Chapter V: Part 5

In England the preparations by no means corresponded with the necessities of the position. The estimates indeed provided for a force of twenty-one thousand British in Flanders in 1744 as against sixteen thousand in the previous year, but only at the cost of depleting the weak garrison left in England; for the actual number of men voted for the two years was the same. All British officers of experience strongly urged upon the Government the importance of being first in the field,[68] but, when an army was to be made up in different proportions of English, Dutch, Germans and Austrians, it needed a Marlborough to bring the discordant Courts into harmony as well as to make ready the troops for an early campaign. By the beginning of April eighty thousand French soldiers had marched from their winter quarters, and were concentrated on the frontier between the Scheldt and the Sambre, while the Allies were still scattered about in cantonments, not exceeding even then a total strength of fifty-live thousand men. Wade, the English commander, delayed first by confusion at home and next by contrary winds, was still in England while the French were concentrating, and not a single English recruit, to repair the losses of the past campaign, had arrived in Flanders. Then arose disputes as to the disposition of the Allied forces, both Austrians and Dutch being nervously apprehensive of leaving their towns on the frontier without garrisons. When in the second week in May the Allied Army was at last collected close to Brussels, it was still weaker by twenty thousand men than it should have been, and found itself confronted with the task of holding Flanders, Brabant, Hainault, and the Sambre against a superior force of French.[69] May passed away and June came, but the Allies remained helpless and motionless in their camp, while Saxe, after a short march westward, turned north and advanced steadily between the Scheldt and the Lys. His principal object was not very difficult to divine. By the middle of June his detachments had seized Ypres and Fort Knock, which commanded the canal from Nieuport to Ypres, thus cutting off the British from one of their bases on the coast. It remained to be seen whether he would aim next at Ostend, where the whole of the British stores of ordnance were accumulated, or whether he would attempt Bruges and Ghent in order to secure the navigation of the Bruges Canal as well as of the Scheldt and Lys. Again, it was always open to him, if he pleased, to besiege Tournay, a fortress which the Allies would not willingly lose. Thus the problem set to the Allies was not easy of solution; but of all solutions they chose the worst. The Dutch and Austrians could not bear the notion of forsaking any one of their darling strongholds, and insisted that the strength of the army should be frittered away in providing weak garrisons for the defence of all.[70] Wade, to do him justice, was for keeping all the troops together, crossing the Scheldt, and taking up a strong position to cover Ghent; but the Austrians would not consent, lest they should expose Brussels.[71] Wade was certainly not a strong man, but he must not be too hardly judged. Marlborough had spent the most anxious days of all his campaigns in distraction between the safety of Ghent and of Brussels, and had only extricated himself by the march that preceded the battle of Oudenarde.

Meanwhile King George had been exerting himself with great energy, though two months too late, to provide Wade with additional troops, both British and Dutch, and had begged that Prince Charles of Lorraine might cross the Rhine with his whole army, and direct the operations in Flanders as Commander-in-Chief of all the Allies. It was a wise step in every way, since the Prince’s relationship to Queen Maria Theresa assured to him the seniority in rank which was needed to hold so heterogeneous a host in coherence. ◆July.◆ Prince Charles did his share of the work admirably, forcing his passage across the Rhine with great skill in the face of the French, and taking up a strong position on the frontier of Alsace. A few days later the British reinforcements reached Wade, and King George issued positive orders to him to take the offensive and “commence hostilities of all kinds.”[72]

It seemed, indeed, as if the time were come for pressing home upon the French; but just at this critical moment Frederick of Prussia intervened in favour of France, and, by a threat to invade Bohemia, brought Prince Charles back quickly over the Rhine. None the less Wade and his fellows held a council of war and resolved to bring Saxe to action if possible. ◆July 20/31.◆ King George gave his gracious approval to their plan, and on the 31st of July the Allies turned westward and crossed the Scheldt. It still remained to be seen, however, whether Saxe would allow an action to be forced on him; for he lay now, entrenched to the teeth, on the Lys between Menin and Courtrai, which was a pretty clear indication that he would not. At this moment Lord Stair, who had followed the course of operations carefully from England, came forward, like a true pupil of Marlborough, with a new plan of campaign. His advice was that the Allies should turn Saxe’s tactics against himself. They should march south to Orchies, between Lille and Tournay, and there encamp, where they would be within reach of half-a-dozen French fortified towns. The French would not dare to leave the fortresses defenceless; and the garrisons necessary to render them secure would absorb the whole of their force in the field. Then the Allies could send detachments into France and lay Picardy under contribution, or possibly carry out the plan, rejected two years before, of a march to the Seine. The King of Prussia’s action only made some bold stroke of the kind the more imperative.[73]

