and that Marlborough had no intention of forcing his way into France
through the lines of La Bassée and the wet swampy country beyond them,
when he could pass the lines of the Trouille without loss of a man.
He was in a difficult position, for Mons was slenderly garrisoned
and difficult of access, though, if captured, it would be a valuable
acquisition to the Allies. The approach to it from the westward was
practically shut off by a kind of natural barrier of forest, running,
roughly speaking, from St. Ghislain on the Haine to the north to
Maubeuge on the Sambre to the south. In this barrier there were but
two openings, the Trouée de Boussut between the village of that name
and the Haine, and the Trouées d’Aulnois and de Louvière, which are
practically the same, some miles further to the south. These will be
more readily remembered, the northern entrance by the name of Jemappes,
the southern by the name of Malplaquet. ◆Aug. 27./Sept. 7.◆ Villars no
sooner knew what was going forward than he pushed forward a detachment
with all speed upon the northern entrance, which was the nearer to him.
The detachment came too late. The Prince of Hessen-Cassel was already
astride of the opening, his right at Jemappes, his left at Ciply. The
French thereupon fell back to await the approach of the main army of
the Allies.
◆Aug. 26./Sept. 6.◆
Meanwhile that army had toiled through a sea of mud on the northern
bank of the Haine, and crossing the river had by evening invested Mons
on the eastern side. ◆Aug. 27./Sept. 7.◆ On the following day Villars
and his whole army also arrived on the scene and encamped a couple of
miles to westward of the forest-barrier, from Montreuil to Athis.
Here he was joined by old Marshal Boufflers, who had volunteered his
services at a time of such peril to France. The arrival of the gallant
veteran caused such a tumult of rejoicing in the French camp that
Marlborough and Eugene, not knowing what the clamour might portend,
withdrew all but a fraction of the investing force from the town, and,
advancing westward into the plain of Mons, caused the army to bivouac
between Ciply and Quévy in order of battle.
◆Aug. 28./Sept. 8.◆
Villars meanwhile had not moved, being adroit enough to threaten
both passages and keep the Allies in doubt as to which he should
select. While, therefore, the mass of the Allied army was moved
towards the Trouée d’Aulnois, a strong detachment was sent up to watch
the Trouée de Boussut. ◆Aug. 29./Sept. 9.◆ That night Villars sent
detachments forward to occupy the southern passage, and by mid-day
of the morrow his whole army was taking up its position across the
opening. Marlborough at once moved his army forward, approaching so
close that his left wing exchanged cannon-shot with Villars’s right.
Everything pointed to an immediate attack on the French before they
should have time to entrench themselves. Whether the Dutch deputies
intervened to stay further movements is uncertain. All that is known
is that a council of war was held by the commanders of the Allies, and
that, after much debate, it was resolved to await the arrival of the
detachment from the Trouée de Boussut and of the troops that had been
left behind at Tournay, to turn the siege of Mons into a blockade,
and in the meanwhile to send eighteen battalions north to capture St.
Ghislain. Evidently in some quarter there was reluctance to hazard a
general action.
Villars now set himself with immense energy to strengthen his
position; and, when Marlborough and Eugene surveyed the defences at
daybreak of the following morning, they were astonished at the
formidable appearance of the entrenchments. ◆Aug. 30./Sept. 10.◆
Marlborough was once more for attacking without further delay, but he
was opposed by the Dutch deputies and even by Eugene. The attack was
therefore fixed for the morrow; and another day was lost which Villars
did not fail to turn to excellent account.
