THE THIRD CIVIL WAR (1568). NEW CATHOLIC LEAGUE. THE BATTLE OF JARNAC
The peace of Longjumeau, more than any treaty of the civil wars, was
a tentative settlement, an armistice merely. It was chiefly compelled
by the lack of funds of both parties and from its signature was more
openly opposed and protested against than any other of the treaties.
Suspense over the probability of a third and worse war prevailed from
the beginning. For while many on each side returned to their homes,
there were many others who had no place to which to retire, for whom
vagabond life had attractions and who preferred war to peace and
plundering to honest labor.[1212] Both sides were too suspicious and
too fearful to lay down their arms. So many of the Huguenot captains
kept their troops in the fields that the King wrote to no less than
212 places charging the governors thereof to scatter these bands.
Many known to have been in arms hid them in secret places and were,
in consequence, not permitted to return to their native places until
such arms were given up. The Catholic resentment seems to have been
strongest in Paris[1213] and Burgundy, though in the former the provost
of the merchants made the singularly sane plea to the King to have an
especial regard for justice lest its denial might stir the Protestants
to new strife. In general, though, wherever the King’s garrisons were
stationed there was trouble.
It was not long before the Guise opposition organized. Failing of
their hold upon Charles IX, the Guises directed their efforts upon
his brother, Henry, duke of Anjou, whose Catholic sentiments[1214]
were less impeachable than those of Charles and who began to “show
some tokens of an ambitious heart,” was a sworn Catholic, and showed
great offense at his royal brother’s action in “very courteously”
entertaining the cardinal Châtillon, the count Rochefoucauld, and
Brocarde, the Protestant governor of Orleans.[1215] On the night of
March 29 a secret conference was held at the Louvre of the leaders
among the Guise party, in which it was proposed that a pacific attitude
be pretended until the disarming of the prince of Condé’s forces and
the withdrawal of the reiters had taken place, and then suddenly
to seize Orleans, Soissons, Auxerre, and La Rochelle—the Huguenot
strongholds—for which duty Lansac, Martigues, Chavigny, and Brissac
were to be appointed, reinforce the garrison of Paris, and send the
ferocious Montluc into Gascony to subjugate the strongest Protestant
provinces, seize the sea-ports, and drive a Catholic wedge in between
Poitou and the territories of the queen of Navarre, who already had
taken the precaution to strengthen her defenses. By some means, perhaps
through the marshal Cossé, who was a Politique at heart, the cardinal
Châtillon learned of the plot the very next day, and straightway
informed the marshal Montmorency, another moderate, of it. At the same
time the plan was discovered from another source to the prince of
Condé. When Charles IX was taxed with information of it, he swore that
the whole thing was done without his knowledge, accused the cardinal
of Lorraine of treasonable practice, and calling for pen and ink wrote
to Condé promising “good and sincere” observation of all that had been
agreed upon at Longjumeau.[1216]
It will be observed how completely this plan of the Guises for the
subjugation of Guyenne and Gascony is in alignment with the views
of Montluc which he had expressed to Philip II.[1217] Hitherto
the King of Spain had been sustaining two separate lines of secret
correspondence, one with Montluc direct; the other with the cardinal of
Lorraine through the duke of Alva. These two lines now are fused into a
larger whole, at least so far as the Spanish king is concerned.[1218]
Montluc is the military, the cardinal of Lorraine the diplomatic, agent
of Philip’s purposes.
The development of the Holy League has now advanced another stage
in its evolution. The old warrior had not discontinued his secret
relations with Spain, in spite of his warm denial of the fact to the
queen mother, who taxed him with it,[1219] but through Bardaxi still
kept in communication with Philip II. We find him writing twice to the
King in February 1567 and Philip responding in terms of encouragement
in the following month.[1220] Guyenne was peculiarly vulnerable to such
an attack as was now contemplated, and Montluc was certainly the best
captain to execute it. The army of the Huguenots there was in a bad
state.[1221]
The instrument was already forged to Philip II’s hand in the local
Catholic leagues in France. His interest in these was one of the
silent activities at Bayonne. The instructions to the duke of Alva and
to Bardaxi were almost identical. “As the queen mother lacks either
fixity of ideas or honesty of purpose”—the words are those of the
_procès-verbal_ framed in the Spanish council-chamber, it is necessary
to encourage the practices of Montluc and the Catholics.[1222] It must
have been a source of delight to the Spanish king to observe the rapid
increase of these associations. There are two changes to be noticed in
these provincial leagues: their increasingly popular character, and
their tendency to fuse together. Hitherto they had been local in their
operations. Now a process of federation is to be observed by which
the provincial leagues are gradually welded into one whole—in a word
the mighty Sainte Ligue of 1576 potentially exists now.[1223] The
federative tendency of these associations was a natural result of their
increase in number and membership. It was not a haphazard development
at all. Design is evident throughout.[1224]
The renewal of civil war in 1567 had given a great impulse to this
spirit of association.[1225] Nowhere was it more pronounced than in
Burgundy. Tavannes, who was governor of Burgundy, in the year 1567
(July 18), formed a league under the name of the Confrérie du St.
