appalled at the new and extraordinary dangers which now awaited them,
for they were truly of the most formidable description. What rendered
them peculiarly so, was, that the perils in a peculiar manner affected
the bold and the forward. The first to mount a breach, to effect a
lodgement in a horn-work, to penetrate into a mine, was sure to
perish. First a hollow rumbling noise was heard, which froze the
bravest hearts with horror: a violent rush as of a subterraneous
cataract succeeded; and immediately the earth heaved, and whole
companies, and even battalions, were destroyed with a frightful
explosion. On the 15th August a sally by M. De Surville was bravely
repulsed, and the besiegers, pursuing their advantage, effected a
lodgement in the outwork: but immediately a mine was sprung, and a
hundred and fifty men were blown into the air. In the night between
the 16th and 17th, a long and furious conflict took place below ground
and in utter darkness, between the contending parties, which at length
terminated to the advantage of the besiegers.[23] On the 23d a mine
was discovered, sixty feet long by twenty broad, which would have
blown up a whole battalion of Hanoverian troops placed above it; but
while the Allies were in the mine, congratulating themselves on the
discovery, a mine below it was suddenly sprung, and all within the
upper one buried in the ruins. On the night of the 25th, three hundred
men, posted in a large mine discovered to the Allies by an inhabitant
of Tournay, were crushed by the explosion of another mine directly
below it; and on the same night, one hundred men posted in the town
ditch were suddenly buried under a bastion blown out upon them. Great
was the dismay which these dreadful and unheard-of disasters produced
among the allied troops. But at length the resolution and energy of
Marlborough and Eugene triumphed over every obstacle. Early on the
morning of the 31st August the white flag was displayed, and a
conference took place between the two commanders in the house of the
Earl of Albemarle; but the governor having refused to accede to the
terms demanded--that he should surrender prisoners of war--the fire
recommenced, and a tremendous discharge from all the batteries took
place for the next three days. This compelled the brave De Surville to
submit; and Marlborough, in consideration of his gallant defence,
permitted the garrison to march out with the honours of war, and
return to France, on condition of not serving again till exchanged. On
September 3d the gates were surrendered; and the entire command of
this strong fortress and rich city, which entirely covered Spanish
Flanders, was obtained by the Allies.[24]
No sooner was Tournay taken than the allied generals turned their
eyes to Mons, the next great fortress on the road to Paris, and which,
with Valenciennes, constituted the only remaining strongholds that lay
on that line between them and Paris. So anxious was Marlborough to
hasten operations against this important town, that on the very day on
which the white flag was displayed from the citadel of Tournay, he
dispatched Lord Orkney with all the grenadiers of the army, and twenty
squadrons, to surprise Ghislain, and secure the passage of the Haine.
On the 3d, the Prince of Hesse-Cassel was dispatched after him with
4000 foot and 60 squadrons. Lord Orkney, on arriving on the banks of
the Haine, found the passage so strongly guarded that he did not deem
it prudent to alarm the enemy by attempting to force them. The Prince
of Hesse-Cassel, however, was more fortunate. He marched with such
extraordinary diligence, that he got over forty-nine English miles in
fifty-six successive hours; a rapidity of advance, for such a
distance, that had never been surpassed at that, though it has been
outdone in later times.[25] By this means he reached the Haine on the
other side of Mons, and surprised the passage near Obourg, at two in
the morning of the 6th, and at noon he entered the French lines of the
Trouille without opposition, the enemy retiring with precipitation as
he advanced. He immediately extended his forces over the valley of the
Trouille, fixed his headquarters at the abbey of Belian, and with his
right occupied in strength the important plateau of Jemappes, which
intercepted the communication between Mons and Valenciennes. It was on
this height that the famous battle was fought between the French
Republicans under Dumourier in 1792: another proof among the many
