THE SEVEN WEEKS--THE THREE PHASES
From the day when the Duke had appeared upon the southern side of the
mountains, and was debouching into the plains of the Danube, to the day
when he broke the French line at Blenheim, is just over seven weeks; to be
accurate, it is seven weeks and three days. It was on the last Sunday but
one of the month of June that he passed the mountains; it was upon the
second Wednesday of August that he won his great victory.
These seven weeks divide themselves into three clear phases.
The first is the march of Marlborough and Baden upon Donauwoerth and the
capture of that city, which was the gate of Bavaria.
The second is the consequent invasion and ravaging of Bavaria, the
weakening of the Elector, and his proposal to capitulate; the consequent
precipitate advance of Tallard to the aid of the Elector, and the
corresponding secret march of Eugene to help Marlborough.
The third occupies the last few days only: it is concerned with the
manoeuvres immediately preceding the battle, and especially with the
junction of Marlborough and Eugene, which made the victory possible.
THE FIRST PHASE
_From the junction of Marlborough and Baden to the fall of Donauwoerth_
When the Duke of Marlborough had joined hands with the forces of Baden
upon the 22nd of June 1704 his general plan was clear: the last of his
infantry, under his brother Churchill, would at once effect their junction
with the rest at Ursprung, and he and Baden had but to go forward.
His great march had been completely successful. He had eluded and confused
his enemy. He was safe on the Danube watershed, and within a march of the
river itself. The only enemies before him on this side of the hills were
greatly inferior in number to his own and his ally's. His determination to
carry the war into Bavaria could at once be carried into effect.
With this junction the first chapter in that large piece of strategy which
may be called "the campaign of Blenheim" comes to an end.
Between the successful termination of his first effort, which was
accomplished when he joined forces with Baden upon the Danube side of the
watershed in the village of Ursprung, and the great battle by which
Marlborough is chiefly remembered, there elapsed, I say, seven summer
weeks. These seven weeks are divided into the three parts just
distinguished.
In order to understand the strategy of each part of those seven weeks, we
must first clearly grasp the field.
The accompanying map shows the elements of the situation.
East of the Black Forest lay open that upper valley of the Danube and its
tributaries which was so difficult of access from the valley of the Rhine.
In the hills to the north of the Danube, and one day's march from the town
of Ulm, were now concentrated the forces of Marlborough and the Duke of
Baden. They were advancing, ninety-six battalions strong, with two hundred
and two squadrons and forty-eight guns: in all, say, somewhat less than
70,000 men.
[Illustration: Map illustrating the march of Marlborough and Baden across
Marcin's front from the neighbourhood of Ulm to Donauwoerth.]
At Ulm lay Marcin, and in touch with him, forming part of the same army,
the Elector of Bavaria was camped somewhat further down the river, near
Lauingen.
The combined forces of Marcin and the Elector of Bavaria numbered, all
told, some 45,000 men, and their inferiority to the hostile armies, which
had just effected their junction north of Ulm at Ursprung, was the
determining factor in what immediately followed.
Marcin crossed the Danube to avoid so formidable a menace, and took up his
next station behind the river at Leipheim, watching to see what
Marlborough and the Duke of Baden would do. The Elector of Bavaria, in
command of the bridge at Lauingen, stood fast, ready to retire behind the
stream. The necessity of such a retreat was spared him. The object of his
enemies was soon apparent by the direction their advance assumed.
For the immediate object of Marlborough and Baden was not an attack upon
the inferior forces of the Elector and Marcin, but, for reasons that will
presently be seen, the capture of Donauwoerth, and their direct march upon
Donauwoerth took them well north of the Danube. On the 26th, therefore,
Marcin thought it prudent to recross the Danube. He and the Elector
joined forces on the north side of the Danube, and lay from Lauingen to
Dillingen, commanding two bridges behind them for the crossing of the
stream, and fairly entrenched upon their front. Meanwhile their enemies,
the allies, passed north of them at Gingen. This situation endured for
three days.[4]
When it was apparent that the allied forces of the English general and the
Duke of Baden intended to make themselves masters of Donauwoerth (and the
Elector of Bavaria could have no doubt of their intentions after the 29th
of July, when their march eastward from Gingen was resumed), a
Franco-Bavarian force was at once detached by him to defend that town, and
it is necessary henceforward to understand why Donauwoerth was of such
importance to Marlborough's plan.