Esprit. Churchmen, the nobility of Burgundy, and wealthy bourgeois who
wished to preserve the Catholic religion were united together in the
service of the King. The version of its origin in the _Mémoires de
Tavannes_ is so interesting that I venture to quote it:
Seeing so much discontent and so many threatening enterprises among
the Huguenots, the queen, for safety’s sake, in the beginning of the
year 1567 caused a levy of 9,000 Swiss [the actual number was 6,000]
to be made under pretext that they were to be for the service of
the duke of Alva in the Flemish War. The prevailing unrest and the
rumors of insurrection gave the sieur de Tavannes, who penetrated the
designs of the queen and the purpose of the Huguenots, the thought
that a prudent man might also take precautions of his own. He reasoned
that the Huguenots did not have more zeal for their cause than the
Catholics for the old religion, and that those who would preserve
it would give their lives and employ their last sou to succor the
King; in a word, oppose league to league. He therefore organized
the Confrérie du St. Esprit, which in reality was a league of the
ecclesiastics and the nobility of Burgundy, with rich men from the
towns, who voluntarily swore to serve in the interest of the Catholic
religion against the Huguenots, sacrificing both person and property
for the sake of the King. Without using coercion he gave orders for
the enrolment of men-at-arms and the collection of money, created
warders, spies, and messengers, in imitation of the Huguenots, in
order to discover their machinations. The oath subscribed to justified
this design. Each parish of Dijon paid its men for three months,
and each town contributed 200 horse and 250 footmen. Burgundy could
furnish 1,500 horse and 400 men on foot, paid for three months of the
year. The sieur de Tavannes summoned an assembly in the Maison du Roi,
... and there caused the oath to be read.
The oath began:
We swear by the most holy and incomprehensible name of God, the
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, in whose name we have been baptized, and
we promise on our honor and the peril of our lives that, henceforth,
at all times, through the chiefs and those who shall be named by the
King under these articles, we will make known any enterprise that
may work contrary to our said law and faith of which we have made
profession in our baptism, and which we have maintained by the grace
of God to the present, and also to make known every enterprise, which
may clothe itself in hatred of the maintenance of the said faith,
against the said royal Majesty, madame his mother, and messieurs his
brothers, who rule over us by divine permission.
And further on in the oath:
We swear and promise in the present writing to render all friendship
and fraternity the one to the other, to aid each other reciprocally
against all phases of the opposite party, if they shall undertake any
enterprise against any one of the signatories to the cause of this
party; and for the sake of said aid we promise respectively, the one
and the other, to employ all our persons, our credit, and our favors
without sparing anything. And we promise to observe all the articles
above sworn to without regard to friends, parents, or any relationship
which we may have with those who undertake the contrary.[1226]
In the following year, on April 2, 1568, “La Fraternité des Catholiques
de Châlons-sur-Saône” emerged.
A l’imitation de la majesté du Roy nostre sire [so runs the
instrument], et soubs sa protection et bon plaisir ... nous avons
faict entre nous et pour tous autres Catholiques qui adjoindre se
vouldront une fraternité qui s’appellera Confrairie et Société des
Catholiques.