which history affords how frequently the crisis of war, at long
distances of time from each other, takes place in the same place. By
this decisive movement Marlborough gained an immense advantage;--Mons
was now passed and _invested on the side of France_; and the
formidable lines, thirty leagues in length, on which Marshal Villars
had been labouring with such assiduity during the two preceding
months, were turned and rendered of no avail.[26]
While the Prince of Hesse-Cassel, with the advanced guard of the army,
gained this brilliant success, Marlborough was rapidly following with
the main body in the same direction. The force besieging Tournay
crossed the Scheldt at the bridge of that town, and joined the
covering force under Eugene. From thence they advanced to Sirant,
where they were joined by Lord Orkney with his detachment, which had
failed in passing the Haine. On the 6th, having learned of the success
of the Prince of Hesse-Cassel, who had turned the enemy's lines, and
got between Mons and France, the allied generals pushed on with the
utmost expedition, and leaving their army to form the investment of
Mons, joined the prince in the abbey of Belian. Both commanders
bestowed on him the highest compliments for the advantages he had
gained; but he replied, "The French have deprived me of the glory due
to such a compliment, since they have not even waited my arrival." In
truth, such had been the celerity and skill of his dispositions, that
they had rendered resistance hopeless, and achieved success without
the necessity of striking a blow. Meanwhile Marshal Boufflers, hearing
a battle was imminent, arrived in the camp as a volunteer, to serve
under Villars, his junior in military service; a noble example of
disinterested patriotism, which, not less than the justly popular
character of that distinguished general, raised the enthusiasm of the
French soldiers to the very highest pitch.[27] Every thing announced
a more sanguinary and important conflict between the renowned
commanders and gallant armies now arrayed on the opposite sides, than
had yet taken place since the commencement of the war.[28]
During these rapid and vigorous movements, which entirely turned and
broke through his much-vaunted lines of defence, Villars remained with
the great body of his forces in a state of inactivity. Aware he was to
be attacked, but ignorant where the blow was first likely to fall, he
judged, and probably rightly, that it would be hazardous to weaken his
lines at any one point by accumulating forces at another. No sooner,
however, did he receive intelligence of the march of the Prince of
Hesse-Cassel, than he broke up from the lines of Douay, and hastily
collecting his forces, advanced towards that adventurous commander. At
two in the morning of the 4th, he arrived in front of him with his
cavalry; but conceiving the whole allied army was before him, he did
not venture to make an attack at a time when his great superiority of
force would have enabled him to do it with every chance of success.
The movement of Villars, however, and general _feux-de-joie_ which
resounded through the French lines on the arrival of Marshal
Boufflers, warned the allied leaders that a general battle was at
hand; and orders were in consequence given to the whole army to
advance at four o'clock on the afternoon of the 7th. A detachment of
Eugene's troops was left to watch Mons, the garrison of which
consisted only of eleven weak battalions and a regiment of horse, not
mustering above five thousand combatants; and the whole remainder of
the allied army, ninety thousand strong, pressed forward in dense
masses into the level and marshy plain in the middle of which Mons is
situated. They advanced in different columns, headed by Marlborough
and Eugene; and never was a more magnificent spectacle presented, than
when they emerged from the woods upon the plain, and ascended in the
finest order, with their whole cavalry and artillery, as well as
infantry, the undulating ground which lies to the south of that town.
They arrived at night, and bivouacked on the heights of Quaregnon,
near Genly, and thence on to the village of Quevy, in a line not three
miles in length, and only five distant from the enemy; so that it was
evident a general battle would take place on the following day, unless
Villars was prepared to abandon Mons to its fate.[29]
The French marshal, however, had no intention of declining the combat.