The entrance from the westward to the Trouée d’Aulnois or southern
entrance to the plain of Mons was marked by the two villages of Campe
du Hamlet on the north and Malplaquet on the south. About a mile in
advance of these villages the ground rose to its highest elevation, the
opening being about three thousand paces wide, and the ground broken
and hollowed to right and left by small rivulets. This was the point
selected by Villars for his position. It was bounded on his right by
the forest of Laignières, the greatest length of which ran parallel
to the Trouée, and on the left by a forest, known at different points
by the names of Taisnières, Sart and Blangies, the greatest length of
which ran at right angles to the Trouée. Villars occupied the forest
of Laignières with his extreme right, his battalions strengthening
the natural obstacles of a thick and tangled covert by means of
abatis. From the edge of the wood he constructed a triple line of
entrenchments, which ran across the opening for full a third of its
width, when they gave way to a line of nine redans. These redans in
turn yielded place to a swamp backed by more entrenchments, which
carried the defences across to the wood of Taisnières. Several cannon
were mounted on the entrenchments, and a battery of twenty guns before
the redans. On Villars’s left the forests of Taisnières and Sart
projected before the general front, forming a salient and re-entering
angle. Entrenchments and abatis were constructed in accordance with
this configuration, and two more batteries were erected on this side,
in addition to several guns at various points along the line, to
enfilade an advancing enemy. Feeling even thus insecure, Villars threw
up more entrenchments at the villages of Malplaquet and Chaussée du
Bois in rear of the wood of Sart, and was still hard at work on them
to the last possible moment before the action. Finally in rear of all
stood his cavalry, drawn up in several lines. The whole of his force
amounted to ninety-five thousand men.
[Illustration:
MALPLAQUET
Aug. 31st./Sept. 11th 1709
_Stanford’s Geogl. Estabt., London._
]
The position was most formidable, but it had its defects. In the first
place the open space before the entrenchments was broken at about
half a mile’s distance by a small coppice, called the wood of Tiry,
which could serve to mask the movements of the Allied centre. In the
second place the forest of Sart ran out beyond the fortified angle in a
long tongue, which would effectually conceal any troops that might be
directed against the extreme left flank. Finally the French cavalry,
being massed in rear of the entrenchments, could take no part in the
action until the defences were forced, and was therefore incapable
of delivering any counterstroke. Marlborough and Eugene accordingly
decided to make a feint attack on the French right and a true attack on
their left front and flank. Villars would then be obliged to reinforce
his left from his centre, which would enable the defences across the
open to be carried, and the whole of the allied cavalry to charge
forward and cut the French line in twain.
◆Aug. 31./Sept. 11.◆
The dawn of the 11th of September broke in dense heavy mist which
completely veiled the combatants from each other. At three o’clock
prayers were said in the Allied camp, and then the artillery was
moved into position. Forty pieces were massed in a single battery
on the open ground against the French left, and were covered with
an epaulment for defence against enfilading fire; twenty-eight more
were stationed against the French right, and the lighter pieces were
distributed, as usual, among the different brigades. Then the columns
of attack were formed. Twenty-eight battalions under Count Lottum were
directed against the eastern face of the salient angle of the forest
of Taisnières, and forty battalions of Eugene’s army under General
Schulemberg against the northern face, while a little to the right of
Schulemberg two thousand men under General Gauvain were to press on the
French left flank in rear of their entrenchments. Behind Schulemberg
fifteen British battalions under Lord Orkney were drawn up in a single
line on the open ground, ready to advance against the centre as soon
as Schulemberg and Lottum should have done their work. Far away beyond
Gauvain, General Withers with five British and fourteen foreign
battalions and six squadrons was to turn the extreme French left at the
village of La Folie.
For the feint against the French right, thirty-one battalions, chiefly
Dutch, were massed together under the Prince of Orange. The cavalry was
detailed in different divisions to support the infantry. The Prince
of Orange was backed by twenty-one Dutch squadrons under the Prince
of Hesse, Orkney by thirty more under Auvergne, Lottum by the British
and Hanoverian cavalry, and Schulemberg by Eugene’s horse. The orders
given to the cavalry were to sustain the foot as closely as possible
without advancing into range of grape-shot, and, as soon as the
central entrenchments were forced, to press forward, form before the
entrenchments and drive the French army from the field. The whole force
of the Allies was, as near as may be, equal to that of the French.
At half-past seven the fog lifted, and the guns of both armies opened
fire. Eugene and Marlborough thereupon parted, the former taking
charge of the right, the latter of the left of the army. Then the
divisions of Orange and of Lottum advanced in two dense columns up the
glade. Presently the Dutch halted, just beyond range of grape-shot,
while Lottum’s column pushed on under a terrific fire to the rear
of the forty-gun battery and deployed to the right in three lines.