And it is added—sign of omen—
Et au cas qu’il advint que Dieu ne veuille que les persones de sa
majesté et de messieurs ses frères ... fussent oppressés de sorte
que ne sceussions avoir advertissement de leurs volontez, promettons
rendre toute obeissance au général chef qui sera esleu.[1227]
Six weeks later, on May 18, 1568, through the activity of Tavannes, a
similar association was formed in Berry and was confirmed at Bourges by
the archbishop, Jacques le Roy.[1228] A month later La Ligue Chrétienne
et Royale, “for the defense of the Catholic church in France and for
maintaining the royal authority in the House of Valois,” to which
was appended the significant proviso, “so long as it shall govern in
the Catholic and Apostolic religion” appeared in Champagne under the
auspices of Henry of Guise, then eighteen years of age and governor of
the province. The nobility, the bishop, and the clergy, in a meeting
at Troyes, concluded, signed, and took an oath to this league on June
25.[1229] Exactly a month later, on July 25, the Beauvaisis followed
the lead of Burgundy, Berry, and Champagne, and formed an “Association
Catholique” for the same purpose.[1230] The movement also spread west
of the Seine, into Maine and Anjou, where the clergy, the nobility,
and the third estate, on July 11, 1568, established an association
whose members swore “de vivre et mourir en la religion catholique et de
nous secourir les uns et les autres contre les rebelles et hérétiques
sectaires de la nouvelle religion.” Forty persons signed the oath.[1231]
In Toulouse, the former league was revived in September, 1568, with
new energy under the patronage of the cardinal of Armagnac and actual
leadership of a secular priest who preached war upon the Protestants
with a crusader’s zeal. On September 12 the latter gathered those
desirous of reviving the association in the cathedral of St. Etienne
where a solemn oath was taken by all, who promised to devote life and
property to the support of the catholic religion. The league thus
formed was officially entitled La Croisade, with the motto: “Eamus
nos, moriamur cum Christo.” All its members wore a white cross.[1232]
Even some of the smaller towns followed the example of the provinces
and large cities. At Anduze in Lower Languedoc at this same time the
churches formed a Catholic union.[1233] The movement actually spread
into Lower Navarre where in the same month, September, the sieur de
Luxe and some others, at the instigation of the cardinal of Lorraine,
perhaps, formed a league at St. Palais for the purpose of driving out
the Calvinist preachers in St. Palais. They seized La Rive, the pastor
at St. Palais, Tarde, pastor at Ostabanès, both of whom were imprisoned
in the house of De Luxe. But the prompt conduct of Jeanne d’Albret
and the prince of Navarre, who won his spurs in the siege of Garris,
speedily crushed this association.[1234]
In view of this spontaneous organization of the Catholics everywhere,
it was inevitable that the peace of Longjumeau would be of short
duration, even if there had been no special circumstances to bring
it to an end.[1235] The Guises, after the discovery of their secret
conference of March 29, for the time being sought to dissemble their
feelings and purposes, and not to offend the King’s anger. When it was
observed in the royal presence that great inconvenience was likely to
arise in France for want of obedience to the edict, the cardinal of
Lorraine, hearing the remark, replied “Sur ma conscience, il n’y a rien
plus necessaire.”
The feud between the Guises and Montmorencys seemed likely to involve
the state in war before very long.[1236] The quarrel between the two
houses was the more intense at this time owing to the fact that the
duke of Anjou’s retention of the lieutenantship, in which office the
Guises supported and maintained him for their own purposes, gave
offense to the marshals, Montmorency, Damville, and Vieilleville; the
more so because they were all moderate Catholics and were dissatisfied
with the duke’s bigoted Catholic leanings and affiliation with the
Guises; they argued that “it had not been seen heretofore, that the
King should have a lieutenant,” that the continuance of such a title,
especially in time of peace, was a prejudice to their station,[1237]
adding significantly that they “being marshals knew what appertained
to their charges.” The strife between the factions soon became so
severe as to dismay some, especially the cardinal of Bourbon, who
threatened “that in case the King would take no better order than he
had done, he would depart the court and give the world to understand
how he had at heart the honour of his house and the welfare of his
friends.” The chancellor L’Hôpital, having vainly endeavored to soften
the strife, asked leave to be discharged of his office—an event which
the cardinal of Lorraine would have hailed with delight. As it was, the
Guises used Anjou to abuse the position of the chancellor.[1238]
The continued presence of the reiters and the Swiss also added to
the anxiety of those who were peaceably inclined, for “there was
not a town or a village in the Ile-de-France that was not furnished
with soldiers,” the country indeed teeming so much with them that
traveling now was more perilous even than during the wars.[1239] The
6,000 Swiss still remained within four leagues of Paris at the last
of May. The reiters of the prince stopped in Burgundy and plundered
the country; while the prince of Condé vainly demanded that they be
paid at once.[1240] At Dijon five of them were slain by the desperate
populace and a massacre of thirteen of the inhabitants followed.[1241]
Many thought that the war would be renewed the moment the harvest was
gathered.[1242]
Late in May the duke of Montmorency left Paris for Chantilly, while
his brother Damville stayed in the capital. The action of each was
significant. At Chantilly the cardinal Châtillon and other Protestant
nobles deliberated, while in Paris Damville’s house was frequented by
those hostile to the cardinal of Lorraine’s authority, notably the four
marshals, all of whom inveighed against him and were popularly believed