Stair had gained over the Austrian general D’Arenberg to this project in 1742; but it was hardly likely to be accepted by him now. Carteret, in forwarding Stair’s memorandum to Wade, gave him no positive orders except at least to do something; but poor Wade found it impossible to make the Austrians do anything. The Allies having crossed the Scheldt halted inactive for weeks, and no persuasion could induce D’Arenberg to move. At last the army did march down to the plains of Lille, but without its artillery, so that it could not be said seriously to threaten the French fortresses. The Dutch and Austrians had undertaken to furnish a siege-train, but had taken no step to procure one of the ten thousand horses that were required to transport it. After a short sojourn in the south the Allies marched helplessly northward once more. August passed away and September came, but even in the fourth month of the campaign the Dutch and Austrians were still without their artillery.[74] Wade boldly proposed to force Saxe’s lines on the Lys: the Austrians refused. He proposed to pounce on a detachment of fourteen thousand men, which Saxe had imprudently isolated from his main army: D’Arenberg carefully sent a weak body of cavalry to reveal to the detachment the danger of its position. Finally, in the first week of October the Allies retired into winter-quarters, which was precisely the object for which D’Arenberg had been working from the first. Despite of the English subsidies, he had no money with which to pay his troops, and he wished to spare the Austrian Netherlands the burden of furnishing forage and contributions. Wade, sick in body and distressed in mind, at once resigned his command. He had had enough of the Austrian alliance, and King George before long was to have enough of it also.[75]

◆1745.◆

Once again, despite the endless length to which the war was dragging on, the establishment of the British forces remained virtually unaugmented for the year 1745. The troops allotted for service in Flanders were indeed raised to a strength of twenty-five thousand men, but this was effected only by reducing the garrison of Great Britain to fifteen thousand, which, as events were to prove before the year’s end, created a situation of perilous weakness. Moreover, the past campaign had revealed a failing in one of the confederated powers which was hardly less serious than the impecuniosity and selfishness of Austria. The Dutch army, which under Marlborough had done such brilliant service, was become hopelessly inefficient. The competition of rival demagogues for popular favour had reduced it to such weakness in numbers, that it hardly sufficed to find efficient garrisons for the fortified towns. Concurrently its discipline had suffered; and General Ligonier had already complained that the Dutch troops which served with the Allies in 1744 were intolerably insubordinate and disorderly, setting a bad example to the whole army.[76] In February 1745 Ligonier again brought the matter to the notice of the English Government. The Dutch, he said, would probably keep all their men in garrison, and, if the Allies were so weak that they could only find garrisons for the fortresses on the frontier, the French would be free to go where they pleased. It would be far better, therefore, to make a great effort, collect a hundred thousand men, take the offensive, and end the war in a single campaign. Ten thousand men would be required to guard the line of the Bruges Canal, and the remainder should besiege Maubeuge and Landrecies and enter France by the line of the Sambre, making the Meuse the main line of communication, as open alike to the passage of reinforcements from England, from Holland, and from Germany.[77] Such counsel was not likely to find acceptance with the men who had mismanaged the war so far. One important change, however, was made by the appointment of the Duke of Cumberland to be Commander-in-Chief in Flanders, and also in Great Britain.[78] The Duke at the time of this promotion still wanted a month to complete his twenty-fifth year, but he had from his boyhood been an enthusiastic soldier, he had studied his profession, he had shown bravery at Dettingen, and, young though he might be, he was older than Condé had been when he first gained military fame. Finally, it was an immense advantage that a Prince of a reigning family should preside over so motley an army as that of the Allies, since there would be the less disposition to cavil at his authority.