It was his intention to enter Bavaria so as to put a pressure upon the
Elector, whose immediate and personal interests were bound up with the
villages and towns of his possessions. The Elector could not afford to
neglect the misfortunes of its civilian inhabitants, even for the ends of
his own general strategy; still less could he sacrifice those subjects of
his for the strategic advantage of the King of France and his marshal.
This Marlborough knew. To enter Bavaria, to occupy its towns (only one of
which, Ingolstadt, was tolerably fortified), and if possible to take its
capital, Munich, had been from its inception the whole business and
strategic motive of his march to the Danube.
But if Marlborough desired to enter Bavaria, Donauwoerth was the key to
Bavaria from the side upon which he was approaching.
This word "key" is so often used in military history, without any
explanation of it which may render it significant to the reader, that I
will pause a moment to show _why_ Donauwoerth might properly be called in
metaphor the "key" of Bavaria to one advancing from the north and west.
Bavaria could only be reached by a general coming as Marlborough came, on
condition of his possessing and holding some crossing-place over the
Danube, for Marlborough's supplies lay north of that river (principally at
Noerdlingen), and the passing of the enormous supply of an army over one
narrow point, such as is a bridge over such an obstacle as a broad river,
demands full security.
It will further be seen from the map that yet another obstacle, defending
Southern Bavaria and its capital towards the west, as the Danube does
towards the north, is the river Lech; a passage over this was therefore
also of high importance to the Duke of Marlborough and his allies. Now, a
man holding Donauwoerth can cross both rivers at the same time unmolested,
for they meet in its neighbourhood.
Further, Donauwoerth was a town amply provisioned, full of warehouse room,
and in general affording a good advanced base of supply for any army
marching across the Danube. It afforded an opportunity for concentration
of supplies, it contained waggons and horses and food. Supplies, it must
be remembered, were the great difficulty of each of the two opposed
forces, in this moving of great numbers of men east of the Black Forest,
in a comparatively poor country, largely heath and forest, and ill
populated.
[Illustration: Map showing how Donauwoerth is the key of Bavaria from the
North-West.]
No serious permanent defences, such as could delay the capture of the
town, surrounded Donauwoerth; but up above it lies a hill, called from its
shape "the Schellenberg" or "Bell Hill." This hill is not isolated, but
joins on the higher ground to its north by a sort of flat isthmus, which
is level with the summit or nearly so.[5]
The force which, on perceiving the Duke of Marlborough's intention of
capturing Donauwoerth, the Elector of Bavaria very rapidly detached to
defend that town, was under the command of Count d'Arco; it consisted of
two regiments of cavalry and about 10,000 infantry (of whom a quarter were
French). D'Arco had orders to entrench the hill above the town as rapidly
as might be and to defend it from attack; for whoever held the
Schellenberg was master of Donauwoerth below. But the Elector could only
spare eight guns for this purpose from his inferior forces.
Upon the 2nd of July, in the early morning, Marlborough, by one of those
rapid movements which were a prime element in his continuous success,
marched before dawn with something between seven and eight thousand
infantry carefully chosen for the task and thirty-five squadrons of horse
for the attack on the Schellenberg. It was Marlborough's alternate day of
command.
With all his despatch, he could not arrive on the height of the hill nor
attack its imperfect but rapidly completing works until the late
afternoon. It is characteristic of his generalship that he risked an
assault with this advance body of his without waiting for the main part of
the army under the Duke of Baden to come up. With sixteen battalions only,
of whom a third were British, he attempted to carry works behind which a
force equal to his own in strength was posted. The risk was high, for he
could hardly hope to carry the works with such a force, and all depended
upon the main body coming up in time. There was but an hour or two of
daylight left.
The check which Marlborough necessarily received in such an attempt
incidentally gave proof of the excellent material of his troops. More than
a third of these fell in the first furious and undecided hour. They failed
to carry the works. They had already once begun to break and once again
rallied, but had suffered no final dissolution under the ordeal--though it
was both the first to which the men were subjected during this campaign,
and probably also the most severe of any they were to endure.
Whether they, or indeed any other troops, could long have survived such
conditions as an attempt to storm works against equal numbers is not open
to proof; for, while the issue was still doubtful (but the advantage
naturally with the force behind the trenches), the mass of the army under
the Duke of Baden came up in good time upon the right (that is, from the
side of the town), poured almost unopposed over the deserted earthworks of
that side, and, five to one, overwhelmed the 12,000 Franco-Bavarians upon
the hill.
