THE WAR FOR LOMBARDY
1859
Austria declares War--Montebello--Garibaldi's
Campaign--Palestro--Magenta--The Allies enter Milan--Ricasoli saves
Italian Unity--Accession of Francis II.--Solferino--The Armistice of
Villafranca.
Baron von Kellersperg reached Turin on the 23rd of April, bringing
with him the Austrian ultimatum: 'Disarmament within three days, or
war.' Cavour read the document, and then drew his watch out of his
pocket. It was half-past five in the afternoon. At the same hour on
the 26th, he gave Baron von Kellersperg the answer: 'Sardinia having
accepted the principle of a general disarmament, as formulated by
England, with the adhesion of France, Prussia and Russia, the
Sardinian Government has no other explanation to make.' The retort was
justified. Austria, which now required Sardinia to disarm, had refused
to disarm herself. She must take the consequences.
The British Government made a last desperate effort to maintain peace,
and the Austrians always said that this was their ruin, as it delayed
the invasion of Piedmont for a week. On the 29th appeared the Emperor
Francis Joseph's Declaration of War, and on the same day the first
Austrian columns crossed the Ticino. The Austrian commander-in-chief
was Count Gyulai, who was in high favour with the aristocratic party,
by which his appointment was suggested to, if not forced upon, the
Emperor. The latter, not altogether easy in his mind about Gyulai's
capabilities, commissioned General Hess, in whom he placed full
confidence, to keep his eye on him. Hess could not, however, do much
more than take notes of one of the most remarkable and providential
series of blunders ever committed by the commander of an army.
In spite of the delay which the Austrians ascribed to the English
peace negotiations, there was time for them to destroy the Sardinian
army before the French came up. Gyulai had 100,000 men in the theatre
of war, a number increased up to 200,000 during the campaign. Both
Sardinia and her ally mustered much fewer men than were spoken of at
Plombières. The Piedmontese could dispose of 56,000 infantry, formed
in five divisions, one division of cavalry numbering 4,000, and one
brigade of volunteers, to which the name was given of 'Cacciatori
delle Alpi.' The enrolment of these was stopped when it had reached
the small figure of 4,500 men, a figure that looks out of all
proportion with the brilliant part they played. The same influences
which cut short the enrolment prevented Cavour from keeping his
distinct promise to give Garibaldi, now invested with the official
rank of major-general, 10,000 regulars, with a battery and a troop of
horse.
The French army consisted of 128,000 men, including about 10,000
cavalry. The Emperor's Government had notified beforehand to Vienna
that the passage of the Ticino by the Austrian troops would be
considered equivalent to a declaration of war, and accordingly, on the
29th of April, diplomatic relations between the two Powers were broken
off. The French forces had been really on the move for more than a
week--ever since, in fact, by what the Marquis of Normanby called 'an
unpardonable breach of confidence,' the intention of Austria to invade
Sardinia was communicated to Paris. The mobilisation was conducted
with rapidity; in spite of the snow, which lay deep on the Mont Cenis,
the first corps, under Marshal Baraguay d'Hilliers, made a swift march
over the Alps, and the foremost division entered Turin on the 30th of
April. The troops of Canrobert and Niel, who commanded the third and
fourth corps, were sent by Toulon and Marseilles, while the generals
themselves went on to Turin in advance. MacMahon's corps, which was
the second, was on its way from Algiers. The fifth corps, under the
command of Prince Napoleon, was despatched at a later date to Tuscany,
where it was kept in a state of inactivity, which suggested rather a
political than a military mission. General Regnault de Saint-Jean
d'Angély commanded the Imperial Guard. Napoleon III assumed the
supreme command of the allied armies, with General Vaillant as head of
the staff.
The condition of neither French nor Austrian army was satisfactory.
The former had more modern arms and a greater proportion of old
soldiers, but it was generally thought that the French cavalry, so far
superior to the Prussian in the war of 1870, was inferior to the
Austrian in 1859. The commissariat and ambulance arrangements of the
French were disgraceful, though they had this advantage, that when
there was food to be had the soldiers were allowed to eat it, while
the Austrians were limited to half-a-pound of beef a day, and were
only allowed to cook once in the twenty-four hours, which led to their
having constantly to fight fasting. In point of discipline, they were
probably superior to the French, who fought, however, and this should
always be remembered of them in Italy, with the best will in the
world. They carried about their pet monkeys and dogs, and were always
good-humoured and in good spirits, even when wounded. What would have
been the effect on them of even a single defeat is a question which it
is useless to discuss.