to be forming a new opposition to him.[1243] The Huguenot leaders,
Condé, Coligny, D’Andelot, all lay in various castles throughout the
Ile-de-France, with captains, soldiers, and gentlemen around them,
and so distributed that no river separated them one from the other,
while one ford between Paris and Rouen was kept open to enable those
of the religion in Picardy to keep in touch with the prince.[1244] So
skilfully was the distribution made that the leaders could have been
able to unite within a day and a half if necessary.[1245]
The strain upon Charles IX soon began to tell. He was heard to say that
he would rather lose his crown outright than live in continual fear,
and as the feud became intenser, the King yielded and finally showed
his hand by displacing the marshal Montmorency as governor of Paris,
though he dared not go quite so far as to put Henri d’Anjou in his
room, but chose his youngest brother, the duke of Alençon.[1246]
We discover at this time the germ of the Politique party.[1247]
If the Guises had been aware of the astonishing diplomatic stroke
Montmorency had conceived in his retreat at Chantilly and which he
had communicated to the Huguenot leaders, they might not have pressed
the case of Anjou so insistently. This scheme was to separate the
King’s brother from his attachment to the Guises and at the same time
enlist English aid in support of religious toleration in France—the
aim of the Politique party—by nothing less than bringing about the
marriage of the Valois prince with Queen Elizabeth. At the same time
Montmorency, by gaining the favor of the duke, would work the cardinal
out of power. To this end the duke approached the English envoy in
France.[1248]
Day by day the animosity of the parties grew. In a certain sense the
peril of the times was greater than during a state of war. Daily
murder by dagger and by drowning, and violation of property took place
throughout France, to such an extent that it was said more had been
murdered since the publication of the peace than were in the war which
it was supposed to have concluded.[1249] But although the animosity
of the parties was strong enough to incite them to war, the renewal
of hostilities was yet very dependent upon the fluctuation of events
in the Netherlands,[1250] and at this moment the balance there was
inclined in Spain’s favor.[1251]
William of Orange, while not in alliance with the French, nevertheless
sought to avail himself of the services of the 4,000 reiters which
John Casimir had raised for the French Protestants, whose use was no
longer required by the Huguenots after the peace of Longjumeau. A
horror of Spanish cruelty was beginning to pervade Germany and brought
him sympathy and support.[1252] Calvinist Europe built high hopes
upon this assistance for the Dutch.[1253] But Orange was straitened
for money[1254] and it was not until the middle of August that he was
ready to return to give Alva battle with an army of 6,000 horsemen and
four regiments of foot, besides the Lorrainers and Gascons who were
all gunners. According to the plan of the prince, three armies were to
enter the Netherlands at once, the French under a Huguenot leader named
Cocqueville, through Artois; the Count of Hoogstraeten between the
Rhine and the Meuse, and Louis of Nassau through Groningen.
But the whole plan failed. Cocqueville raised seven or eight hundred
men with the intention of provoking Artois to revolt.[1255] Failing
to take Doulens by surprise, Cocqueville pillaged the abbey-town of
Dammartin. The duke of Alva energetically protested to Charles IX
against this violation of the Spanish provinces by French subjects,
and the marshal Cossé was sent into Picardy. The foreigners in
Cocqueville’s band were summarily beheaded at St. Valéry, the leader
himself was sent to Abbeville for trial for treason and executed,
and the whole expedition came to naught.[1256] The enforced delay of
the prince of Orange, united with this repulse, was fatal to the
Netherland project. On July 21, 1568, Louis of Nassau was defeated at
Jemmingen by Alva, Spanish tyranny was fixed more firmly in the Low
Countries, and Egmont and Hoorne were shortly afterward sent to the
scaffold.[1257]
Everything was now out of joint. The success of the Dutch would have
emboldened their French coreligionists to renew the struggle with some
hope of success.[1258] But the Catholic victory in the Low Countries
hardened the resolution of the French government. Hitherto chiefly
the lesser nobility of France had been successfully coerced by the
French crown. Now the cardinal of Lorraine intended to do the like with
the higher nobles, compelling them either to abandon their religious
and political contentions or to take up arms.[1259] At the same time
military preparations began to be made which could not but be viewed
with alarm by the Huguenots. The crown was stronger in cavalry, in
infantry, in artillery, and in munitions. The country as a whole was
with the King, and the chief cities were in his hands. “The great
cities,” said Coligny mournfully, “are the tombs of our armies.”[1260]
So carefully were the preparations made that the King remained armed
while the Huguenots were scattered and unarmed,[1261] saving large
numbers of individual nobles who yet stood upon their guard. In
northern and central France, La Rochelle excepted, the government
controlled all the towns. In Provence and Languedoc, however, many
of the towns were governed by the Protestants.[1262] In order to
prevent the communication of intelligence between the various parts
of France under Protestant control, Charles IX even had refused to
permit Condé to levy money upon the Huguenots for payment of the
reiters, notwithstanding the governments’ own poverty, although the
prince cunningly suggested such an action.[1263] The outlook was dark
indeed. The Huguenots nowhere save in the south seemed strong enough
to take the field, and it seemed hopeless for them to expect to join
with their coreligionists of the north owing to the vigilance of
Montluc in Languedoc and Tavannes in Burgundy and to the fact that the
whole course of the Loire was patrolled by forces of the government.