Cumberland entered upon his work energetically enough, crossed over to Flanders early in April, made all his arrangements for concentration at Brussels on the 2nd of May, and actually began his march southward on the following day.[79] ◆April 22./May 3.◆ Even so, however, Marshal Saxe had taken the field before him, assembling his troops in Hainault, as in the previous year, so that it was impossible to divine which of the fortresses of the barrier he might intend to attack. After a feint which pointed to the siege of Mons, he marched rapidly upon Tournay and invested it on the 30th of April, ◆Apr. 19/30.◆ screening his movements so skilfully with his cavalry that not a word as to his operations reached Cumberland until nearly a week later. Cumberland, after leaving Soignies on the 3rd of May, moved slowly south-westward by Cambron, Maulbay, and Leuse, and arrived on the evening of the 9th at Brissoel, within sight of Saxe’s army. ◆April 28./May 9.◆ The ground immediately in front of the Allies was broken by little copses, woods, and enclosures, all of them crammed with mercenary irregular troops—Pandours, Grassins, and the like—which, imitated first from the Austrians, had by this time become a necessary part of the French as of every army. Beyond this broken ground a wide plain swept in a gentle, almost unbroken slope to the village of Fontenoy, which formed the centre of Saxe’s position. The advanced parties of irregulars, together with twelve squadrons drawn up on the slope before Fontenoy, forbade Cumberland’s further advance for that day, and the Allies encamped for the night. Headquarters were fixed at Maubray, a village in full sight of Fontenoy, and a bare mile and a half to the south-eastward of the French camp.

◆April 29./May 10.◆

On the next day the French advanced posts were pushed out of the copses, and Cumberland, together with the Prince of Waldeck and the Count of Königseck, who commanded the Dutch and the Austrians respectively, went forward to reconnoitre the position. Saxe’s army occupied the crest of the slope, lying astride of the two roads that lead from Condé and from Leuse to Tournay. His right rested on the village of Anthoin and on the Scheldt, the tower of Anthoin Castle marking the western boundary of his position with clearness enough. From thence his line extended due east along the crest of the height for about a mile to the village of Fontenoy. A few hundred yards before Fontenoy stands the hamlet of Bourgeon, but this was now veiled in smoke and flame, having been fired by the Pandours as they retired. From Anthoin to Fontenoy Saxe’s front faced due south, but eastward from Fontenoy it turned back almost at right angles to the forest of Barry and the village of Ramecroix, fronting considerably to eastward of south. The village of Vezon, however, which lies in the same straight line with Fontenoy, due east of Anthoin, was also occupied by the French as an advanced post. This was quickly cleared by Cumberland’s troops, and the Allied Generals completed their reconnaissance. Saxe’s position was undoubtedly strong by nature and had been strengthened still further by art. Beyond Anthoin the French right flank was secured by a battery erected on the western bank of the Scheldt, while the village itself was entrenched, and held by two brigades. Between Anthoin and Fontenoy three redoubts had been constructed, and the space was defended by three brigades of infantry backed by eight squadrons of horse. Fontenoy itself had been fortified with works and cannon, and made as strong as possible; and from Fontenoy to the forest of Barry ran a double line of entrenchments, the first line held by nine and the second by eleven battalions of infantry. At the edge of the forest of Barry were two more redoubts, the foremost of them called the Redoubt d’Eu, both armed with cannon to sweep the open space between the forest and Fontenoy; in rear of the forest were posted nine more battalions, and in rear of all two strong lines of cavalry. The flower of the French army, both horse and foot, was stationed in this space on Saxe’s left, for the English had the right of the line in the Allied Army, and Saxe knew the reputation of the red-coats.

The Allied Generals decided to attack on the following day. Königseck, it is said, was for harassing Saxe’s communications and compelling him to raise the siege of Tournay; but, finding himself overruled by Cumberland and by Waldeck, he gave way. Cumberland’s force was decidedly inferior in numbers, being less than fifty thousand against fifty-six thousand men, but he was young and impetuous, and had been strongly impressed by the disastrous inaction of the preceding campaign. It was agreed that the Dutch and Austrians should assail the French centre and right, the Dutch in particular being responsible for Fontenoy, while the British attacked the French left between that village and the forest of Barry.

