[Sidenote: 1708.]
The successes of the past campaign were sufficient to set the
British Parliament in good humour, and to prompt it to vote a
further increase of ten thousand German mercenaries for the
following year. Nevertheless political troubles were increasing,
and there were already signs that the rule of Godolphin and
Marlborough was in danger. The death of the Prince Consort had been
a heavy blow to the Duke. Prince George may have deserved Lord
Macaulay's character for impenetrable stupidity, but there can be
little doubt that his heavy phlegmatic character was of infinite
service to steady the weak and unstable Queen Anne.
[Sidenote: 1709.]
In the spring of 1709, however, it seemed reasonable to hope that
peace, which would have set all matters right, was well-nigh
assured. France, already at the last gasp through the exhaustion
caused by the war, was weakened still further by a severe winter
which had added famine to all her other troubles; and Lewis
sought anxiously, even at the price of humiliation, for peace. He
approached Marlborough, reputed the most avaricious and corruptible
of men, with a gigantic bribe to obtain good terms, but was
unhesitatingly rebuffed. The Duke stated the conditions which might
be acceptable to England; and had the negotiations been trusted to
him, there can be little doubt but that he would have obtained the
honourable peace which he above all men most earnestly desired. He
was, however, overruled by instructions from home imposing terms
which Lewis could not be expected to grant; the war was continued;
and Marlborough, who had striven his hardest to bring it to an end,
was of course accused of prolonging it deliberately for his own
selfish ends.
[Sidenote: June.]
[Sidenote:
15
June --.
26
]
The French, now menaced with an invasion and a march of the Allies
to Paris, had strengthened their army enormously by withdrawing
troops from all quarters to Flanders, and had set in command their
only fortunate general, that very able soldier and incomparable
liar, Marshal Villars. To cover Arras, the northwestern gate of
France, Villars had thrown up a strong line of entrenchments from
the Scarpe at Douay to the Lys, which were generally known, after
the name of his headquarters, as the lines of La Bassée. There he
lay, entrenched to the teeth, while Marlborough and Eugene, after
long delay owing to the lateness of the spring, encamped with
one hundred and ten thousand men to the south of Lille, between
two villages, with which the reader will in due time make closer
acquaintance, called Lincelles and Fontenoy. Thence they moved
south straight upon Villars' lines with every apparent preparation
for a direct attack upon them and for forcing their way into France
at that point. The heavy artillery was sent to Menin on the Lys;
report was everywhere rife of the coming assault, and Villars lost
no time in summoning the garrison of Tournay to his assistance. On
the 26th of June, at seven in the evening, Marlborough issued his
orders to strike tents and march; and the whole army made up its
mind for a bloody action before the lines at dawn. To the general
surprise, after advancing some time in the direction of the French,
the columns received orders to change direction to the left. After
some hours' march eastward they crossed a river, but the men did
not know that the bridge lay over the Marque and that it led them
over the battlefield of Bouvines; nor was it until dawn that they
saw the gray walls and the four spires of Tournay before them and
discovered that they had invested the city.
[Sidenote:
June 26
-------
July 7.
]
[Sidenote:
19
July --.
30
]
[Sidenote:
Aug. 23
-------
Sept. 3.
]
Tournay had been fortified by Vauban and was one of the strongest
fortresses in France,[365] but its garrison had been weakened by
the unsuspecting Villars, and there was little hope for it. The
heavy artillery of the Allies, which had been sent to Menin, went
down the Lys to Ghent and up the Scheldt to the besieged city, the
trenches were opened on the 7th of July, and after three weeks,
despite the demonstrations of Villars and of incessant heavy rain,
Tournay was reduced to surrender.[366] Then followed the siege
of the citadel, the most desperate enterprise yet undertaken by
the Allied troops, inasmuch as the subterraneous works were more
numerous and formidable than those above ground. The operations
were, therefore, conducted by mine and countermine, with
destructive explosions and confused combats in the darkness, which
tried the nerves of the soldiers almost beyond endurance. The men
did not object to be shot, but they dreaded to be buried alive by
the hundred together through the springing of a single mine.[367]
Four English regiments[368] bore their share in this work and
suffered heavily in the course of it, until on the 3rd of September
the citadel capitulated.
