south of the French position) the land rises gradually upward in long
rolls of bare fields. At the head of this slope is a typical watershed
country, a country that is typical of watersheds in land neither hilly nor
mountainous; small, sluggish streams, lessening to mere trickles of water
as you rise, cut the clay; and the landscape, though at the watershed
itself one is standing at a height of 500 feet above the sea, has the
appearance of a plain. It is indeed difficult, without the aid of a map,
to decide when one has passed from the one to the other side of the water
parting, and the actual summit is, at this season of the year, a confused,
flat stretch of open stubble fallow, and here and there coarse, heathy,
untilled land. For two or three miles every way this level stretches,
hummocked by slight rolls between stream and stream, and upon the actual
watershed marked by one or two stagnant ponds. Seven miles behind you as
you stand upon the battlefield lies the little French market town of
Bavai, which was for centuries one of the great centres of Roman rule. It
was the capital of the Nervii. Seven great Roman roads still strike out
from it, to Rheims, to Cologne, to Utrecht, to Amiens, to the sea. Two in
particular, that to Treves and that to Cologne, spreading gradually apart
like the two neighbouring fingers of a hand, are the natural ways by which
an army advancing to such a field or retreating from it would communicate
with Bavai as a base.[8]
The outstanding feature of this terrain is not that it is the summit of a
watershed; indeed, as I have said, but for a map one would not guess that
it bore this character, and to the eye it presents the appearance of a
plain; it is rather the symmetrical arrangement of it as a broad belt of
open land, flanked upon either side north and south by two great woods.
That upon the right is known as the wood of Laniere, that upon the left
bears several names in its various parts, and is easiest to remember under
the general title of "The Forest of Sars." The gap between these two woods
narrows to a line which is precisely 2000 yards in extent and runs from
north-west to south-east, the two nearest points where either wood
approaches the other being distant one from another by that distance and
bearing one to the other upon those points of the compass. The French
army, therefore, drawn up on the open land and stretching from wood to
wood, faced somewhat north of east. The allies, drawn up a mile and a
half away on the broad beginning of that gap, looked somewhat south of
west. Behind the latter at a day's march was Mons; behind the former some
seven miles was Bavai; and the modern frontier as well as the natural
topographical frontier of the watershed runs just in front of what was
then the emplacement of the French line.
Upon the French side the bare fields are marked by no more than a few
hamlets, the chief of which is the little village of Malplaquet, a few
houses built along what is now the main road to Brussels. Certain of the
French reserve were posted in this village, accompanied by a few sections
of artillery, but the fields before it lay completely open to the action.
Upon the Belgian side a string of considerable villages stretched; three
of them from right to left marked the principal position of the allies.
Their names from north to south, that is, from the left of the allies to
the right, are Aulnois, Blaregnies, and Sars. The first of these lies
right under the wood of Laniere; the second faces the gap between the
woods; the third lies behind the left-hand wood, and takes its name from
it, and is, as we have seen, called the forest of Sars.[9]
The dispositions which the French army would take in such a defensive
position were evident enough. It must defend the gap by entrenchment; it
must put considerable forces into the woods upon the right and to the left
of the gap to prevent the entrenchments being turned. The character of
Villars and the French tradition of depending upon earth wherever that be
possible, was bound, if time were accorded, to make the entrenchment of
the open gap formidable. The large numbers engaged upon either side left a
considerable number at the disposal of either commander, to be used by the
one in holding the woods, by the other in attempting to force them; not
much more than half of the French force need stand to the defence of the
open gap. This gap was so suitable, with its bare fields after harvest,
the absence of hedges, the insignificance of the rivulets, for the action
of cavalry, that gates or gaps would be left in the French entrenchment
for the use of that arm in order to allow the mounted men to pass through
and charge as the necessity for such action might arise. In general,
therefore, we must conceive of the French position as strong entrenchments
thrown across the gap and lined with infantry, the cavalry drawn up behind
to pass through the infantry when occasion might demand, through the line
of entrenchment, and so to charge; the two woods upon either side thickly
filled with men, and the position taken up by these defended by felled
tree trunks and such earthwork as could be thrown up with difficulty in
the dense undergrowth.