FONTENOY
April 30th/May 11th 1745

_Stanford’s Geogl. Estabt., London._
]

◆April 30./May 11.◆

At two o’clock on the following morning the British began to move out of their camp upon Vezon, the cavalry leading. The advance took much time, for there were many narrow lanes to be traversed before the force could debouch upon the slope, and, when the slope was passed, it was still necessary to defile through the village of Vezon. Cumberland’s order of attack was simple. Brigadier Ingoldsby, with the Twelfth and Thirteenth Foot, the Forty-second Highlanders, a Hanoverian battalion, and three six-pounder cannon, was to assault the Redoubt d’Eu on the right flank of the line of the British advance, and to carry it with the bayonet. The remainder of the infantry was simply to march up across the thousand yards of open ground between it and Fontenoy and sweep the enemy out of their entrenchments.

Before five o’clock the advanced squadrons of the British horse, fifteen in all, under General Campbell, had passed through Vezon and deployed in the plain beyond, to cover the formation of the infantry for the attack. The French batteries in Fontenoy and the redoubt at once opened fire on them, but the cavalry endured the fire for an hour unmoved, until at length a shot carried away General Campbell’s leg. The gallant veteran, who had fought at Malplaquet and was now seventy-eight years of age, was carried dying from the field, full of lamentation that he could take no further part in the action. No one but himself seems to have known for what purpose his squadrons had been brought forward, and accordingly after his fall they were withdrawn. The infantry then moved up to the front, where General Ligonier proceeded to form them in two lines, without further interruption, to use his own simple words, than a lively and murderous cannonade from the French. Cumberland meanwhile ordered up seven six-pounders to the right of the British front, which quickly came into action. Conspicuous before the French front rode an officer on a white horse, and the English gunners at once began to lay wagers who should kill him. The second or third shot brought the white charger to the ground, and his rider was carried, shattered and dying, to the rear. He was Count Grammont, the gallant but thoughtless officer who had spoiled the combinations of Noailles at Dettingen. Then, turning to their more legitimate work, the gunners quickly made their presence felt among the French field-batteries; but the round shot never ceased to plough into the scarlet ranks of the British from Fontenoy and from the Redoubt d’Eu. Ligonier’s two lines of infantry were soon formed, with the cavalry in two more lines in their rear; and the General presently sent word to Cumberland that he was ready to advance as soon as Waldeck should lead his Dutch against Fontenoy. The name of the aide-de-camp who carried this message should not be omitted, for he was Captain Jeffery Amherst of the First Guards.

Thereupon the Dutch and Austrians, in the centre and left, advanced against Fontenoy and Anthoin, but flinching from the fire in front, and above all from that in their flank from the battery on the other side of the Scheldt, soon shrank back under cover and could not be induced to move forward again.[80] Worst of all, the Dutch cavalry was smitten with panic, galloped back on to the top of some of the British squadrons, and fled away wildly to Hal crying out that all was lost. Things therefore went ill on the Allied left; and meanwhile on the right there was enacted a blunder still more fatal. For Ingoldsby, misconceiving his instructions, hesitated to make his attack on the Redoubt d’Eu, and despite repeated orders from Cumberland never delivered it at all. Cumberland, however, was impatient. Without further delay he placed himself at the head of the British, who were standing as Ligonier had arrayed them, in most beautiful order. In the first line, counting from right to left, stood a battalion of the First Guards, another of the Scots Guards, and another of the Coldstream, the First, Twenty-first, Thirty-first, Eighth, Twenty-fifth, Thirty-third, and Nineteenth; in the second line the Buffs occupied the post of honour on the right, and next to them came in succession the Twenty-third, Thirty-second, Eleventh, Twenty-eighth, Thirty-fourth, and Twentieth. Certain Hanoverian battalions joined them on the extreme left. The drums beat, the men shouldered arms, and the detachments harnessed themselves to the two light field-guns that accompanied each battalion. Ingoldsby saw what was going forward and aligned his battalions with them on the right. Then the word was given to advance, and the two lines moved off with the slow and measured step for which they were famous in Europe.