In Napoleon's proclamation to the French people it was stated that the
scope of the war was to give Italy to herself, not to make her change
masters; the recompense of France would be to have upon her frontiers
a friendly people which owed its independence to her. As things stood
there were but two alternatives: Austria supreme as far as the Alps,
or Italy free to the Adriatic. On the 12th of May, the Imperial yacht,
the _Reine Hortense_, steamed into the harbour of Genoa with the
Emperor on board. A splendid reception awaited him, and amongst the
first to greet him was Cavour. 'You may well rejoice,' said Napoleon,
as he embraced the Sardinian statesman, 'for your plans are being
realised.'
Gyulai, who had insisted on invading Piedmont, contrary to the opinion
of Hess (who counselled waiting for reinforcements on the left bank of
the Mincio), wasted his time after crossing the Ticino in making plans
and changing them while he could unquestionably have thrown himself on
Turin had he possessed more resolution, and this was the only
operation that could have justified the initial folly of the invasion.
The taking of the capital might not have altered the fortunes of the
war, but it would have had all the appearance of a triumph, and would
have raised the _moral_ of the Austrian soldiers. The allies had time
to concentrate their forces near Tortona, and it was left to them to
assume the offensive. The Austrians retired towards the Apennines, but
made a forward movement on the 20th of May with the object of seizing
the heights of Casteggio which command the road to Piacenza; they were
met by the allies at the village of Montebello where Marshal Lannes
obtained a victory in 1800. The allies were completely successful in
this first battle, the honours of the day falling to the Sardinian
cavalry, which showed great gallantry. The Austrian forces were
considerably superior in strength.
Almost at the same time as the engagement of Montebello, Garibaldi
with his diminutive army (which through the weeding-out of men unfit
for service was reduced to about 3,500 before it took the field),
crossed the Lago Maggiore, and advanced boldly into the heart of the
enemy's country. The volunteers had no artillery, and by way of
cavalry only some forty or fifty were mounted on their own horses and
dignified with the name of 'guides.' They were badly armed and worse
equipped; the only good thing they had was an excellent ambulance
organised by Dr Bertani, Garibaldi's surgeon-general from Roman days
downwards. But they formed a picturesque sight as they marched along
gaily to the everlasting song, 'Addio, mia bella, addio'; and a
physiognomist would have been struck by their intelligent and often
distinguished faces: nobles and poets, budding doctors and lawyers,
bristled in the ranks, while the officers were the still young
veterans of 1848-1849: Cosenz, hero of Venice; Medici, the defender of
the Vascello; Bixio, Sirtori, Cairoli--all the Knights of the Legend.
Moving swiftly from place to place, and appearing where and when he
was least expected, Garibaldi took the entire country of the Lombard
lakes. Gyulai, who at first looked upon the Garibaldian march as a
simple diversion intended to draw off his attention, now became
concerned, and dispatched Urban with 10,000 men to destroy the
volunteers, and stem the insurrection which everywhere followed in
their wake. On the 27th of May Garibaldi drove Urban from his position
near San Fermo, and that commander had his mission still unfulfilled
when he received the order to retreat after the battle of Magenta. The
volunteers were free to pursue their way to Brescia and the
Valtellina, where they performed many feats in the latter period of
the war, winning the admiration of Hayn, the Austrian general opposed
to them, which he was generous enough to express in no measured terms.
The great war was meanwhile approaching its climax. After Montebello
the whole French army executed a secret flank movement, changing its
position from Voghera, where Gyulai believed it to be, and whence he
expected it to move on to Piacenza, to the line of the Sesia, between
Cameriano and Casale. To mask the main operations, the Sardinian
forces were sent to Palestro, on the other side of the Sesia. On the
30th of May, they drove in the outposts of the enemy, and on the 31st
fought the important engagement by which the Austrian attempt to
retake Palestro was repelled, and great damage caused to Zobel's
corps, which was obliged to leave eight guns sticking in the mud. The
French Zouaves of the 3rd regiment fought with the Piedmontese, and
made the battle famous by the reckless valour of their bayonet
charges. Victor Emmanuel, deaf to all remonstrances, placed himself at
their head, in consequence of which they elected him their corporal,
an honour once paid to the first Napoleon.
