg and the surrounding area of the town.