After one of those short stubborn and futile attempts at resistance which
such situations discover in all wars, the inevitable dissolution of
d'Arco's command came before the darkness. It was utterly routed; and we
may justly presume that not 4000--more probably but 3000--rejoined the
army of Marcin and of the Elector of Bavaria.
The loss of the Schellenberg had cost Marlborough's enemies, whose forces
were already gravely inferior to his own, eight guns and close upon
one-fifth of their effective numbers. The Franco-Bavarians hurried south
to entrench themselves under Augsburg, while Donauwoerth, and with it the
passage of the two great rivers and the entry into Bavaria, lay in the
possession of Marlborough and his ally.
The balance of military and historical opinion will decide that
Marlborough played for too high stakes in beginning the assault so late in
the evening and with so small a force. But he was playing for speed, and
he won the hazard.
It was a further reward of his daring that he could point after this first
engagement to the fine quality of his British contingent.[6]
It was upon the evening of July the 2nd, then, that this capital position
was stormed. It was upon the 5th that Marcin and the Elector lay hopeless
and immobile before Augsburg, while their enemies entered a now
defenceless Bavaria by its north-western gate. And this complete
achievement of Marlborough's plan was but the end of the first phase in
the campaign upon the Danube.
Meanwhile, a large French reinforcement under Tallard was already far up
on its way from the Rhine, across the Black Forest, to join Marcin and the
Elector of Bavaria and set back the tide of war, and, when it should have
effected its junction with those who awaited it at Augsburg, to oppose to
Marlborough and the Duke of Baden a total force greater than their own.
The French marshal, Tallard, was in command of the army thus rapidly
approaching in relief of the Franco-Bavarians. His arrival, if he came
without loss, disease, or mishap, promised a complete superiority over the
English and their allies, unless, indeed, by some accident or stroke of
genius, reinforcement should reach _them_ also before the day of the
battle.
This reinforcement, in the event, Marlborough _did_ receive. He owed it,
as we shall see, to the high talents of Prince Eugene; and it is upon the
successful march of this general, his junction with Marlborough, and the
consequent success of Blenheim, that the rest of the campaign turns.
We turn next, then, to follow the second phase of the seven weeks, which
consists in Tallard's advance to join the Elector, and in Eugene's rapid
parallel march, which brought him, just in time, to Marlborough's aid.
THE SECOND PHASE
_The Advance of Tallard_
To follow the second phase of the seven weeks, that is, the phase
subsequent to the capture of the Schellenberg and the retirement of Marcin
and the Elector of Bavaria on to Augsburg, it is necessary to hark back a
little, and to trace from its origin that advance of Tallard's
reinforcements which was to find on the field of Blenheim so disastrous a
termination.
We shall see that in this second phase Tallard did indeed manage to effect
his junction with the Elector and Marcin with singular despatch; that this
junction compelled Marlborough and Baden to cease the ravaging of Bavaria
upon which they had been engaged, and to join in closely watching the
movement of the Franco-Bavarian forces, lest their own retreat or their
line of supplies should be cut off by that now large army.
The Schellenberg was stormed, as we have seen, on the 2nd of July.
Tallard, as we have also seen, had orders from Versailles, when
Marlborough's plan of reaching the Danube was clear, to put himself in
motion for an advance to the Elector's aid.
He moved at first with firmness and deliberation, determined to secure
every post of his advance throughout the difficult hills, and thoroughly
to provision his route. He crossed the Rhine upon July 1st, and during the
very hours that, far to the east, the disaster of Donauwoerth was in
progress, he was assembling his forces upon the right bank of the river
before beginning to secure his passage through the Black Forest. Upon the
4th he began his march over the hills.
A week later he was in the heart of the broken country at Hornberg, and on
the 16th of July he had contained the garrison of Villingen, the principal
stronghold which barred his route to the Danube, and which, did he leave
it untaken, would jeopardise his provision and supply, the health and even
the maintenance of his horses and men by the mountain road.
Upon the 18th he opened fire upon the town; but on the very day that the
siege thus began he received from Marcin the whole story of the disaster
of the Schellenberg, which had taken place a fortnight before, and a most
urgent request for immediate reinforcement.