His army was entirely fresh, and in the finest order; it had engaged
in no previous operations; whereas a bloody siege, and subsequent
fatiguing marches in bad weather, had sensibly weakened the strength,
though they had not depressed the spirits, of the allied soldiers. The
vast efforts of the French government, joined to the multitude of
recruits whom the public distress had impelled into the army, had in
an extraordinary degree recruited his ranks. After making provision
for all the garrisons and detached posts with which he was charged, he
could bring into the field no less than a hundred and thirty
battalions, and two hundred and sixty squadrons; and as they had all
been raised to their full complement, they mustered sixty-five
thousand infantry, and twenty-six thousand horse, with eighty guns; in
all, with the artillery, ninety-five thousand combatants. This vast
array had the advantage of being almost entirely of one nation,
speaking one language, and animated with one spirit; while the allied
force was a motley array of many different faces and nations of men,
held together by no other bond but the strong one of military success
and confidence in their chief. Both armies were of nearly equal
strength, under the command of the ablest and most intrepid commanders
of their day; the soldiers of both had acted long together, and
acquired confidence in each other; and both contained that
intermixture of the fire of young, with the caution of veteran troops,
which is of the happiest augury for military success. It was hard to
say, between such antagonists, to which side the scales of victory
would incline.[30]
The face of the country occupied by the French army, and which was to
be the theatre of the great battle which was approaching, is an
irregular plateau, interspersed by woods and intersected by streams,
and elevated from a hundred and fifty to two hundred feet above the
meadows of the Trouille. Mons and Bavay, the villages of Quevrain and
Giory, formed the angular points of this broken surface. Extensive
woods on all the principal eminences both give diversity and beauty to
the landscape, and, in a military point of view, added much to the
strength of the position as defensible ground against an enemy. Near
MALPLAQUET, on the west of the ridge, is a small heath, and
immediately to the south of it the ground descends by a rapid slope to
the Hon, which finds its way by a circuitous route by the rear of the
French position to the Trouille, which it joins near Condé. The
streams from Malplaquet to the northward all flow by a gentle slope
through steep wooded banks to the Trouille, into which they fall near
Mons. The woods on the plateau are the remains of a great natural
forest which formerly covered the whole of these uplands, and out of
which the clearings round the villages and hamlets which now exist,
have been cut by the hands of laborious industry. Two woods near the
summit level of the ground are of great extent, and deserve particular
notice. The first, called the wood of Louvière, stretches from
Longueville in a north-easterly direction to Cauchie; the second,
named the wood Taisnière, of still larger size, extends from the
Chaussée de Bois to the village of Bouson. Between these woods are two
openings, or Trouées as they are called in the country--the Trouée de
la Louvière, and the Trouée d'Aulnoet. Generally speaking, the ground
occupied by the French, and which was to be the theatre of the battle,
may be described as a rough and woody natural barrier, stretching
across the high plateau which separates the Haine and the Trouille,
and pervious only by the two openings of Louvière and Aulnoet, both of
which are in a very great degree susceptible of defence.[31]
The allied army consisted of one hundred and thirty-nine battalions,
and two hundred and fifty-three squadrons, with one hundred and five
guns; mustering ninety-three thousand combatants. The two armies,
therefore, were as nearly as possible equal in point of military
strength--a slight numerical superiority on the part of the French
being compensated by a superiority of twenty-five guns on that of the
Allies. Among the French nobles present at the battle, were no less
than twelve who were afterwards marshals of France.[32] The son of
James II., under the name of the Chevalier of St George, who combined
the graces of youth with the hereditary valour of his race, was there;
St Hilaire and Folard, whose works afterwards threw such light on
military science, were to be found in its ranks. The Garde-du-corps,
Mousquetaires gris, Grenadiers _à cheval_, French, Swiss, and Bavarian
guards, as well as the Irish brigade, stood among the combatants. The
reverses of Louis had called forth the flower of the nobility, as well
as the last reserves of the monarchy.[33]
Early on the morning of the 9th, Marlborough and Eugene were on the
look-out at the Mill of Sart, with a strong escort, consisting of
thirty squadrons of horse. From the reports brought in, it was soon
ascertained that the whole enemy's army was in march towards the plain
of Malplaquet, on the west of the plateau, and that Villars himself
was occupying the woods of Lasnière and Taisnière. His headquarters
were at Blaugnies, in the rear of the centre. The two armies were now
only a league and a half separate, and Marlborough and Eugene were
clear for immediately attacking the enemy, before they could add to
the natural strength of their position by intrenchnents. But the Dutch
deputies, Hooft and Goslinga, interfered, as they had done on a
similar occasion between Wavre and Waterloo, and so far modified this
resolution as to induce a council of war, summoned on the occasion, to
determine not to fight till the troops from Tournay were within reach,
and St Ghislain, which commanded a passage over the Haine, was taken.