Moreover, the general contribution being stopped, both resources and
communication were at an end; the gentry too were impoverished by the
late war to a very great extent, having “consumed as much in eight
months as they had gathered in four years before,”[1264] so that the
wisest of the Huguenot leaders were of the opinion that the religion
was not in a state to attempt anything by open arms.
While he tried to augment his forces Condé sought to remedy matters
by appeal to the King,[1265] complaining of the outrages inflicted
on the Huguenots[1266] (Montluc had even hanged seven gentlemen of
the entourage of the queen of Navarre, in Languedoc), being careful
not to impute these wrongs, however, to the King, but reprobating the
malignancy of the cardinal of Lorraine and accusing him of secret
intelligence with Spain.[1267] The cardinal, thus assailed, parried
through the King, who two days later issued a proclamation, which after
reciting the complaints of murder, robberies and other wrongs alleged
by those of “the pretended Reformed religion,” declared that the King,
having sent his _maîtres des requêtes_ into the provinces where these
acts of violence had been perpetrated, was satisfied of the substantial
justice of the administration, and asserted that the complaints had
either been manufactured by the Huguenot leaders, or else grossly
exaggerated. The proclamation closed by commanding all judges and other
officers, on pain of deprivation, to search out and punish wrong-doers,
so that those of the religion might not have ground for complaining
that justice was not done them.[1268]
Such a proclamation was mere verbiage, however, and was intended to
lull the anxiety of the Huguenots while the government’s preparations
went forward. It deceived none of the Protestant leaders. The signs of
the times were too plain to be concealed. Arms were secretly levied and
stored in La Rochelle, Saintes, Châtellerault, St. Jean-d’Angély.[1269]
To these signs was now added another unmistakable indication. In
August, 1568 the concentration of fourteen companies of gendarmes and
several bands of infantry in Burgundy, where the two most conspicuous
of the leaders of the Huguenots then were—the prince of Condé and
Coligny[1270]—ostensibly to prevent the prince from delivering his
German reiters to the prince of Orange, precipitated civil war anew.
Protestant historians have contended that the government of Charles IX
was wholly to blame for the renewal of war. But it may be fairly said
that Charles IX acted not only according to his right, but according
to policy in seeking to prevent the union of the Huguenot and Dutch
interests. France was not yet prepared to espouse an open anti-Spanish
policy, though she was already secretly so inclining,[1271] and
the projected alliance of the prince of Condé and the prince of
Orange[1272] would have been certain seriously to compromise her
with Spain. Finally, it may be added, that there was not a little of
self-ambition in Condé’s action.[1273]
This attempted co-operation of the prince of Condé and the prince of
Orange drew the French government into close association with the duke
of Alva. But the diplomatic relations now established between the
courts of Paris and Madrid were of much greater importance and the
negotiations were energetically forwarded by the cardinal of Lorraine,
who on November 21, sent the cardinal of Guise into Spain charged to
treat of marriage between Philip II and Marguerite of Valois,[1274] or
if that proved unacceptable, to suggest Philip’s marriage with one of
the daughters of the Emperor, while Charles IX was to marry the other.
At the same time Alva proposed that the duke of Anjou—the future
Henry III—should marry the queen of Portugal.[1275] The far-reaching
effect of such a series of alliances is manifest. The two houses of
Hapsburg would become dynastically united again in a common family and
politico-religious purpose, into which association France would be
woven.
The government had secretly prepared for the sudden investment of
La Rochelle, intending to “spring” the war suddenly at that point,
but had been compelled to alter the plan. This change of plan induced
the resolution to attempt to capture the prince and Coligny,[1276]
the purpose of the Guises (with whom the King and his mother were not
acting) probably being to send them to the scaffold, as Alva had done
with Egmont and Hoorne.
But the deception and duplicity which they used to allay the suspicions
of the prince and the admiral offended the bluff, soldierly honor of
Tavannes, who, though a bigoted Catholic, would not stoop to such a
dishonorable course of action.[1277] While feigning to obey the orders
to capture the two leaders, he contrived to apprise them of their
danger by managing so as to have his letters intercepted by them.[1278]
Thanks to this timely warning, escape was made possible. On August 23,
1568 Condé and Coligny, accompanied by the members of their families
and D’Andelot’s—the princess of Condé being pregnant—crossed the
Loire in sudden flight, guarded on the road by a hundred horsemen. The
fugitives were bound for La Rochelle, which was safely reached without
mishap, though not without peril.