Tallard's deliberation, his attempt to secure the enemy's one stronghold
upon the line of his passage across the hills, and amply to provision his
advance, were fully justified. He knew nothing of the fall of Donauwoerth.
He believed himself to have full time for a properly organised march to
join the Elector of Bavaria, and that meant the capture of Villingen. And
the siege of that fortress had the further advantage that it compelled
Eugene and his army to remain near the Rhine. Only at this late day, the
18th of July, did Tallard learn that the forces of Marlborough and of
Baden had captured the crossing of the Danube and the Lech, and were
pouring into Bavaria.
He should have known it earlier, but the despatch which bore him the
information had miscarried.
Already, upon the 9th, Marcin had written from Augsburg a pressing letter
to Tallard, bidding him neglect everything save an immediate march, and,
ill provisioned as he was, and insecure as he would leave his
communications, to hasten to the aid of the Elector. Marlborough and
Baden (he wrote) had crossed the Danube and the Lech on the 5th and 6th of
July. They were before Rhain; and when Rhain fell (as fall it must), all
Bavaria would be at their mercy.
This letter Tallard never received.
Marcin was right. Rhain could not possibly hold out: none of the Bavarian
strongholds except Ingolstadt were tolerably fortified. Rhain was destined
to fall, and with its fall all Bavaria would be the prey of the allied
generals.
The Elector, watching all this from just beyond the Lech, was in despair.
He proposed to sue for terms unless immediate news of help from the French
upon the Rhine should reach him. And if the Elector sued for terms and
retired from the contest, France would be left alone to bear the whole
weight of the European alliance: its forces would at once be released to
act upon the Rhine, in Flanders, or wherever else they would.
When, upon the 14th, Marcin wrote that second letter to Tallard, telling
him to neglect everything, to march forward at all costs, and to hasten to
Bavaria's relief--the letter which Tallard did receive, and which came to
him on the 18th of July, just as he was beginning the siege of
Villingen--Rhain still held out; but, even as Tallard read the letter,
Rhain had fallen, and the terrible business of the harrying of Bavaria had
begun. For Baden and Marlborough proceeded to ravage the country, a cruel
piece of work, which Marlborough believed necessary, because it was his
supreme intention to bring such pressure to bear upon the Elector as might
dissuade him from taking further part in the war.
The villages began to burn (one hundred and twenty were destroyed), the
crops to be razed. The country was laid waste to the very walls of Munich,
and that capital itself would have fallen had the Englishman and his
imperial ally possessed a sufficient train to besiege it.
Tallard was still hesitating to abandon the siege of Villingen when, upon
the 21st of July, came yet a _third_ message from Marcin, which there was
no denying. Tallard learnt from it of the fall of Rhain, of the ravaging
of Bavaria, of the march of Marlborough and Baden upon Munich, of the
crucial danger in which France lay of seeing the Elector of Bavaria
abandon her cause.
Wholly insufficient as the provisioning of the route was, Marcin assured
Tallard it was just enough to feed his men and horses during the dash
eastwards; and, with all the regret and foreboding necessarily attached to
leaving in his rear an unconquered fortress and marching in haste upon an
insufficiently provided route, Tallard, on the next day, the 22nd, raised
the siege of Villingen and risked his way across the mountains down to the
valley of the Danube.
The move was undoubtedly necessary if the Bavarian alliance was to be
saved, but it had to be accomplished in fatal haste.
Sickness broke out among Tallard's horses; his squadrons were reduced in a
fashion that largely determined the ultimate issue at Blenheim.
His troops, ill fed and exhausted, marched upon wretched rations of bread
and biscuit alone, and with that knowledge of insecurity behind them which
the private soldier, though he can know so little of the general plan of
any campaign, instinctively feels when he is taking part in an advance of
doubtful omen.
A week later, upon the 29th of July, the army was in sight of Ulm. It
found there but six thousand sacks of flour. It knew that it would find no
sufficient provisionment in Augsburg at the end of its advance, yet
advance it must unless the forces of Bavaria were to be lost to the cause
of Louis XIV.
Five days later the junction was effected, and upon Monday the 4th of
August the united armies of Tallard and the Elector of Bavaria faced, in
the neighbourhood of Augsburg, the opposing armies of Marlborough and
Baden upon the further side of the Lech.