It would be the business of the allies to try and force this line, either
by carrying the central entrenchments across the gap or by turning the
French left flank in the forest of Sars or the French right flank in the
wood of Laniere, or by both of these attempts combined; for it must be
remembered that the numerical superiority of the allies gave them a choice
of action. Should either the stand on the left or that on the right be
forced, the French line would be turned and the destruction of the army
completed. Should the centre be pierced effectively and in time, the
Northern half of the army so severed would certainly be destroyed, for
there was no effective line of retreat; the Southern half might or might
not escape towards the valley of the Sambre. In either case a decisive
victory would destroy the last of the French bodies of defence and would
open the way for an almost uninterrupted march upon Paris.
It will be self-evident to the reader that what with Villars' known
methods, his dependence upon his engineers, the tradition of the French
service in this respect, the inferior numbers of the French forces, and
the glaring necessities of the position, earthworks would be a deciding
factor in the result.
Now the value of entrenchment is a matter of time, and before proceeding
to a description of the action we must, if we are to understand its
result, appreciate how great an advantage was conferred upon the French by
the delay in the attack of the allies.
As I have said, it was upon the morning of Monday, September 9th, that the
two armies were drawn up facing each other, and there is no apparent
reason why the assault should not have been delivered upon that day. Had
it been delivered we can hardly doubt that a decisive defeat of the French
would have resulted, that the way to Paris would have been thrown open,
and that the ruin of the French monarchy would have immediately followed.
As it was, no attack was delivered upon that Monday. The whole of Tuesday
was allowed to pass without a movement. It was not until the Wednesday
morning that the allies moved.
The problem of this delay is one which the historian must anxiously
consider, for the answer to it explains the barrenness and political
failure associated with the name of Malplaquet. But it is one which the
historian will not succeed in answering unless indeed further documents
should come to light. All that we now know is that in a council of war
held upon the Monday on the side of the allies, it was thought well to
wait until all the troops from Tournai should have come up (though these
were few in number), and necessary to send 9000 men to hold the bridge
across the Haine at St Ghislain in order to secure retreat in case of
disaster.[10]
The English historians blame the Dutch, the Dutch the English, and the
Austrians and Prussians blame both.
Perhaps there would have been an attack upon the Tuesday at least had not
Villars spent all the Monday and all the Monday night in exacting from
his men the most unexpected labours in constructing entrenchments of the
most formidable character. Marlborough and Eugene, riding out before their
lines to judge their chances on the Tuesday, were astonished at the work
that had been done in those twenty-four hours. Nine redans, that is,
openworks of peculiar strength, stretched across the gap to within about
600 yards of the wood of Laniere, and the remainder of the space was one
continuous line of entrenchment. What had been done in the woods could not
be judged from such a survey, but it might be guessed, and the forcing of
these became a very different problem from what it would have been had an
attack been delivered on the Monday. Behind this main line Villars drew up
another and yet another series of earthworks; even Malplaquet itself, with
the reserve in the rear, was defended, and the work was continued without
interruption even throughout the Tuesday night with relays of men.
When at last, upon the Wednesday morning, the allies had arrived at their
tardy agreement and determined to force an action, their superiority in
numbers, such as it was (and this disputed point must be later
discussed), was quite negatived by having to meet fortifications so
formidable as to be called, in the exaggerated phrase of a witness, "a
citadel."