Then the fire of the cannon slackened for a time, till about nine
o’clock a salvo of the forty guns gave the signal for attack. Lottum’s
and Schulemberg’s divisions thereupon advanced perpendicularly to
each other, each in three lines, Gauvain’s men crept into the wood
unperceived, and Orkney extended his scarlet battalions across the
glade.
Entering the wood, Schulemberg’s Austrians made the best of their way
through marshes and streams and fallen trees, nearer and nearer to
the French entrenchments. The enemy suffered them to approach within
pistol-shot, only to deliver a volley which sent them staggering back;
and, though the Austrians extended their line till it joined Gauvain’s
detachment, yet they could make little way against the French fire.
Lottum’s attack was hardly more successful. Heedless of the tempest of
shot in their front and flank the Germans pressed steadily on, passed
a swamp and a stream under a galling fire, and fell fiercely upon the
breastwork beyond; but, being disordered by the ground and thinned by
heavy losses, they were forced to fall back. Schulemberg then resumed
the attack with his second line, but with all his exertions could
not carry the face of the angle opposed to him. Picardie, the senior
regiment of the French Line, held this post and would not yield it to
the fiercest assault. The utmost that Schulemberg could accomplish was
to sweep away the regiments in the wood, and so to uncover its flank.
Lottum, too, extended his front and attacked once more, Orkney
detaching three British battalions, the Buffs, Sixteenth, and
Temple’s, to his assistance, while Marlborough took personal command
of Auvergne’s cavalry in support. The Buffs on Lottum’s extreme
left found a swamp between them and the entrenchments, so deep as
to be almost impassable. In they plunged, notwithstanding, and were
struggling through it when a French officer drew out twelve battalions
and moved them down straight upon their left flank. The British brigade
would have been in a sorry plight had not Villars caught sight of
Marlborough at the head of Auvergne’s horse and instantly recalled
his troops. So the red-coats scrambled on, and, turning the flank of
the entrenchment while Lottum’s men attacked the front, at length with
desperate fighting and heavy loss forced the French back into the wood.
Thus exposed to the double attack of Lottum and Schulemberg, Picardie
at last fell back, but joined itself to Champagne, the next regiment
in seniority; and the two gallant corps, finding a rallying-point
behind an abatis, turned and stood once more. Their comrades gave way
in disorder, but the wood was so dense that the troops on both sides
became disjointed, and the opposing lines broke up into a succession of
small parties, fighting desperately from tree to tree with no further
guidance than their own fury.
The entrenchments on the French left had been forced; and Villars sent
urgent messages to his right for reinforcements. But Boufflers could
spare him none. After Schulemberg and Lottum had been engaged for half
an hour, the Prince of Orange lost patience and, without waiting for
orders, opened not a false but a real attack against the French right.
On the extreme left of Orange’s division were two Highland regiments of
the Dutch service, Tullibardine’s and Hepburn’s, and next to them King
William’s favourite Blue Guards. These were to attack the defences in
the forest of Laignières, while the rest fell upon the entrenchments
in the open; and it was at the head of the Highlanders and of the Blue
Guards that Orange took his place. A tremendous fire of grape and
musketry saluted them as they advanced, and within the first few yards
most of the Prince’s staff were struck dead by his side. His own horse
was killed beneath him, but he disentangled himself and continued to
lead the advance on foot. A few minutes more brought his battalions
under the fire of a French battery on their left flank. Whole ranks
were swept away, but still the Prince was to be seen waving his hat in
front of his troops; and Highlanders and Dutchmen pressing steadily on
carried the first entrenchment with a rush. They then halted to deploy,
but, before they could advance further, Boufflers had rallied his men,
and charging down upon his assailants drove them back headlong. On
Orange’s right, success as short-lived was bought at as dear a price.
The Prince still exerted himself with the utmost gallantry, but his
attack was beaten back at all points. The loss of the Dutch amounted to
six thousand killed and wounded; the Blue Guards had been annihilated,
and the Hanoverian battalions, which had supported them, had suffered
little less severely. In fact, the Prince’s precipitation had brought
about little less than a disaster.