In spite of the deplorable sickness and loss among his horse, the absence
of remounts, the exhaustion of his men, the poor provisioning, and the
insecurity of the line of supply behind him, Tallard could now present
forces somewhat superior (counted by battalions and nominal
squadrons)--far superior in artillery--to the forces of the allies.
Had this reluctant and tardy advance of Tallard's on the one hand, the
ravaging of Bavaria by Baden and Marlborough on the other, between them
constituted the whole of the second phase in the preliminaries of
Blenheim, the result of the campaign might have been very different, in
spite of the impoverished condition of the Franco-Bavarian army.
But a third element, of the utmost importance, must be added: the rapid,
the secret, and the successful march of Eugene during these same days
across the northern part of these same hills which the French had just
traversed by their southern passes, and the debouching of that formidable
captain with his admirably disciplined force, especially strong in
cavalry, upon the upper valley of the Danube to reinforce Marlborough and
to decide the war.
So long as Tallard proceeded, with soldierly method, to the proper
affirmation of his line of advance and to the reduction of Villingen,
Eugene had been pinned to the neighbourhood of the Rhine.
Would Eugene, when the siege of Villingen was raised, and when Tallard had
been persuaded to that precipitous eastern move, go back to hold the line
of the Rhine against the French forces there situated, or would he decide
for the risk of detaching a large command, perhaps of leading it himself,
and of joining Marlborough? That was the doubtful factor in Tallard's
plans.
As in the case of Marlborough's own march to the Danube, either
alternative was possible. The safer course for Eugene, and that one
therefore which seemed in the eyes of his enemies the more probable, was
for him to remain on the Rhine. But it was conceivable that he would run
the risk of leading a force to the Danube; and did he so decide, the
whole business of the French remaining on the Rhine was to discover his
intention, the whole business of Eugene to hide it.
As in the case of Marlborough's march to the Danube, Eugene was led by a
just instinct to gamble on the chance of the French army in Alsace not
noting his move, and of the few troops he left opposite them upon the
Rhine sufficing to screen his movements and to give the effect of much
larger numbers. In other words, though his task in the coalition was to
watch the central Rhine, he decided to take the risk of seeing the Rhine
forced, and to march in aid of the English general whom he had himself
summoned to Bavaria, with whose genius his own had such sympathy, and at
whose side he was to accomplish the marvels of the next seven years.
Like Marlborough, he was successful in concealing his determination, but,
with a smaller force than Marlborough's had been, he was able to be more
successful still.
Villeroy, who commanded the French upon the Middle Rhine, was informed by
numerous deserters and spies that Eugene, after the fall of Villingen, was
at Radstadt, and intended detaching but two or three battalions at most
from his lines upon the right bank of the Rhine, and these not, of
course, for work upon the Danube, but only to cover Wurtemburg by
garrisoning Rottweil.
This information, coming though it did from many sources, was calculatedly
false, and Eugene's movements, after the siege of Villingen had been
raised, were arranged with a masterly penetration of his enemy's mind. A
leisurely two days after the siege of Villingen was raised he entered that
fortress, ordered the breaches to be repaired, and, in his every order and
disposition, appeared determined to remain within the neighbourhood of the
Upper Rhine. Nearly a week later he was careful to show himself at
Rottweil, hardly a day's march away, apparently doing no more than cover
Wurtemburg against a possible French attack from beyond the Rhine; and, so
far as such leisure and immobility could testify to his intentions, he
proclaimed his determination to remain in that neighbourhood, and in no
way to preoccupy himself with what might be going on in the valley of the
Upper Danube.
With due deliberation, he left eight battalions in Rottweil to garrison
that place, posted seventeen upon his lines upon the Rhine, and himself
openly proceeded--and that at no great speed--to march for the valley of
the Neckar with 15,000 men.... Those 15,000 had been picked from his army
with a particular care; nearly one-third were cavalry in the highest
training, and the command, which seemed but one of three detachments all
destined to operate upon the Rhine, was in fact a body specially chosen
for a very different task. Eugene continued to proceed in this open
fashion and slow as far as Tuebingen....
[Illustration: Map showing Eugene's march on the Danube from the Black
Forest.]
It was many days since Tallard had begun his advance; many days since
Villeroy, on the Rhine, had been watching the movements of Eugene; and
during all these days that great general had done no more than assure his
original positions with ample leisure, and to begin, with what was
apparently a gross lack of concealment, a return by the Neckar round the
north of the Black Forest to the Rhine valley.