One last point must be mentioned before the action itself is described:
the open gap across which the centre of the allies must advance to break
the French centre and encapture the entrenchments was cut in two by a
large copse or small wood, called "The Wood of Tiry." It was not defended,
lying too far in front of the French line, and was of no great consequence
save in this: that when the advance of the allies against the French
defence should begin, it was bound to canalise and cut off from support
for a moment the extreme left of that advance through the channel marked A
upon the map over page. As will be seen, the Dutch advanced too early and
in too great strength through this narrow gap, and the check they
suffered, which was of such effect upon the battle, would not have been
nearly so severe had not the little wood cut them off from the support of
the centre.
V
THE ACTION
On the morning of Wednesday, the 11th of September, the allied army was
afoot long before dawn, and was ranged in order of battle earlier than
four o'clock. But a dense mist covered the ground, and nothing was done
until at about half-past seven this lifted and enabled the artillery of
the opposing forces to estimate the range and to open fire. In order to
understand what was to follow, the reader may, so to speak, utilise this
empty period of the early morning before the action joined, to grasp the
respective positions of the two hosts.
[Illustration: The Elements of the Action of Malplaquet, September 11th,
1709.]
The nature of the terrain has already been described. The plan upon the
part of the allies would naturally consist in an attempt to force both
woods which covered the French flank, and, while the pressure upon these
was at its strongest, the entrenched and fortified centre. Of course, if
either of the woods was forced before the French centre should break,
there would be no need to continue the central attack, for one or other of
the French flanks would then be turned. But the woods were so well
garnished by this time, and so strongly lined with fallen tree-trunks and
such entrenchments as the undergrowth permitted, that it seemed to both
Eugene and Marlborough more probable that the centre should be forced than
that either of the two flanks should first be turned, and the general plan
of the battle depended rather upon the holding and heavy engagement of the
forces in the two woods to the north and south than in any hope to clear
them out, and the final success was expected rather to take the form of
piercing the central line while the flanks were thus held and engaged. The
barren issue of the engagement led the commanders of the allies to excuse
themselves, of course, and the peculiar ill-success of their left against
the French right, which we shall detail in a moment, gave rise to the
thesis that only a "feint" was intended in that quarter. The thesis may
readily be dismissed. The left was intended to do serious work quite as
much as the right. The theory that it was intended to "feint" was only
produced after the action, and in order to explain its incomplete
results.[11]
Upon the French side the plan was purely defensive, as their inferior
numbers and their reliance upon earthworks both necessitated and proved.
It was Villars' plan to hold every part of his line with a force
proportionate to its strength; to furnish the woods a little more heavily
than the entrenchments of the open gap, but everywhere to rely upon the
steadiness of his infantry and their artificial protections in the
repelling of the assault. His cavalry he drew up behind this long line of
infantry defence, prepared, as has already been said, to charge through
gaps whenever such action on their part might seem effective.
It will be perceived that the plan upon either side was of a very simple
sort, and one easily grasped. On the side of the allies it was little more
than a "hammer-and-tongs" assault upon a difficult and well-guarded
position; on the side of the French, little more than a defence of the
same.
Next must be described the nature of the troops engaged in the various
parts of the field.
Upon the side of the allies we have:--
On their left--that is, to the south of their lines and over against the
wood of Laniere--one-third of the army under the Prince of Orange. The
bulk of this body consisted in Dutch troops, of whom thirty-one battalions
of infantry were present, and behind the infantry thus drawn up under the
Dutch commander were his cavalry, instructed to keep out of range during
the attack of the infantry upon the wood, and to charge and complete it
when it should be successful. Embodied among these troops the British
reader should note a corps of Highlanders, known as the Scottish
Brigade.[12] These did not form part of the British army, but were
specially enrolled in the Dutch service. The cavalry of this left wing was
under the command of the Prince of Hesse-Cassel, who was mentioned a few
pages back in the advance upon Mons. It numbered somewhat over 10,000
sabres.