Forward tramped the ranks of scarlet, silent and stately as if on parade. Full half a mile of ground was to be traversed before they could close with the invisible enemy that awaited them in the entrenchments over the crest of the slope, and the way was marked clearly by the red flashes and puffs of white smoke that leaped from Fontenoy and the Redoubt d’Eu on either flank. The shot plunged fiercely and more fiercely into the serried lines as they advanced into that murderous cross-fire, but the gaping ranks were quietly closed, the perfect order was never lost, the stately step was never hurried. Only the Hanoverians in the second line, finding that they were cramped for space, dropped back quietly and decorously, and marched on in third line behind the British. Silent and inexorable the scarlet lines strode on. They came abreast of village and redoubt, and the shot which had hitherto swept away files now swept away ranks. Then the first line passed beyond redoubt and village, and the French cannon took it in reverse. The gaps grew wider and more frequent, the front grew narrower as the men closed up, but still the proud battalions advanced, strewing the sward behind them with scarlet, like some mass of red blossom that floats down a lazy stream and sheds its petals as it goes.

At last the crest of the ridge was gained and the ranks of the French battalions came suddenly into view little more than a hundred yards distant, their coats alone visible behind the breastwork. Next to the forest of Barry, and exposed to the extreme right of the British, a line of red showed the presence of the Swiss Guards; next to them stood a line of blue, the four battalions of the French Guards, and next to the Guards a line of white, the regiments of Courtin, Aubeterre, and of the King, the choicest battalions of the French Army. Closer and closer came the British, still with arms shouldered, always silent, always with the same slow, measured tread, till they had advanced to within fifty yards of the French. Then at length Lord Charles Hay of the First Guards stepped forward with flask in hand, and doffing his hat drank politely to his enemies. “I hope, gentlemen,” he shouted, “that you are going to wait for us to-day and not swim the Scheldt as you swam the Main at Dettingen. Men of the King’s company,” he continued, turning round to his own people, “these are the French Guards, and I hope you are going to beat them to-day”; and the English Guards answered with a cheer. The French officers hurried to the front, for the appearance of the British was a surprise to them, and called for a cheer in reply. But only a half-hearted murmur came from the French ranks, which quickly died away and gave place to a few sharp words of command; for the British were now within thirty yards. “For what we are about to receive may the Lord make us truly thankful,” murmured an English Guardsman as he looked down the barrels of the French muskets, but before his comrades round him had done laughing the French Guards had fired; and the turn of the British had come at last.[81]

For despite of that deadly march through the cross-fire of the French batteries to the muzzles of the French muskets, the scarlet ranks still glared unbroken through the smoke; and now the British muskets, so long shouldered, were levelled, and with crash upon crash the volleys rang out from end to end of the line, first the First Guards, then the Coldstreams, then the Scots, and so through brigade after brigade, two battalions loading while the third fired, a ceaseless, rolling, infernal fire. Down dropped the whole of the French front rank, blue coats, red coats and white, before the storm. Nineteen officers and six hundred men of the French and Swiss Guards fell at the first discharge; regiment Courtin was crushed out of existence; regiment Aubeterre, striving hard to stem the tide, was swept aside by a single imperious volley which laid half of its men on the ground. The British infantry were perfectly in hand; their officers could be seen coolly tapping the muskets of the men with their canes so that every discharge might be low and deadly; while the battalion-guns also poured in round after round of grape with terrible effect. The first French line was utterly shattered and broken. Even while the British were advancing, Saxe had brought up additional troops to meet them and had posted regiments Couronne and Soissonois in rear of the King’s regiment, and the Brigade Royal in rear of the French Guards; but all alike went down before the irresistible volleys. The red-coats continued their triumphant advance for full three hundred yards into the heart of the French camp, and old Ligonier’s heart leaped within him, for he thought that the battle was won.