This was done next day, the fort being carried by escalade, and its
garrison of two hundred men made prisoners; and on the day following,
all the reserves from Tournay came up. But these advantages, which in
themselves were not inconsiderable, were dearly purchased by the time
which Villars gained for strengthening his position. Instead of
pushing on to attack the allies, as Marlborough and Eugene had
expected, to raise the siege of Mons, that able commander employed
himself with the utmost skill and vigour in throwing up intrenchments
in every part of his position. The nature of the ground singularly
favoured his efforts. The heights he occupied, plentifully
interspersed with woods and eminences, formed a concave semicircle,
the artillery from which enfiladed on all sides the little plain of
Malplaquet, so as to render it literally, in Dumont's words, "une
trouée d'enfer." Around this semicircle, redoubts, palisades, abattis,
and stockades, were disposed with such skill and judgment, that,
literally speaking, there was not a single inequality of ground, (and
there were many,) which was not turned to good account. The two
_trouées_ or openings, in particular, already mentioned, by which it
was foreseen the Allies would endeavour to force an entrance, were so
enfiladed by cross batteries as to be wellnigh unassailable. Twenty
pieces of artillery were placed on a redoubt situated on an eminence
near the centre of the field; the remainder were arranged along the
field-works constructed along the lines. Half the army laboured at
these works without a moment's intermission during the whole of the
9th and 10th, while the other were under arms, ready to repel any
attack which might be hazarded. With such vigour were the operations
conducted, that by the night of the 10th, the position was deemed
impregnable.[34]
During these two days, which were passed in inactivity, awaiting the
coming up of the reinforcements from Tournay, which the council of war
had deemed indispensable to the commencement of operations,
Marlborough and Eugene had repeatedly reconnoitred the enemy's
position, and were fully aware of its growing strength. Despairing of
openly forcing such formidable lines, defended by so numerous and
gallant an army, they resolved to combine their first attack with a
powerful demonstration in rear. With this view, the rear-guard, which
was coming up from Tournay under General Withers, of nineteen
battalions and ten squadrons, received orders not to join the main
body of the army, but, stopping short at St Ghislain, to cross the
Haine there, and, traversing the wood of Blangris by a country road,
assail the extreme left of the enemy at the farm of La Folie, when the
combat was seriously engaged in front. Forty battalions of Eugene's
army, under Baron Schulemberg, were to attack the wood of Taisnière,
supported by forty pieces of cannon, so placed that their shot reached
every part of the wood. To distract the enemy's attention, other
attacks were directed along the whole line; but the main effort was to
be made by Eugene's corps on the wood of Taisnière; and it was from
the co-operation of the attack of Schulemberg on its flank, that
decisive success was expected.[35] All the corps had reached their
respective points of destination on the evening of the 10th.
Schulemberg was near La Folie; Eugene was grouped, in four lines, in
front of Taisnière; and the men lay down to sleep, anxiously awaiting
the dawn of the eventful morrow.[36]
At three in the morning of the 11th, divine service was performed,
with the utmost decorum, at the head of every regiment, and listened
to by the soldiers, after the example of their chief, with the most
devout attention. The awful nature of the occasion, the momentous
interests at stake, the uncertainty who might survive to the close of
the day, the protracted struggle now to be brought to a decisive
issue, had banished all lighter feelings, and impressed a noble
character on that impressive solemnity. A thick fog overspread the
field, under cover of which the troops marched, with the utmost
regularity, to their appointed stations: the guns were brought forward
to the grand battery in the centre, which was protected on either side
by an _épaulement_ to prevent an enfilade. No sooner did the French
outposts give notice that the Allies were preparing for an attack,
than the whole army stood to their arms, and all the working parties,
who were still toiling in the trenches, cast aside their tools, and
joyfully resumed their places in the ranks. Never, since the
commencement of the war, had the spirit of the French soldier been so
high, or so enthusiastic a feeling infused into every bosom. With
confidence they looked forward to regaining the laurels, under their
beloved commander, Marshal Villars, which had been withered in eight
successive campaigns, and arresting the flood of conquest which
threatened to overwhelm their country. No sooner did he mount on
horseback at seven, than loud cries of "Vive le Roi!" "Vive le
Maréchal de Villars!" burst from their ranks. He himself took the
command of the left, giving the post of honour on the right, in
courtesy, to Marshal Boufflers. On the allied side, enthusiasm was not
so loudly expressed, but confidence was not the less strongly felt.