[Sidenote:
20
Aug. --.
31
]
[Sidenote:
Aug. 23
--------
Sept. 3.
]
Before the close of the siege Marlborough and Eugene, leaving a
sufficient force before Tournay, had moved back with the main army
before the lines at Douay. They had long decided that the lines
were far too formidable to be forced, but they saw no reason for
communicating this opinion to Villars. On the 31st of August Lord
Orkney, with twenty squadrons and the whole of the grenadiers of
the army, marched away silently and swiftly eastward towards St.
Ghislain on the Haine. Three days later, immediately after the
capitulation of the citadel of Tournay, the Prince of Hessen-Cassel
started at four o'clock in the afternoon in the same direction; at
nine o'clock Cadogan followed him with forty squadrons more, and at
midnight the whole army broke up its camp and marched after them.
Twenty-six battalions alone were left before Tournay to superintend
the evacuation and to level the siege works, with orders to watch
Villars carefully and not to move until he did.
[Sidenote:
Aug. 26
-------
Sept. 6.
]
The Prince of Hessen-Cassel soon overtook Orkney, from whom he
learned that St. Ghislain was too strongly held to be carried by
his small force. The Prince therefore at once pushed on. Rain
was falling in torrents, and the roads were like rivers, but he
continued his advance eastward behind the woods that line the Haine
almost without a halt, till at length at two o'clock on the morning
of the 6th of September he wheeled to the right and crossed the
river at Obourg three miles to the north-east of Mons. Before him
lay the river Trouille running down from the south through Mons,
and in rear of it a line of entrenchments, thrown up from Mons to
the Sambre during the last war to cover the province of Hainault.
A short survey showed him that the lines were weakly guarded; and
before noon he had passed them without opposition. His force,
despite the weather and the state of the roads, had covered the
fifty miles to Obourg in fifty-six hours.
[Sidenote:
Aug. 27
--------
Sept. 7.
]
Too late Villars discovered that for the second time he had been
duped, 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 but slenderly garrisoned and difficult of access, while, 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 on 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. 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 it, his right at Jemappes, his left at Ciply. The French
thereupon fell back to await the approach of the main army of the
Allies.
[Sidenote:
Aug. 26
--------
Sept. 6.
]
[Sidenote:
Aug. 27
--------
Sept. 7.
]
Meanwhile that army had toiled through the sea of mud on the
northern bank of the Haine, and crossing the river had by evening
invested Mons on the eastern side. 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.
[Sidenote:
Aug. 28
--------
Sept. 8.
]
[Sidenote:
Aug. 29
--------
Sept. 9.
]
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. That night Villars sent detachments
forward to occupy the southern passage, and by midday 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, wherein, 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, and that in the meanwhile eighteen battalions should
be sent north to the capture of St. Ghislain and the investment of
Mons turned into a blockade. Evidently in some quarter there was
reluctance to hazard a general action.
[Sidenote:
Aug. 30
--------
Sept. 10.
]
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. 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 is 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 rises 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 Blaugies, 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 abattis. 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 abattis 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.
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.
[Sidenote:
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 in position. Forty pieces were massed in a single battery in
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. In rear of 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
to the French left 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 and delivered 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 little 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 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 abattis
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 fell
dead 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 their presence 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 them 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.[369] 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
at their heels. 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 them 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 fell upon the Gendarmerie
in their turn. Boufflers, however, was again ready with fresh
troops, and coming down upon Marlborough with the French Household
Cavalry crashed through his two leading lines and threw even the
third into disorder. Then Eugene coming up with the Imperial horse
threw the last reserves into the melée 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. Then Boufflers 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.
[Illustration: MALPLAQUET
Aug. 31^{st}
------------ 1709.
Sep. 11^{th}
_To face page 524_
]
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,[370] the heaviest sufferers
being the Coldstream Guards, Buffs, Orrery's and Temple's.[371]
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
deferred 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.
Still, in spite of all blunders, which were none of Marlborough's,
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.
[Sidenote:
Sept. 28
--------
Oct. 9.
]
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. Tournay had given the Allies firm foothold on the
Upper Scheldt, and Mons was of great value as covering the captured
towns in Flanders and Brabant. The season's operations had not been
without good fruit, despite the heavy losses at Malplaquet.