There is reason to think that after Palestro, Gyulai, having at last
realised what Napoleon was about, wished to evacuate Lombardy, but was
prevented from doing so by strong protests sent by the Emperor Francis
Joseph, who was at Verona. The Austrian army was in full retreat when
it was pulled up near Magenta, with the object of checking the advance
of the French, who had already begun to cross the Ticino by the
bridges of San Martino and Buffalora, which the Austrians had tried to
blow up, but had not succeeded from want of proper powder. In the
great battle of the 4th of June, Austrians and French numbered
respectively about 60,000 men; no Piedmontese were engaged till the
evening, when a battalion of Bersaglieri arrived. The Imperial Guard,
with which was Napoleon, had to bear the brunt of the fight for four
hours, and ran a good chance of being annihilated; not a brilliant
proof of French generalship, but happily the Austrians also committed
grave mistakes. MacMahon's arrival at five in the afternoon prevented
a catastrophe, and the fighting, which continued far into the night,
was from this moment attended by results on the whole advantageous to
the French. Not much more can be said. Magenta was very like a drawn
battle. The Austrians are calculated to have lost 10,000 men, the
French between 4,000 and 5,000. It was expected that the Austrians
would renew the attack, but on the 5th, Gyulai ordered the retreat,
which was the last order he had the opportunity of giving, as he was
deprived of his command immediately after.
At mid-day on the 5th, Milan, which was trembling on the verge of
revolution, made the pleasurable discovery that there were no
Austrians left in the town. The municipality sent out delegates with
the keys of the city to Victor Emmanuel. At ten a.m. on the 7th,
MacMahon's corps began to file down the streets. Words cannot describe
the welcome given to them. How MacMahon lifted to his saddle-bow a
child that was in danger of being crushed by the crowd will be
remembered from the pretty incident having passed into English poetry.
On the 8th, the King and the Emperor made their entry amidst a new
paroxysm of enthusiasm. Napoleon is reported to have exclaimed: 'How
this people must have suffered!' In his proclamation 'to the Italian
people,' which bears the same date as his entry into Milan, he renewed
the assurance of the disinterested motives which had brought him to
Italy: 'Your enemies, who are also mine, have endeavoured to diminish
the universal sympathy felt in Europe for your cause, by causing it to
be believed that I am making war for personal ambition, or to
increase French territory. If there are men who fail to comprehend
their epoch, I am not one of them. In the enlightened state of public
opinion now prevailing, true greatness lies in the moral influence
which we exercise rather than in sterile conquests.' The proclamation
ended with the words: 'To-morrow you will be the citizens of a great
country.' Not the least effusive demonstrations were reserved for
Cavour, who joined his Sovereign a few days after the battle of
Magenta.
* * * * *
Leaving the Milanese to put their faith in princes while yet there was
time, a glance must be taken at what had been going on in the rest of
Italy, which was becoming a great nation far more rapidly, and in a
much fuller sense than Napoleon III. expected or wished. When Austria
sent her ultimatum to Turin, the Sardinian minister at the Court of
Tuscany invited the Grand Duke's Government to take part in the war of
liberation. This they refused to do. On perceiving, however, that he
could not depend on his troops, the Grand Duke promised to co-operate
with Piedmont, but his advisers did not now think it possible to save
the grand ducal throne, unless Leopold II. abdicated in favour of his
son, who was not burdened with the fatal associations of the reaction
of ten years before. Leopold probably thought that even his abdication
would not keep out the deluge, and he took the more dignified course
of declining to yield to force. On the 27th of April, accompanied by
the Corps Diplomatique as far as the frontier, he left Tuscany. A
Provisional Government was formed with Peruzzi at its head, which
hastily raised 8000 men for immediate service under the command of
General Ulloa. Before long Prince Napoleon, with the fifth corps of
the French army, landed, for no reason that could be avowed, at
Leghorn. The real motive was to prepare the way for the fabrication
of a new kingdom of Etruria, which existed already in Napoleon's
brain. This masterpiece of folly had but a lukewarm supporter in
Prince Napoleon, who was the only Napoleon and about the only
Frenchman (if he could be called one) who grasped the idea of the
unity of Italy and sincerely applauded it. Had Jérôme Napoleon been
born with the least comprehension of self-respect and personal
dignity, his strong political intelligence and clear logical
discernment must have produced something better than the most
ineffectual career of the century.