Suddenly, from the moment of his reaching Tuebingen, all this slow and
patient work ceases. Eugene and his 15,000 abruptly disappear.
In place of the open march which all might follow, friend and foe alike,
there is a void; in place of clear and reiterated information upon his
unhurried movements, there is nothing but a fog, contradictory rumours,
fantastic and ill-credited.
Never was a design better kept or concealed to a moment so near its
accomplishment. When that design was accomplished, it was to determine, as
we shall see in what follows, the whole issue of the campaign of Blenheim.
THE THIRD PHASE
_The Appearance of Eugene_
The third phase in the operations which led up to the battle of Blenheim
is one of no more than nine days.
It stands distinct from all that went before, and must be regarded in
history as a sort of little definite and enclosed preface to the great
action. The distinctive character of this, the third phase, resides in the
completion of the Franco-Bavarian force, its manoeuvring in the presence
of the enemy, and its finding itself unexpectedly confronted with the
reinforcements of Eugene.
To seize the character of this third phase, the sketch map opposite must
be referred to.
It is the 5th of August. Tallard has fully effected his junction with
Marcin and the Elector of Bavaria, and the united Franco-Bavarian force
lies in and to the east of Augsburg. On the opposite bank of the river
Lech this force is watched by the army of Marlborough and Baden, which has
been ravaging Bavaria. But Marlborough and Baden, though they have an
advanced depot at Donauwoerth, have their forward munitions and supplies
far up northwards. Noerdlingen is their advanced base, two days' marching
beyond the Danube. A week away to the north Nuremberg contains their only
large and permanent collection of stores. Marlborough and Baden are in
perpetual difficulty for food, for ammunition, and for forage--especially
for ammunition.
[Illustration: Map showing the situation when Eugene suddenly appeared at
Hochstadt, August 5-7, 1704.]
Since the whole object of Marlborough in marching to the Upper Danube was
to embarrass in this new seat of war the alliance of the French and
Bavarian forces, it is, conversely, the business of the French commander
to get him out of the valley of the Upper Danube and restore the liberty
of action of the French monarch and of his ally the Elector of Bavaria.
The surest way of getting Marlborough out of the Upper Danube is to
threaten his line of supply. He will then be compelled to fall back
northward upon his base. Further (though Tallard did not know it at the
moment), there is present the very real difficulty of friction between the
two commanders of the army opposing him. Marlborough and Baden are not
getting on well together. If it were possible for Marlborough to persuade
Baden to go off on some little expedition of his own, withdrawing but a
few soldiers, Marlborough would be well content, and Marlborough is by far
the more formidable of the two men. But though the opportunity for such a
riddance of divided command is open, for Prince Louis of Baden is anxious
to besiege Ingolstadt, Marlborough dares not weaken the combined forces,
even by a few battalions, now that Tallard has effected his junction with
the Elector and with Marcin, and that a formidable force is opposed to
him.
These elements in the situation, once clearly seized, the sequel follows
from them logically enough.
The above describes the situation on the 5th of August.
On the 6th, Wednesday, the united Franco-Bavarian force began its march
northward towards the Danube, a march parallel with Marlborough's line of
supply, and threatening that line all the way, ready to cut it when once
the northern bank of the Danube was reached. Marlborough was compelled,
in view of that march, to go back northward, step for step with his
opponents. The artery that fed him was in danger, and everything else must
be neglected.
In the evening of that Wednesday, August the 6th, Tallard and the Elector
were at Biberach, Marlborough and Baden at Schobenhausen, which, as the
map shows, lies also a day's march to the north from the last position
these troops had held, and was on the way to the crossing of the Danube at
Neuburg, as the Franco-Bavarians were on the way to the crossing of the
same great river at Dillingen.
On the 7th there was no movement, but on the 8th, the Friday, as the
Franco-Bavarian host approached the crossing of the Danube at Dillingen,
their leader (if Tallard may be regarded as their leader--he was nominally
under the orders of the Elector, but he was the marshal of Louis XIV.)
heard suddenly that Eugene _had appeared at Hochstadt with thirty-nine
squadrons and twenty battalions_.
The trick was done. The rapid and secret march of Eugene had been
accomplished with complete success, and his force was within speaking
distance of Marlborough's.
When the news came to the French camp, it was even there evident what a
sudden transformation had come over the campaign; but to one who could
see, as the historian sees, the moral condition of both forces, the event
is more significant still.