The confusion in this part of the field called both Marlborough and
Eugene to the Allied left to restore order. Further useless sacrifice
of life was checked, for enough and more than enough had been done
to prevent Boufflers from detaching troops to Villars. But soon came
an urgent message requiring the presence of the Duke and the Prince
once more on the right. Schulemberg and Lottum had continued to push
their attack as best they could; and red-coated English, blue-coated
Prussians, and white-coated Austrians were struggling forward from tree
to tree, tripping over felled trunks, bursting through tangled foliage,
panting through quagmires, loading and firing and cursing, guided only
by the flashes before them in the cloud of foul blinding smoke. But now
on the extreme right Withers was steadily advancing; and his turning
movement, though the Duke and Eugene knew it not, was gradually forcing
the French out of the wood. Villars, seeing the danger, called the
Irish Brigade and other regiments from the centre, and launched them
full upon the British and Prussians. Such was the impetuosity of the
Irish that they forced their opponents back some way, until their own
formation was broken by the density of the forest. Eugene hastened
to the spot to rally the retreating battalions and, though struck by
a musket ball in the head, refused to leave the field. Then up came
Withers, just when he was wanted. The Eighteenth Royal Irish met the
French Royal Regiment of Ireland, crushed it with two volleys by sheer
superiority of fire, drove it back in disorder, and pressed on.[64]
Eugene also advanced and was met by Villars, who at this critical
moment was bringing forward his reinforcements in person. A musket
shot struck the Marshal above the knee. Totally unmoved, the gallant
man called for a chair from which to continue to direct his troops,
but presently fainting from pain was carried insensible from the
field. The French, notwithstanding his fall, still barred the advance
of the Allies, but they had been driven from their entrenchments and
from the wood on the left, and only held their own by the help of the
troops that had been withdrawn from the centre. The moment for which
Marlborough had waited was now come.
The forty-gun battery was moved forward, and Orkney leading his British
battalions against the redans captured them, though not without
considerable loss, at the first rush. Two Hanoverian battalions on
their left turned the flank of the adjoining entrenchments; and
Orange, renewing his attack, cleared the whole of the defences in
the glade. The Allied cavalry followed close behind him. Auvergne’s
Dutch were the first to pass the entrenchments, and, though charged
by the French while in the act of deploying, succeeded in repelling
the first attack. But now Boufflers came up at the head of the French
Gendarmerie, and drove Auvergne’s men back irresistibly to the edge of
the entrenchments. Here, however, the French were checked, for Orkney
had lined the parapet with his British; and, though the Gendarmerie
thrice strove gallantly to make an end of the Dutch, they were every
time driven back by the fire of the infantry. Meanwhile the central
battery, which had been parted right and left into two divisions,
advanced and supported the infantry by a cross-fire, and Marlborough,
coming up with the British and Prussian horse, charged the Gendarmerie
in their turn. Boufflers, however, was again ready with fresh troops,
and falling upon Marlborough with the French Household Cavalry crashed
through his two leading lines and threw even the third into disorder.
Then Eugene advancing at the head of the Imperial horse threw the last
reserves into the mêlée and drove the French back. Simultaneously the
Prince of Hesse hurled his squadrons against the infantry of the French
right, and, with the help of the Dutch foot, isolated it still further
from the centre. Boufflers now saw that the day was lost and ordered a
general retreat to Bavay, while he could yet keep his troops together.
The movement was conducted in admirable order, for the French, though
beaten, were not routed, while the Allies were too much exhausted to
pursue. So Boufflers retired unmolested, though it was not yet three
o’clock, honoured alike by friend and foe for his bravery and his skill.