On the 8th of May, Baron Ricasoli took office under the Provisional
Government as Minister of the Interior, and for nearly twelve months
he was the real ruler of Tuscany. He had an ally of great strength,
though of humble origin, in Giuseppe Dolfi, the baker, of whom it was
currently said that any day he could summon 10,000 men to the Piazza
della Signoria, who would obey him to the death. To Dolfi it was due
that there were no disorders after the Grand Duke left. What Italy
owes to the Lord of Brolio, history will never adequately state,
because it is well-nigh impossible fully to realise how critical was
her position during all that year, from causes external and internal,
and how disastrous would have been the slightest mistake or wavering
in the direction of Tuscan affairs, which formed the central hinge of
the whole complicated situation. Fortunate, indeed, was it that there
was a man like the Iron Baron, who, by simple force of will, outwitted
the enemies of Italy more thoroughly than even Cavour could do with
all his astuteness. Austere, aristocratic, immovable from his purpose,
indifferent to praise or blame, Ricasoli aimed at one point--the
unity of the whole country; and neither Cavour's impatience for
annexation to Piedmont, nor the scheme of Farini and Minghetti for
averting the wrath of the French Emperor by a temporary and
preparatory union of the central states, drew him one inch from the
straight road, which was the only one he had ever learnt to walk in.
In June, the Duke of Modena and the Duchess-Regent of Parma found it
impossible to remain in their states, now that Austrian protection was
withdrawn. The latter had done what she could to preserve the duchy
for her young son, but the tide was too strong. These revolutions were
accomplished quietly; but, some months after, on the incautious return
to Parma of a man deeply implicated in the abuses of Charles III.'s
government--Colonel Anviti--he was cruelly murdered; an act of
vengeance which happily remained alone.
After the battle of Magenta, when the Austrian troops were recalled
from the Marches and Romagna, those districts rose and demanded the
dictatorship of Piedmont. Napoleon foresaw that this would happen as
far back as the Plombières interview, and at that date it did not
appear that he meant to oppose it. But now, in Paris, the Clerical
party were seized with panic, and the Empress-Regent, then, as always,
completely under their control, did all in her power to arouse the
Emperor's opposition. The Pope, on his part, knowing that he was
secure in Rome--thanks to the French garrison, which, though it hated
its office, as the French writer Ampère and others bore witness, was
sure to perform it faithfully--had the idea of sending his Swiss
troops to put down the growing revolution. With these, and a few Roman
troops of the line, Colonel Schmidt marched against Perugia, where, in
restoring the Papal authority, he used a ferocity which, though denied
by clerical writers, was attested by all contemporary accounts, and
was called 'atrocious' by Sir James Hudson in a despatch to Lord John
Russell. The significance of such facts, wrote the English minister at
Turin, could only be the coming fall of the Pope's Temporal Power.
L.C. Farini was sent by Victor Emmanuel to administer the provinces of
Modena and Parma, and Massimo d'Azeglio was charged with the same
mission in Romagna. The Marches of Ancona had been recovered by the
Papal troops, which were concentrated in the district called La
Cattolica, near Rimini. A volunteer corps, under the Piedmontese
General Mezzacapo, was entrusted with the task of preventing them from
crossing into the Legations.
In the month of May, when the allies were reaping their first
successes, an event occurred at Caserta which precipitated crisis in
the South Italy. Ferdinand II. died at forty-eight years of age of a
terrible complaint which had attacked him a few months earlier, when
he went to meet his son's bride, the Princess Maria Sofia of Bavaria,
sister of the Empress of Austria. The news from Upper Italy hastened
his end; he is said to have exclaimed not long before he died: 'They
have won the cause!'
The accession of a youth, of whom nothing bad was known, to a throne
that had been occupied by a sovereign so out of place in modern
civilisation as Ferdinand, would appear at first sight a fortunate
circumstance for the chances of the dynasty; but it was not so. In an
eastern country it matters little whether the best of the inhabitants
loathe and detest their ruler; but it matters much whether he knows
how to cajole and frighten the masses, and especially the army, into
obedience. Naples, more Oriental than western, possessed in Ferdinand
a monarch consummately expert in this side of the art of government.