A great commander, whose name was henceforth to be linked most closely
with that of Marlborough's himself, was present upon the Upper Danube. He
brought with him troops not only equivalent in number to a third of his
colleague's existing forces, but trained under his high leadership,
disciplined in his excellent school, and containing, what will prove
essential to the fortunes of the coming battle, a very large proportion of
cavalry. Further, the appearance of Eugene at this critical moment
permitted Marlborough to rid himself of Louis of Baden, to despatch him to
the siege of Ingolstadt in the heart of Bavaria, at once to be free of the
clog which the slow decision and slow movements of that general burdened
him with, to threaten the heart of the enemy's country by that general's
departure on such a mission, and to unite himself and his forces with a
man whose methods were after his own heart.
It is true that a minor problem lay before Eugene and Marlborough which
must be solved before the great value of the junction they were about to
effect could be taken advantage of. Their forces were still separated by
the Danube: Marlborough lay a day's march to the south of it, and were he
to cross the Danube at Neuburg he would be two days' march from Eugene.
But each army was free to march towards the other, and all that their
commanders had to decide was upon which side of the river the junction
should be effected. Were the junction effected to the south--that is, were
Eugene to cross the Danube and join Marlborough in Bavaria--Tallard,
crossing the Danube at Dillingen, could strike at the great northern line
of communications which conditioned all these movements. It was,
therefore, the obvious move for Eugene and Marlborough to join upon the
_northern_ bank of the Danube, and to move upon and defend that
all-important line of communications, point for point, as Tallard might
threaten it.
It was on the 8th, the Friday, as I have said, that Eugene's presence was
known both to Tallard and to Marlborough, for Eugene had ridden forward
and met his colleague.
Upon the 9th, the Saturday, the French marched towards the bridge of
Dillingen. Eugene, who was already on the way back to his army, returned
to inform Marlborough of this, then rode westward again to his forces,
and, while the French made their arrangements for crossing the river on
the morrow, he busied himself in conducting his 15,000 eastward down the
north bank of the Danube. Three thousand of Marlborough's cavalry went
forward to meet him, and to begin that junction between the two forces
which was to determine the day at Blenheim.
The next day, Sunday the 10th, the Franco-Bavarian army passed the river
and lay in the position with which their forces had in the past been so
familiar, the position from Lauingen to Dillingen which Marcin and the
Elector had held when, six weeks before, Marlborough and Baden had passed
across the Franco-Bavarian front to the north in their march upon
Donauwoerth and the Schellenberg.
On the same Sunday, the 10th, Marlborough had brought up his main force to
Rhain, within an hour of the Danube, and Eugene was drawing up his force
at a safe distance from the French position north of the village of
Muenster, and behind the brook of Kessel, where that watercourse joins the
Danube.
But, though junction with Marlborough was virtually effected, it must be
effected actually before Eugene could think himself safe from that
Franco-Bavarian force a day's march behind him, which was three times his
own and more. His urgent messages to Marlborough led that commander to
march up his men through the night. Before the dawn of August the 11th
broke, Churchill, with twenty battalions, had crossed at Merxheim, and the
whole army, marching in two columns, was upon the move--the right-hand
column following Churchill to the bridge of Merxheim, the left-hand column
crossing the Lech by the bridge of Rhain, to pass the Danube at
Donauwoerth. In the afternoon of that Monday the whole of Marlborough's
command was passing the Wornitz, and long after sunset, following upon a
march which had kept the major part of the great host afoot for more than
twenty hours, Eugene and Marlborough were together at the head of 52,000
men, established in unison, and defending, with now no possibility of its
interruption, the line of communications from the north.
Every historian of this great business has justly remarked the
organisation and the patient genius of the man who made such a
concentration possible under such conditions and in such a time, without
appreciable loss, at hurried notice, and with a complete success.
It is a permanent example and masterpiece in that inglorious part of war,
the function of transport and of marching orders, upon which strategy
depends as surely as an army depends on food.
Fully accompanied by his artillery, Marlborough's force could not have
accomplished the marvel that it did; yet even this arm was brought up, in
the rear of the army, by the morning of Tuesday the 12th, and from that
moment, given a sufficient repose, the whole great weapon under the two
captains could act as one.