From the safe retreat of this famous port and stronghold the prince of
Condé issued a manifesto protesting that he and his followers intended
nothing prejudicial to the King, but only to protect those of the
religion from the tyranny and oppression of their enemies. A form of
oath was adopted, to be taken by the nobility, officers, and others
of the prince’s army, regulations were issued for the maintenance
of discipline in the army, for the prevention of desertion, private
plundering, and avoidance of excess of baggage, camp-followers,
disorders, and quarrels.[1279]
The government at once took up the gage of battle and prepared to
push the war. On September 25, 1568, an edict proscribed the Reformed
faith, exiled the pastors thereof, and excluded Protestants from
public offices and from the universities.[1280] As far back as July
the government had begun negotiations with the Pope to secure license
to alienate from the lands of the church 200,000 crowns per annum.
This had failed when first petitioned,[1281] but the cardinal of
Lorraine by the end of August had managed to raise 1,200,000 francs,
although half of it had to go to pay old debts to the Parisians.[1282]
The holy father, having at last been persuaded of the good of the
cause, consented to the alienation of 100,000 crowns annual rent
of the clerical lands, upon condition that the money be strictly
employed for the compulsion of those who denied the authority of Rome
and the revocation of the Edict of Toleration.[1283] The debate upon
the measure pertaining to the church lands brought about a clash in
the King’s Privy Council between the cardinal of Lorraine and the
chancellor L’Hôpital, on September 19. The latter protested against
the withdrawal of the Edict of Toleration, on the ground that it would
induce the war at once and lead to the overrunning of the country
again by the reiters, and refused to affix the royal seal to the
proposed ordinance, without which the papal writing was of no force in
France. The cardinal retaliated by taunting the chancellor with being
a hypocrite and asserted that his wife and daughter were Calvinists.
L’Hôpital retorted by sarcastically alluding to the notorious
administrative practices of the Guises, at which the cardinal became
so angry that he would have seized the venerable chancellor by his
great white beard if the marshal Montmorency had not stepped between
them. In his rage the cardinal, turning to the queen mother, declared
the chancellor’s vicious policy of toleration was at the bottom of
the evils of France and that if he were in the hands of the Parlement
of Paris his head would not tarry on his shoulders twenty-four hours
longer.[1284] The issue of this episode was not long in forthcoming.
On September 28 Michel de l’Hôpital was dismissed from office[1285]
and the seal given to the archbishop of Sens, Biragues, a pupil of the
Guises and a henchman of Philip of Spain.[1286] It was he who rescinded
the Edict of January and the other two edicts of pacification and
exiled all Huguenot preachers from France within twenty days, forbade
all exercise of the Reformed religion on pain of death, and dismissed
from office and the universities all those who were Protestants.
The new civil war was represented as a war of religion; indeed as
a crusade, the King going to evensong at La Sainte-Chapelle, on
Michaelmas Eve, where the heart of St. Louis was interred, and on the
morrow marching in procession with the relics of St. Denis, as did the
former kings of France before they took the road of the cross. The
duke of Anjou, the King’s brother, was appointed lieutenant-general
of the realm on September 1, and proclamation made to the companies
of gendarmerie and the bands of archers, to assemble at Orleans, now
become the Catholic headquarters.[1287]
Charles IX, in October, went in person to Orleans, in order by his
presence, to enlarge the enlistments, and also to overcome the
suspicion that the whole movement was made at the instigation of
the Guises. The government of Paris was left to the King’s youngest
brother, the duke of Alençon, assisted by the duke of Montmorency. In
the meantime the prince of Condé had remained in the vicinity of La
Rochelle during September, while his army was gathering.[1288] When the
army was massed, he moved up the Loire with his forces.
The emulation that had characterized the Huguenot nobility in the last
war now served Condé well. The provinces were alive with activity
during this autumn. The young prince of Navarre, the future Henry
IV, was to win eminence in the coming struggle, and at this time
was at Bergerac where forces were assembled to assist Condé.[1289]
The Catholic and governmental forces were no less alert. The King’s
captains were employed in all parts of the realm to levy men. Montluc,
discovering a plot in Bordeaux to deliver the town to those of the
Reformed religion, executed the greater part of those so accused. At
Toulouse, Auxerre, and Lyons all men were constrained to go to mass. In
Provence and Languedoc the peasantry even rose against the Protestants.