Though without the higher military virtues, his army was his favourite
plaything; he always wore uniform, never forgot a face he had once
seen, and treated the officers with a rather vulgar familiarity,
guessing at their weaknesses and making use of them on occasion. The
rank and file regarded him as a sort of supernatural being. Francis
II., who succeeded him, could scarcely appear in this light even to
the most ignorant. Popular opinion considered him not quite sound in
his mind. Probably his timorous, awkward ways and his seeming
stupidity were simply the result of an education conducted by bigoted
priests in a home that was no home: populated as it was by the
offspring of a stepmother who hated him. His own mother, the charming
Princess Cristina of Savoy, died while the city was rejoicing at his
birth. The story is well known of how, shortly after the marriage,
Ferdinand thought it diverting to draw a music-stool from under his
wife, causing her to fall heavily. It gives a sample of the sufferings
of her brief married life. An inheritance of sorrow descended from her
to her child.
If Francis II. was not popular, neither was the new queen. Far more
virile in character and in tastes than her husband, her high spirit
was not what the Neapolitans admire in women, and those who were
devoted to the late King accused her of having shown impatience during
his illness for the moment when the crown would fall to Francis.
Malicious gossip of this kind, however false, serves its end. Thus,
from one cause or another, the young King exercised a power sensibly
weaker than that of his father, while, besides other enemies, he had
an inveterate one in his stepmother, who began weaving a conspiracy to
oust him from the throne and place on it the eldest of his
half-brothers. This plot received, however, very little popular
support.
The Sardinian Government sought to persuade Francis to join in the
war against Austria; disinterested counsel, as in taking it lay his
only hope, but it was opposed by England, Russia and France. In July
two of the Swiss regiments at Naples mutinied. The Swiss Government,
becoming alive to the discredit cast on the country by mercenary
service, had decided that Swiss subjects serving abroad should lose
their rights as citizens of the Confederation whilst so employed, and
that they should no longer introduce the arms of their respective
cantons into their regimental colours. This was the immediate cause of
their insubordination. The mutineers, most of whom were unarmed, were
ruthlessly shot down in the Campo di Marte to the terror of the
population, and the two Swiss regiments which remained quiet were
dissolved; by which the monarchy lost the troops that were chiefly to
be depended on in emergencies. The Austrians and Bavarians imported in
their stead did not form separate regiments, but were incorporated
among the native troops, though the regiments that contained them were
commonly called 'Bavarian.' They only partially filled the place of
the Swiss.
* * * * *
Between the 4th and the 24th of June, no engagement of any magnitude
was fought in Lombardy except the attack on Benedek at Melegnano, a
battle in which the French lost most men, and gained no strategical
advantage. It was supposed to have been fought because Napoleon I. had
gained a victory in the same neighbourhood. The Austrians retreated to
the Mincio, destroying the bridges over the Adda, Serio, Oglio and
Mella as they went; these rivers the allies had to make repassable,
which is the excuse given for the dilatory nature of their pursuit of
the enemy. The Emperor Francis Joseph had now assumed the command,
with Hess as his principle adviser, and Wimpffen and Schlick, famous
as the 'One-eyed,' as heads of the two great corps into which the army
was divided.
On the 22nd of June, the Austrians were ranged along the left bank of
the Mincio from Peschiera to Mantua, and the French were massed near
Montechiaro, on the Brescia road, which Napoleon had made his
headquarters. In withdrawing all their men from the right bank of the
river, the Austrians desired to create the impression that they had
finally abandoned it. It was their plan, which did not lack boldness,
to throw the whole army back upon the right bank, and to perform a
concentric movement on Montechiaro, where they hoped to fall unawares
on the French and destroy them. They were confident of success, for
they knew what a good stand they had made at Magenta, and now that
Gyulai was got rid of, and the young Emperor had taken the field, they
did not doubt that fortune would turn her wheel. To these men of many
nations, the presence of their Emperor was the one inspiration that
could rouse them, for if they were fighting for anything, it was for
him in the most personal sense; it was to secure his mastery of the
splendid land over which he looked from the castle of Valleggio, on
the 23rd of June, whilst his brilliant staff stood round, waiting for
the signal to mount and clatter down the steep road to the Mincio
bridge. The army now advanced along all its line.
Even the soberest writers have not resisted making some reference to
the magnificent scene of to-morrow's battle. On one side, the mountain
bulwarks rising tier on tier, gorgeous with the trancendent beauty of
colour and light of the Italian summer; on the other, the vine-clad
hillocks which fall gently away from the blue lake of Garda till they
are lost in the
............harvest shining plain
Where the peasant heaps his grain
In the garner of his foe.