On that same morning, Tuesday the 12th, the Franco-Bavarian army under
Tallard and the Elector were choosing out with some deliberation a camp so
situated as to block any movement of their enemy up the valley of the
Danube. The situation of the camp was designed to make this advance up the
Danube so clearly impossible that nothing would be left but what the
strategy of the last few days had imposed upon Marlborough, namely, a
retreat upon his base northward, away from the Danube, towards Noerdlingen.
It was not imagined that the two commanders of the imperial forces would
attack this Franco-Bavarian position, and so risk a general action; for by
a retreat upon Noerdlingen their continued existence as an army was
assured, while an indecisive result would do them far more harm than it
would do their opponents. Did Marlborough and Eugene force an action, it
is doubtful whether Tallard had considered the alternative of refusing it.
At any rate, on this Tuesday, the 12th of August, Tallard and the Elector
had no intention but to take up a position and camp which would make a
retreat up the Danube impossible to Marlborough and Eugene; and certainly
neither imagined that any attempt to force the camp would be made, since
an alternative of retreat and complete safety was offered the enemy
towards Noerdlingen.
While the French fourriers were ordering the lines of the encampment--the
tents stretching, the streets staking out--the English duke and Eugene
overlooked the business from the church tower of Tapfheim and saw what
Tallard designed. Between the main of their own forces and the camp which
the Franco-Bavarians were pitching was a distance of about five miles. The
location of each body was therefore perfectly well known to the other, and
rarely have two great hosts lain in mutual presence for full twenty-four
hours in so much doubt of an issue, in such exact opposition, and each
with so complete an apprehension of his opponent's power.
At this point--let us say noon of Tuesday, August 12th--it is essential
for us to dwell upon the character of such battles as that upon which
Marlborough was already determined; for by the time he had seen the French
disposition of their camp, the duke had determined upon forcing an action.
It is the characteristic of great captains that they live by and
appreciate the heavy risk of war.
When they suffer defeat, history--which soldiers and those who love
soldiers so rarely write--contemns the hardiness of their dispositions.
When victory, that capricious gift, is granted them, history is but too
prone to fall into an opposite error, and to see in their hardihood all of
the calculating genius and none of the determined gambler.
Justice would rather demand that the great captain should be judged by the
light in the eyes of his men, by the endurance under him of immense
fatigues, by the exact accomplishment of one hundred separate things a
day, each clearly designed and remembered, by his grasp of great sweeps
of landscape, by his digestion of maps and horizons, and finally and
particularly by this--that the great captain, whether he loses or he wins,
_risks_ well: he smells the adventure of war, and is the opposite of those
who, whether in their fortunes or their bodies, chiefly seek security.
Judged by all these tests, John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough, was a
supreme commander; and it is not the least part in our recognition of
this, that the first and chief of the great actions upon which his fame
reposes was an action essentially and typically hazardous, and one the
disastrous loss of which was as probable as, or more probable than, the
successful issue which it obtained.
He could not know the special factor of weakness in his opponent's
cavalry; he was to misjudge the first element in the position when he
broke his best infantry in the futile attack upon the village. But he was
to benefit by those small, hidden, momentary things which determine great
battles, and which make of soldiers, as of men who follow the sea,
determined despisers of success, and as determined worshippers of the
merit which may or may not attain it.
To have led his army as he had led it for now three months, to have
designed the general plan that he had designed, and to have accomplished
it; to have effected the splendid concentration but a few hours since upon
the Kessel--these formed a work sufficient to deserve the reward of
victory, Marlborough had the fortune not only to deserve, but to achieve.
The night of that Tuesday fell with no alarm upon the one side or upon the
other. In the camp of Marlborough and of Eugene was the knowledge that the
twin commanders had determined upon an action; in that of Tallard and the
Elector the belief that it was more probable their opponents would follow
the general rules of war, and fall back to recruit their supplies by the
one route that was widely open to them.
Midnight passed. It was already the morning of Wednesday the 13th before
the one had moved, or the other had guessed the nature of his enemy's
plan.
It was moonless and pitch-dark, save for the dense white mist which, in
the marshy lands of that river valley, accompanies the turn of the August
night. This mist had risen and covered the plain. The little villages were
asleep after their disturbance by the advent of so many armed men. The
cockcrows of midnight were now well past when there was stir in
Marlborough's camp, and from this moment, somewhere about two of the
morning of Wednesday, August the 13th, the action of Blenheim begins.