The other end of the allied position consisted in two great forces of
infantry acting separately, and in the following fashion:--
First, a force under Schulemberg, which attacked the salient angle of the
forest of Sars on its northern face, and another body attacking the other
side of the same angle, to wit, its eastern face. In the first of these
great masses, that under Schulemberg, there were no English troops. In
strength it amounted alone to nearly 20,000 men. The second part, which
was to attack the eastern face, was commanded by Lottum, and was only
about half as strong, contained a certain small proportion of English.
It may be asked when once these two great bodies of the left and the right
(each of which was to concern itself with one of the two woods in front of
the gap) are disposed of, what remained to furnish the centre of the
allies? To this the curious answer must be afforded that in the
arrangements of the allies at Malplaquet no true centre existed. The
battle must be regarded from their side as a battle fought by two isolated
wings, left and right, and ending in a central attack composed of men
drawn from either wing. If upon the following sketch map the section from
A to B be regarded as the special province of the Dutch or left wing, and
the section from C to D be regarded as the special province of the
Austro-Prussian or right wing, then the mid-section between B and C has no
large body of troops corresponding to it. When the time came for acting in
that mid-section, the troops necessary for the work were drawn from either
end of the line. There were, however, two elements in connection with this
mid-section which must be considered.
[Illustration]
First, a great battery of forty guns ready to support an attack upon the
entrenchments of the gap, whenever that time should come; and secondly,
far in the rear, about 6000 British troops under Lord Orkney were spread
out and linked the massed right of the army to its massed left. One
further corps must be mentioned. Quite separate from the rest of the army,
and right away on the left on the _French side_ of the forest of Sars, was
the small isolated corps under Withers, which was to hold and embarrass
the French rear near the group of farmsteads called La Folie, and when the
forest of Sars was forced was to join hands with the successful assault
of the Prussians and Austrians who should have forced it.
The general command of the left, including Lord Orkney's battalions, also
including (though tactically they formed part of the right wing) the force
under Lottum, lay with the Duke of Marlborough. The command of the
right--that is, Schulemberg and the cavalry behind him--lay with Prince
Eugene.
The French line of defence is, from its simplicity, quite easy to
describe. In the wood of Laniere, and in the open space just outside it,
as far as the fields in front of Malplaquet village, were the troops under
command of the French general D'Artagnan. Among the regiments holding this
part was that of the Bourbonnais, the famous brigade of Navarre (the best
in the service), and certain of the Swiss mercenaries. The last of this
body on the left was formed by the French Guards. The entrenchments in the
centre were held by the Irish Brigades of Lee and O'Brien, and by the
German mercenaries and allies of Bavaria and Cologne. These guarded the
redans which defended the left or northern part of the open gap. The
remainder of this gap, right up to the forest of Sars, was held by
Alsatians and by the Brigade of Laon, and the chief command in this part
lay with Steckenberg. The forest of Sars was full of French troops,
Picardy, the Marines, the Regiment of Champagne, and many others, with a
strong reserve of similar troops just behind the wood. The cavalry of the
army formed a long line behind this body of entrenched infantry; the
Household Cavalry being on the right near the wood of Laniere, the Gens
d'armes being in the centre, and the Carabiniers upon the left. These last
stretched so far northward and westward as to come at last opposite to
Withers.
* * * * *
Such was the disposition of the two armies when at half-past seven the sun
pierced the mist and the first cannon-shots were exchanged. Marlborough
and Eugene had decided that they would begin by pressing, as hard as might
be, the assault upon the forest of Sars. When this assault should have
proceeded for half an hour, the opposite end of the line, the left, under
the Prince of Orange,[13] should engage the French troops holding the wood
of Laniere. It was expected that the forest of Sars would be forced early
in the action; that the troops in the wood of Laniere would at least be
held fast by the attack of the Prince of Orange, and that the weakened
French centre could then be taken by assault with the use of the reserves,
of Orkney's men, and of detachments drawn from the two great masses upon
the wings.
The reader may here pause to consider the excellence of this plan--very
probably Marlborough's own, and one the comparative ill-success of which
was due to the unexpected power of resistance displayed by the French
infantry upon that day.