The 24th of June was to decide how much longer the Lombard peasant
should labour to fill a stranger's treasury.
The calculations of the Austrians were founded on the slowness which
had hitherto characterised Napoleon's movements. Hess thought that two
days might be safely allowed for the Austrian advance, and that the
enemy would remain passive on the west bank of the river Chiese,
waiting to be attacked on the 25th. If the operation could have been
performed in one day, and it is thought that it could, there would
have been more prospect of success. But even then, the original plan
of attacking the allies west of the Chiese could not have been carried
out, as on the 23rd the whole allied army moved forward, the French
occupying Castiglione and Lonato, and the Sardinians Rezzato and
Desenzano, on the lake of Garda. It is not clear how far the allies
believed in the Austrian advance; that they had warning of it from
several quarters is certain. For instance, a gentleman living at
Desenzano heard from the country people, who, for marketing or other
purposes, constantly go to and fro between that place and Peschiera,
that the Austrians had ordered a quantity of country carts and
transport waggons to be in readiness on the 23rd, and he hastened with
the intelligence to the Piedmontese General Delia Rocca, who, in a
fine spirit of red-tapism, pooh-poohed the information. The French
encountered several Austrian patrols in the course of the day, but
they were inclined to think that the Austrians were only executing a
reconnaissance. On the whole, it seems that the conflict came as a
surprise to both sides.
The Emperor of Austria, after accompanying the advance for a short
distance, returned with Hess to Valleggio for the night. Napoleon
slept at Montechiaro. The Austrian forces bivouacked on the little
hills between Solferino and Cavriana. They rested well, still
confident that no fighting would be done next day. At two in the
morning, the French began to move in the direction of Solferino, and
the Sardinians in that of Peschiera. There is a legend, that in the
grey mists of dawn an advance party of French cavalry espied a huge
and gaunt hussar standing by the roadside. For a moment the figure was
lost sight of, but it reappeared, and after running across the road in
front of the French, it turned and dealt the officer who led the party
so tremendous a blow that he fell off his horse. Then the adventurous
Austrian fled, followed by a volley from the French troopers; the
sound vibrating through the dawn stillness gave the call to arms to
the contrasted hosts. The battle of Solferino had begun.
The news flew to Montechiaro and to Valleggio. Napoleon started for
the scene of action with the Imperial Guard; Francis Joseph's staff
was sent forward at six a.m., but the Emperor and Hess did not start
till later. At near nine, the staff was looking for the Emperor, and
the Emperor was looking for the staff in the open country about Volta;
the sixty or seventy staff-officers dashed across ploughed fields and
over hedges and ditches, in a style which would have done credit to an
English fox-hunt. This remarkable incident was in keeping with the
general management of the battle on the part of the Austrians, who had
been fighting for many hours before the commander-in-chief arrived.
After his arrival, they continued fighting without any visible plan,
according to the expedients of the divisional generals. The particular
expedient adopted by General Zedwitz was to withdraw 15,000 men,
including six regiments of cavalry, from the field. At a critical
moment, Count Clam Gallas had the misfortune to lose his artillery
reserve, and sent everywhere to ask if anyone had seen it. The Prince
of Hesse, acting without orders, or against orders, separated his
division from Schwarzenberg's and brought it up at the nick of time to
save the Austrians, when they were threatened with actual destruction,
at two o'clock in the afternoon.
At that hour the French were in possession of the Spia d'Italia, and
of all the heights of Solferino. They had been engaged in attacking
them since eight in the morning, Napoleon having seen at once that
they were the key to the position, and must be taken, cost what it
might. The cost was great; if there is any episode in French military
history in which soldiers and officers earned all the praise that can
be given to brave men, it is the taking of these Solferino hills.
Again and again Forey's division and Bazaine's brigade returned to the
charge; the cemetery and streets of Solferino were piled up with their
dead, mingled with the dead of the defenders, who contested every inch
of ground. The individual valour of the French soldiers in that six
hours' struggle made it possible to win the battle.
The Austrians, however, after their desperate straits at two o'clock
recovered to so great an extent that, had Zedwitz returned with his
cavalry, as the Emperor was hoping that he would, the day might still
have been theirs. Even as it was, MacMahon's corps swerved under
Zobel's repulse of his attack on San Cassiano, and Niel, in the plain,
was dangerously hard pressed by Schwarzenberg. But, by degrees, the
French recommenced gaining and the Austrians losing ground, and at six
p.m., the latter were retreating in good order, defending each step
before they yielded it.