To crown all both sides levied reiters in Germany.[1290]
[Illustration: AUTUMN CAMPAIGN OF 1568
_Methuen & Co._
]
The lower course of the Loire was the fighting-line, for command of
which both sides aimed.[1291] The tactics of Anjou were to avoid
an engagement, if possible, and to prevent Condé’s forces from
crossing, which he succeeded in doing through a stratagem.[1292] The
passage of the Loire being stopped, and the river towns being all
garrisoned, especially Saumur, the prince of Condé, after taking the
castle of Champigny which belonged to the duke de Montpensier, fell
back on Loudun. The country was so wet that neither horse nor foot
could do much. The prince excelled in cavalry, the Catholic army in
infantry.[1293] In the provinces the Catholic preponderance was marked.
The duke of Aumale in Champagne had 18 companies of men-at-arms and 25
ensigns of footmen, awaiting the coming of the reiters; Marshal Cossé
was in Picardy with 15 companies of men-at-arms and 2,000 footmen. The
reason for the presence of so many troops so far from the actual seat
of the war is to be found in the fact that the movements of the prince
of Orange, who had entered France in December,[1294] gave great anxiety
to the government. The prince was now on the borders of Picardy, but
his horsemen rode as far as Compiègne and Rheims, to the amazement
of the court and the consternation of the Guises, who dispatched the
cardinal of Guise to Madrid for the help of Philip II.[1295] If the two
princes could have effected a junction in the meantime, Paris would
have been between hammer and anvil. As it was, the danger was so great
that the King hastily began to raise an additional army in December,
calling out ban and arrière-ban, and in order that the capital might
be able to withstand a siege, if worst came to worst, drew all the
provisions of the country roundabout Paris for a space of ten miles
into the city.
The position of the various armies was an interesting one. In east
France the reiters of the duke of Deuxponts were endeavoring to join
Orange who delayed his movement to await their coming,[1296] while
Alva dogged his steps.[1297] In the west Condé was vainly striving to
cross the Loire in order to join Orange and the Protestant reiters,
while the duke of Anjou was straining every nerve to keep him back.
In the midst of all, Paris lay calm but tense[1298]—the undisturbed
center of the cyclone of war. Both armies suffered from the terrible
weather of December. The soldiers of each side were dying of famine and
privation.[1299]
The hope long deferred that Condé had cherished of Orange joining him
made him heartsick at last; the latter could not come, for Alva, the
duke of Aumale, and the Catholic reiters under a German colonel named
Schomberg—a name destined to become illustrious—were too closely
watching his movements.[1300] Even had these impediments been removed,
the Seine and the Loire would have had to be crossed—an impossible
feat.
The winter of 1568-69 was occupied with Huguenot and Catholic
negotiations for foreign support and with preparations for a renewal
of the war when the spring came. Meanwhile the delay of France to pay
its debts in Switzerland had gradually provoked a change of public
sentiment in the forest cantons, which pushed them a few years later
into espousal of Spain. The loss of its ascendency in Switzerland was
a particularly hard blow to France. For the policy of Spain had been
to rouse a religious war in the Alpine lands, so that her intervention
would find easy entrance. The five cantons of the center were the
fulcrum of Spain’s diplomatic efforts. Day by day the tension became
greater, the five cantons inclining more to Spain, their neighbors
leaning to France, while between the two groups Bern and Zurich
continued neutral, refusing to aid the prince of Condé with either men
or money.[1301]
Military events were insignificant. Anjou remained with his army in
Limousin, and the prince of Condé in Périgord. On December 23, 1568,
there was a skirmish near Loudun. In January Condé marched to the
relief of Sancerre. The town was of very strong situation and Brocbart,
the Huguenot commandant, filled a great number of wine-vats with sand
and earth and used them for gabions, and so managed to hold out against
five assaults,[1302] although the place was so invested by the Catholic
army that the prince could do nothing to relieve it. Failing this,
he marched upon Saumur in the vain hope of forcing a crossing of the
Loire at some point, on the way putting the garrison of 150 men in the
abbey of St. Florens at Pont-de-Cé to the sword. Both armies suffered
terribly from the weather and the condition of the country.[1303]
In the King’s council the Politique party still labored for peace, and
in the interim made an unsuccessful effort to restore the Edict of
Toleration.[1304] The cessation of hostilities, however, was complete
enough to alarm the Pope, who feared another truce would be made and
used exhortation and promise in order to prevent any compromise with
heresy.[1305]
The Dutch and English were attentive observers of the movement in
France, the former especially, for they felt that they and the French
Protestants were engaged in a common cause. From England came numbers
of English gentlemen to La Rochelle, in order to follow Condé in the
war, and the Channel and the Bay of Biscay were thronged with English