It was wise to put the greater part of the force into a double attack upon
the forest of Sars, for this forest, with its thick woods and heavy
entrenchments, was at once the strongest part of the French position in
its garnishing and artificial enforcement, yet weak in that the salient
angle it presented was one that could not, from the thickness of the
trees, be watched from any central point, as can the salient angle of a
fortification. Lottum on the one side, Schulemberg on the other, were
attacking forces numerically weaker than their own, and separate fronts
which could not support each other under the pressure of the attack.
It was wise to engage the forces upon the French side opposite the allied
left in the wood of Laniere half an hour after the assault had begun upon
the forest of Sars, for it was legitimate to expect that at the end of
that half hour the pressure upon the forest of Sars would begin to be felt
by the French, and that they would call for troops from the right unless
the right were very busily occupied at that moment.
Finally, it was wise not to burden the centre with any great body of
troops until one of the two flanks should be pressed or broken, for the
centre might, in this case, be compared to a funnel in which too great a
body of troops would be caught at a disadvantage against the strong
entrenchments which closed the mouth of the funnel. An historical
discussion has arisen upon the true role of the left in this plan. The
commander of the allies gave it out _after_ the action (as we have seen
above) that the left had only been intended to "feint." The better
conclusion is that they were intended to do their worst against the wood
of Laniere, although of course this "worst" could not be expected to
compare with the fundamental attack upon the forest of Sars, where all the
chief forces of the battle were concentrated.
If by a "feint" is meant a subsidiary part of the general plan, the
expression might be allowed to pass, but it is not a legitimate use of
that expression, and if, as occurred at Malplaquet with the Dutch troops,
a subsidiary body in the general plan is badly commanded, the temptation
to call the original movement a "feint," which developed from breach of
orders into a true attack, though strong for the disappointed commanders,
must not be admitted by the accurate historian. In general, we may be
certain that the Dutch troops and their neighbours on the allied left were
intended to do all they could against the wood of Laniere, did all they
could, but suffered in the process a great deal more than Marlborough had
allowed for.
* * * * *
These dispositions once grasped, we may proceed to the nature and
development of the general attack which followed that opening cannonade of
half-past seven, which has already been described.
The first movement of the allies was an advance of the left under the
Prince of Orange and of the right under Lottum. The first was halted out
of range; the second, after getting up as far as the eastern flank of the
forest of Sars, wheeled round so as to face the hedge lining that forest,
and formed into three lines. It was nine o'clock before the signal for
the attack was given by a general discharge of the great battery in the
centre opposite the French entrenchments in the gap. Coincidently with
that signal Schulemberg attacked the forest of Sars from his side, the
northern face, and he and Lottum pressed each upon that side of the
salient angle which faced him. Schulemberg's large force got into the
fringe of the wood, but no further. The resistance was furious; the
thickness of the trees aided it. Eugene was present upon this side;
meanwhile Marlborough himself was leading the troops of Lottum. He
advanced with them against a hot fire, passed the swampy rivulet which
here flanks the wood, and reached the entrenchments which had been drawn
up just within the outer boundary of it.
This attack failed. Villars was present in person with the French troops
and directed the repulse. Almost at the same time the advance of
Schulemberg upon the other side of the wood, which Eugene was
superintending, suffered a check. Its reserves were called up. The
intervals of the first line were filled up from the second. One French
brigade lining the wood was beaten back, but the Picardy Regiment and the
Marines stood out against a mixed force of Danes, Saxons, and Hessians
opposing them. Schulemberg, therefore, in this second attack had failed
again, but Marlborough, leading Lottum's men upon the other side of the
wood to a second charge in his turn, had somewhat greater success. He had
by this time been joined by a British brigade under the Duke of Argyle
from the second line, and he did so far succeed with this extension of his
men as to get round the edge of the French entrenchments in the wood.