In the last stage of the battle the French limbered up their guns in
the belief that a vast reserve of Austrian cavalry was galloping into
action. What made them think so was a dense yellowish wall advancing
through the air. Had they been natives, they would have recognised the
approach of one of those frightful storms which bring devastation in
their train, and which, as they move forward in what appears a solid
mass, look to the inexperienced eye exactly like the clouds of dust
raised by innumerable horsemen. The bursting of the storm hastened the
end of the fight.
All the day another fight, separate from this, had been going on
between Benedek and the Sardinian army near the knoll of San Martino,
overlooking the lake of Garda. The battle, which began in the early
morning among the cypresses that crown the hillock, raged till seven
p.m. with a fury which cost the Piedmontese over 4,000 in dead and
wounded. It consisted largely in hand-to-hand fighting, which now gave
an advantage to the Austrians, now to the Italians; many of the
positions were lost and re-taken more than half-a-dozen times; the
issue seemed long doubtful, and when Benedek, who commanded his side
with unquestionable ability, received orders from the field of
Solferino to begin a retreat, each combatant was firmly convinced that
he was getting the best of it. Austrian writers allege that this order
saved the Sardinians from defeat, while in both Italian and French
narratives, the Piedmontese are represented as having been already
sure of success. The courage shown alike by Piedmontese and Austrians
could not be surpassed. Victor Emmanuel, as usual, set an example to
his men.
An incident in the battle brings into striking relief what it was this
bloody strife was meant to end. An Austrian corporal fell, mortally
wounded by a Bersagliere whom he conjured, in Italian, to listen to
what he had got to say. It was this: Forced into the Austrian army, he
had been obliged to serve through the war, but had never fired his
rifle on his fellow-countrymen; now he preferred to die rather than
defend himself. So he yielded up his breath with his hand clasped in
the hand which had slain him.
The Austrians lost, on the 24th of June, 13,000 men in killed and
wounded; the French, 10,000. It was said that the frightful scene of
carnage on the battlefield after Solferino influenced Napoleon III. in
his desire to stop the war. Had that scene vanished from his
recollection in June 1870?
Even a field of battle, with its unburied dead, speaks only of a small
part of the miseries of a great war. Those who were at that time at
Brescia, to which town the greater portion of the French wounded and
all the worst cases were brought, still shudder as they recall the
dreadful human suffering which no skill or devotion could do more than
a very little to assuage. The noble Brescian ladies who had once
nursed Bayard, turned, with one accord, into sisters of charity; every
house, every church, became a hospital, all that gratitude and pity
could do was done; but many were to leave their bones in Italy, and
how many more to go home maimed for life, or bearing with them the
seeds of death.
Other reasons than those of sentiment in reality decided Napoleon's
course. Though these can only be guessed at, the guess, at the present
date, amounts to certainty. In the first place, the skin-deep
rejoicings in Paris at the news of the victories did not hide the fact
that French public opinion, never genuinely favourable to the war, was
becoming more and more hostile to it. Then there was the military
question. It is true that the Fifth Corps, estimated at 30,000 men,
had, at last, emerged from its crepuscular doings in Tuscany, and was
available for future operations. Moreover, Kossuth paid a visit to the
Imperial headquarters, and held out hopes of a revolution in Hungary
which would oblige the Austrian Emperor to remove part of his troops
from the scene of the war. Nevertheless, Napoleon was by no means
convinced that his army was sufficient to take the Quadrilateral. He
realised the bad organisation and numerous shortcomings of the forces
under him so vividly that it seems incredible that, in the eleven
following years, he should have done nothing to remedy them. He
attributed his success mainly to chance, though in a less degree to a
certain lack of energy in the Austrians, joined with the exaggerated
fear of responsibility felt by their leaders. He never could
thoroughly understand why the Austrians had not won Solferino.
Naturally, he did not express these opinions to his marshals, but
there is ample proof that he held them; and if the fact stood alone,
it ought not to be difficult to explain why he was not anxious for a
continuance of the war.
But it does not stand alone. Napoleon feared being defeated on the
Rhine as well as in the Quadrilateral. Prussia had six army corps
ready, and she was about to move them. That, after her long
hesitations, she resolved to intervene was long doubted, but it
cannot be so after the evidence which recent years have produced.