Thus ended the battle of Malplaquet, one of the bloodiest ever fought
by mortal men. Little is known of the details of the fighting, these
being swallowed up in the shade of the forest of Taisnières, where
no man could see what was going forward. All that is certain is that
neither side gave quarter, and that the combat was not only fierce but
savage. The loss of the French was about twelve thousand men, and the
trophies taken from them, against which they could show trophies of
their own, were five hundred prisoners, fifty standards and colours and
sixteen guns. The loss of the Allies was not less than twenty thousand
men killed and wounded, due chiefly to the mad onset of the Prince of
Orange. The Dutch infantry out of thirty battalions lost eight thousand
men, or more than half of their number; the British out of twenty
battalions lost nineteen hundred men,[65] the heaviest sufferers being
the Coldstream Guards, Buffs, Orrery’s and Temple’s.[66]
The more closely the battle is studied, the more the conviction grows
that no action of Marlborough’s was fought less in accordance with his
own plans. We have seen that he would have preferred to fight it on
either of the two preceding days, and that he yielded to Eugene against
his own judgment in suffering it to be postponed. Then again there was
the almost criminal folly of the Prince of Orange, which upset all
preconcerted arrangements, threw away thousands of lives to no purpose,
and not only permitted the French to retreat unharmed at the close of
the day, but seriously imperilled the success of the action at its
beginning. Nevertheless there are still not wanting men to believe the
slanders of the contemptible faction then rising to power in England,
that Marlborough fought the battle from pure lust of slaughter.
Notwithstanding all blunders, which were none of Marlborough’s making,
Malplaquet was a very grand action. The French were equal in number to
the Allies, and occupied a position which was described at the time as
a fortified citadel. They were commanded by an able general, whom they
liked and trusted, they were in good heart, and they looked forward
confidently to victory. Yet they were driven back and obliged to leave
Mons to its fate; and though Villars with his usual bluster described
the victory as more disastrous than defeat, yet French officers could
not help asking themselves whether resistance to Marlborough and Eugene
were not hopeless. Luxemburg with seventy-five thousand men against
fifty thousand had only with difficulty succeeded in forcing the faulty
position of Landen; yet the French had failed to hold the far more
formidable lines of Malplaquet against an army no stronger than their
own. Say Villars what he might, and beyond all doubt he fought a fine
fight, the inference could not be encouraging to France.
It was not until the third day after the fight that the Allies
returned to the investment of Mons. Eugene was wounded, and
Marlborough not only worn out by fatigue but deeply distressed over
the enormous sacrifice of life. The siege was retarded by the marshy
nature of the ground and by heavy rain; but on the 9th of October the
garrison capitulated, and therewith the campaign came to an end.
◆Sept. 28./Oct. 9.◆ Tournay had given the Allies firm foothold on the
Upper Scheldt, and Mons was of great value to cover the captured towns
in Flanders and Brabant. The season’s operations had not been without
good fruit, despite the heavy losses at Malplaquet.
VOL. I. BOOK VI. CHAPTER X
◆1711.◆
The French, fully aware of the political changes in England, had during
the winter made extraordinary exertions to prolong the war for yet one
more campaign, and to that end had covered the northern frontier with
a fortified barrier on a gigantic scale. Starting from the coast of
Picardy the lines followed the course of the river Canche almost to its
source. From thence across to the Gy, or southern fork of the Upper
Scarpe, ran a line of earthworks, extending from Oppy to Montenancourt.
From the latter point the Gy and the Scarpe were dammed so as to form
inundations as far as Biache, at which place a canal led the line of
defence from the Scarpe to the Sensée. Here more inundations between
the two rivers carried the barrier to Bouchain, whence it followed
the Scheldt to Valenciennes. From thence more earthworks prolonged the
lines to the Sambre, which carried them at last to their end at Namur.
This was a formidable obstacle to the advance of the Allies, but no
lines had sufficed to stop Marlborough yet; and with Eugene by his
side the Duke did not despair. Before he could start for the campaign,
however, the news came that the Emperor Joseph was dead of smallpox,
an event which signified the almost certain accession of the Archduke
Charles to the Imperial crown and the consequent withdrawal of his
candidature for the throne of Spain. Eugene was consequently detained
at home; and, worse than this, a fine opportunity was afforded
for making a breach in the Grand Alliance. To render the Duke’s
difficulties still greater, though his force was already weakened
by the necessity of finding garrisons for the towns captured in the
previous year, the English Government had withdrawn from him five
battalions[67] for an useless expedition to Newfoundland under the
command of Mrs. Masham’s brother, General Hill; an expedition which may
be dismissed for the present without further mention than that it was
dogged by misfortune from first to last, suffered heavy loss through
shipwreck, and accomplished literally nothing.