They relied with reason on the tried and splendid abilities of their
chiefs, on their own experienced constancy and success in the field.
They had the confidence of veteran soldiers, who had long fought and
conquered together. In allusion to the numerous field-works before
them, and which almost concealed the enemy's ranks from their view,
the sarcastic expression passed through the ranks, "We are again about
to make war on moles." The fog still lingered on the ground, so as to
prevent the gunners seeing to take aim; but at half-past seven it
cleared up; the sun broke forth with uncommon brilliancy, and
immediately the fire commenced with the utmost vigour from the
artillery on both sides.[37]
For about half an hour the cannon continued to thunder, so as to reach
every part of the field of battle with their balls, when Marlborough
moved forward his troops in échelon, the right in front, in order to
commence his projected attack on the French centre and left. The
Dutch, who were on the left, agreeably to the orders they had
received, halted when within range of grape, and a violent cannonade
was merely exchanged on both sides; but Count Lottum, who commanded
the centre of twenty battalions, continued to press on, regardless of
the storm of shot and grape with which he was assailed, and when well
into the enemy's line, he brought up his left shoulders, and in three
lines attacked the right of the wood of Taisnière. Schulemberg, at the
same time, with his forty battalions to the right of Lottum, advanced
against the wood of Taisnière in front; while Lord Orkney, with his
fifteen battalions, as Lottum's men inclined to the right, marched
straight forward to the ground they had occupied, and attacked the
intrenchment before him in the opening. Eugene, who was with
Schulemberg's men, advanced without firing a shot, though suffering
dreadfully from the grape of the batteries, till within pistol-shot of
the batteries. They were there, however, received by so terrible a
discharge of all arms from the intrenchments--the French soldiers
laying their pieces deliberately over the parapet, and taking aim
within twenty yards of their opponents--that they recoiled above two
hundred yards, and were only brought back to the charge by the heroic
efforts of Eugene, who exposed his person in the very front of the
line. Meanwhile, three battalions brought up from the blockade of Mons
stole unperceived, amidst the tumult in front, into the south-eastern
angle of the wood of Taisnière, and were making some progress, when
they were met by three battalions of French troops, and a vehement
fire of musketry soon rang in the recesses of the wood.
Meanwhile, Marlborough in person led on D'Auvergne's cavalry in
support of Lottum's men, who speedily were engaged in a most terrific
conflict. They bore without flinching the fire of the French brigade
_du Roi_, and, crossing a ravine and small morass, rushed with fixed
bayonets, and the most determined resolution, right against the
intrenchment. So vehement was the onset, so impetuous the rush, that
some of the leading files actually reached the summit of the parapet,
and those behind pushing vehemently on, the redoubt was carried amidst
deafening cheers. But Villars was directly in rear of that work; and
he immediately led up in person a brigade in the finest order, which
expelled the assailants at the point of the bayonet, and regained the
work. Marlborough upon this charged at the head of D'Auvergne's
cavalry; and that gallant body of men, three thousand strong, dashed
forward, entered the intrenchments, which were, at the same time,
surmounted by some of Lottum's battalions. While this desperate
conflict was going on in front and flank of the wood, Withers, with
his corps brought up from Tournay, was silently, and with great
caution, entering the wood on the side of La Folie, and had already
made considerable progress before any great efforts were made to expel
them. The advance of this corps in his rear rendered it impossible for
Villars any longer to maintain the advanced line of works in the front
of the wood; it was therefore abandoned, but slowly, and in admirable
order--the troops retiring through the trees to the second line of
works in their rear, which they prepared to defend to the last
extremity.