At the time things wore a different complexion. Europe was never more
amazed than when, on the 6th of July, Napoleon the victor sent General
Fleury to Francis Joseph the vanquished with a request for an
armistice. One point only was plain; an armistice meant peace without
Venetia, and never did profound sorrow so quickly succeed national joy
than when this, to contemporaries astonishing intelligence, went
forth. But the blow fell on no Italian with such tremendous force as
on Cavour.
There are natives of Italy who appear to be more cool, more
calculating, more completely masters of themselves, than the men of
any other nationality. Cavour was one of these. But there comes,
sooner or later, the assertion of southern blood, the explosion of
feeling the more violent because long contained, and the cool, quiet
Italian of yesterday is not to be recognised except by those who know
the race intimately well, and who know the volcano that underlies its
ice and snow as well as its luxuriant vegetation.
On Wednesday, the 6th of June, the French army was spread out in
battle array along the left bank of the Mincio, and everything led to
the supposition that a new and immediate battle was in contemplation.
The Piedmontese were engaged in making preparations to invest
Peschiera. Napoleon's headquarters were at Valleggio, those of the
King at Monzambano. By the evening a very few persons had picked up
the information that Napoleon had sent a messenger to Verona. Victor
Emmanuel knew nothing of it, nor did any of the French generals except
Marshal Vaillant, but such things leak out, and two or three
individuals were aware of the journey to Verona, and spent that night
in racking their brains as to what it might mean. Next day at eleven
o'clock General Fleury returned; the Austrian Emperor had accepted the
armistice. Further secrecy was impossible, and like lightning the news
flashed through the world.
Cavour rushed from Turin to Desenzano, where he arrived the day before
the final meeting between Napoleon and Francis Joseph. He waited for a
carnage in the little _café_ in the piazza; no one guessed who it was,
and conversation went on undisturbed: it was full of curses on the
French Emperor. Mazzini, someone said, was right; this is the way the
war was sure to end. When a shabby conveyance had at length been
found, the great statesman drove to Monzambano. There, of course, his
arrival did not escape notice, and all who saw him were horrified by
the change that had come over his face. Instead of the jovial, witty
smile, there was a look of frantic rage and desperation. What passed
between him and his Sovereign is partly a matter of conjecture; the
exact sense of the violent words into which his grief betrayed him is
lost, in spite of the categorical versions of the interview which have
been printed. Even in a fit of madness he can hardly have spoken some
of the words attributed to him. That he advised the King to withdraw
his army or to abdicate rather than agree to the peace which was being
plotted behind his back, seems past doubting. It is said that after
attempting in vain to calm him, Victor Emmanuel brought the interview
to a sudden close. Cavour came out of the house flushed and exhausted,
and drove back to Desenzano. He had resigned office.
The King showed extraordinary self-control. Bitter as the draught was,
he saw that it must be drunk, and he was determined to drink it with
dignity. Probably no other Italian grasped as clearly as he did the
real reason which actuated Napoleon; at any rate his chivalrous
appreciation of the benefits already received, closed his lips to
reproaches. 'Whatever may be the decision of your Majesty,' he said to
the Emperor on the eve of Villafranca, 'I shall feel an eternal
gratitude for what you have done for the independence of Italy, and I
beg you to believe that under all circumstances you may reckon on my
complete fidelity.'
If there was sadness in the Sardinian camp, so there was in that of
Austria. The Austrians by no means thought that the game was up for
them. It would be interesting to know by what arguments Napoleon
persuaded the young Emperor to renounce the hope of retrieving his
disasters, whilst he slowly pulled to pieces some flowers which were
on the table before which he and Francis Joseph sat. When they left
the house, the heir to all the Hapsburgs looked pale and sad. Did he
remember the dying counsels of 'Father' Radetsky--not to yield if he
was beaten on the Mincio, on the Tagliamento, on the Isonzo, before
the gates of Vienna.
When, on the evening of the same day, the Emperor of Austria signed
the preliminaries of peace, he said to Prince Napoleon, who took the
document to Verona for his signature: 'I pray God that if you are ever
a sovereign He may spare you the hour of grief I have just passed.'
Yet the defeat of Solferino and the loss of Lombardy were the first
steps in the transformation of Radetsky's pupil from a despot, who
hourly feared revolution in every land under his sceptre, to a wise
and constitutional monarch ruling over a contented Empire. To some
individuals and to some states, misfortune is fortune.