and Dutch privateers.[1306] Elizabeth, as the saying went, wanted “to
throw the stone and hide the arm.” Although the English ambassador,
Sir Henry Norris, protested the innocence of his government and the
queen wrote with her own hand that she would not interfere in France,
Englishmen were landed at La Rochelle and in Brittany and English
vessels brought over gunpowder, shoes, and arms.[1307]
While Anjou held the line of the Loire, the French government
established its military base at Château-Thierry on the Marne
in order to prevent communication between the Protestant German
princes, especially the elector palatine and the duke of Deuxponts;
or between the Dutch and its own revolted subjects. To this end it
was planned that the duke of Aumale, with a force of reiters sent by
the margrave of Baden and the count of Westelburg, and some troops
proferred by Count Mansfeldt[1308] should be sent against the prince
of Orange, while the duke of Anjou was to go against the prince of
Condé.[1309] But William of Orange effected a junction with the duke
of Deuxponts[1310] in spite of D’Aumale’s effort to prevent him.[1311]
The attitude of the Lutheran princes had now become more definite in
favor of the Huguenots.[1312]
The international Protestant plan was to drive its blows in on either
side of Lorraine and thus sever the chain through central Europe by
which Philip II held his dominions together, and to separate the two
houses of Hapsburg.[1313] The conduct of the Emperor furthered this
project, for when Charles IX sent La Forrest to the Emperor to protest
against the action of the Lutheran princes of Germany and to continue
the talk of his marriage with the Emperor’s daughter, Ferdinand,
while expressing his regret at the troubled state of France, received
the marriage proposition coldly and complained of the damage done
by the French army under the duke of Aumale within the limits of the
empire,[1314] and recommended that Charles try peaceful methods instead
of force for the pacification of his kingdom.[1315] Parallel with
the project to co-operate with the prince of Orange and the duke of
Deuxponts, Coligny planned a revival of Huguenot activity in the south
of France so that this diversion would weaken resistance to the other.
The aim was, with the aid of the “viscounts” to break a way across the
upper Loire, and so open the road to German assistance.[1316]
The combined array against D’Aumale was too great for him to make
head.[1317] Nor was the adverse double military situation the sole
anxiety of the French government. Montmorency and the duke of Bouillon
were so disaffected that there was even expectation of their openly
joining the Huguenots. The cost of the two armies amounted to 900,000
livres a month, besides the gendarmerie and artillery, which was about
two million each quarter.[1318] There was owing to the gendarmerie
12,000,000 of livres for six quarters; to the 6,000 Swiss with the
duke of Anjou 300,000 livres; to those with the duke of Aumale 100,000
livres besides what was owing to the French infantry. Both of the
King’s commanders were so short of funds that they were forced to seize
church-plate and even reliquaries.[1319]
In these extremities Charles IX viewed the renewal of war on the
opening of spring with alarm and began to think of making peace for a
term, with no intention of keeping it, but merely in order to avoid
a catastrophe and with the hope that some of the Huguenots might be
disarmed in the interim. But suddenly the cloud was lifted. The
royal army under the nominal command of the duke of Anjou, but really
commanded by the veteran Tavannes, who had orders to give battle at
all cost before the duke of Deuxponts could arrive, won the decisive
victory of Jarnac on March 13, 1569. It was a fierce and bloody battle.
The prince of Condé, after having been dangerously wounded and taken
prisoner, suffered a foul death at the hands of some unknown assassin
in the royal army, who shot him with a pistol-ball.[1320] In the
engagement the Scotchman, Stuart, who had killed the constable at St.
Denis, was taken and brought to the duke, who said to him: “So here
you are, you traitor, you who have frequently boasted that you wished
to kill the queen, my mother. Now you shall receive your deserts.” At
that moment the marquis de Villars, the old constable’s brother-in-law,
appeared, and with his own hands executed vengeance.[1321]
[Illustration: _Croquis_
DU
THÉATRE DE LA GUERRE
pour la
_Période du 24 Février au 13 Mars 1569._
Reproduced by permission of the author from M. S. C. Gigon’s _La
bataille de Jarnac et la campagne de 1569 en Angoumais_ #/ ]
[Illustration: BATAILLE DE JARNAC
par
S C GIGON
_Methuen & Co._
]
In Paris when news of the battle of Jarnac was brought a grand
procession was authorized by the clergy and the Parlement. All the
stores and shops were closed as though it were a holiday. The clergy,
bearing the relics of the saints, marched first to the convent of the
Cordeliers, and then to that of the Jacobins, where a fiery sermon was
preached by a Jacobin of Auxerre named Mammerot. After the sermon the
_Te Deum_ was celebrated, and then the militia of the city assembled
under the command of the four captains, and a grand review was held in
the streets. The celebration ended by a great bonfire in front of the
Hotel-de-Ville, and the firing of cannon.[1322]
The Pope took the victory of Jarnac as a direct answer to prayer.[1323]