Saxe for his part thought little differently from Ligonier; but though half dead with dropsy, reduced to suck a bullet to assuage his intolerable thirst, so weak that he could not ride but was carried about the field in a wicker litter, the gallant German never for a moment lost his head. Sending a message to the French King, who with the Dauphin was watching the action from a windmill in the rear, to retire across the Scheldt without delay, he strove to gain time to rally his infantry. On the first repulse of the French Guards Cumberland had detached two battalions to help the Dutch by a flanking attack on Fontenoy. Seeing that this movement must be checked at all hazards, Saxe headed these troops back by a charge of cavalry; whereupon one of the battalions extended itself along the left flank of the British. Partly in this way, partly owing to the incessant play of the French artillery on both flanks, the two British lines assumed the form of two huge oblong columns which gradually became welded into one. The change was not untimely, for now the first line of the French cavalry, which had been posted in rear of the forest of Barry, came down upon the British at full gallop, only to reel back shivered to fragments by the same terrible fire. Then the second line tried its fortune, but met with no better fate. Finally, the Household Cavalry, the famous Maison du Roi, burning with all the ardour of Dettingen unavenged, was launched against the scarlet columns, and like its predecessors, came flying back, a mob of riderless horses and uncontrollable men, decimated, shattered and repulsed by the never-ending fire. “It was like charging two flaming fortresses rather than two columns of infantry.”[82]

Nevertheless some time was hereby gained for the broken French infantry to re-form. The British, once arrived within the French camp, came to a halt, and looked at last to see how the Dutch were faring on their left. As has already been told, Waldeck’s attack had been a total failure, and the British, unsupported and always under a cross-fire of artillery, fell back to the crest of the ridge and were re-formed for a second attack. Waldeck undertook to make another attempt on Fontenoy, and Cumberland, in reliance upon his help, again advanced at the head of the British. But meanwhile Saxe had brought forward his reserves from Ramecroix, and among them the Irish brigade, to meet him, while artillery had also been brought up from the French right to play upon the British front. The French Guards and the rest of the troops of the French first line had also been rallied, and the task of the British was well-nigh desperate. The Irish brigade, which consisted of six battalions, was made up not of Irish only but of Scots and English also, desperate characters who went into action with a rope round their necks, and would fight like devils. Yet, even in this second attack the British carried their advance as far as in the first, the perfection of their fire-discipline enabling them to beat back even the Irish brigade for a time. But their losses had been frightfully heavy; the Dutch would not move one foot to the attack of Fontenoy, and the cannonade in front added to that in the flanks became unendurable. The French infantry likewise closed round on them in superior numbers on both flanks, and it became apparent that there was nothing for it but a retreat.

Ligonier sent back two battalions to secure the roads leading through Vezon, and the retreat then began in perfectly good order. The French Household Cavalry made a furious charge upon the rear of the column as it faced about, but found to its cost that the infernal fire was not yet quenched. The three battalions of Guards and a battalion of Hanoverians turned sternly about to meet them, and gave them a few parting volleys, which wholly extinguished one regiment and brought down every officer of another. A few British squadrons, the Blues conspicuous among them, pushed forward, in spite of heavy losses, through the cross-fire to lend what help they could, and the remnant of the heroic battalions retired, facing about in succession at every hundred yards, as steadily and proudly as they had advanced.

Their losses in the action were terribly severe. Of the fifteen thousand infantry, English and Hanoverian, for the Hanoverians bore themselves not less nobly than their Allies, nearly six thousand were killed or wounded, the casualties of the twenty English battalions just exceeding four thousand men. The heaviest sufferers were the Twelfth and Twenty-third regiments, both of which lost over three hundred men, the Twenty-first and Thirty-first, which lost rather fewer than three hundred men apiece, and the three battalions of Guards, which lost each of them about two hundred and fifty. Of the Generals of Foot, Cumberland, Ligonier, and Brigadier Skelton, though in the hottest of the fire, alone came off unhurt; all of the rest were either killed or wounded. Many regiments of cavalry also suffered not a little, in particular the Blues and Royal Dragoons; and the total loss of the British cavalry exceeded three hundred men and six hundred horses. The loss of the French was never made public, but was certainly at least equal to that of the Allies. Contemporary accounts set it down, with no great improbability, at fully ten thousand men. As an example of the prowess of British infantry, Fontenoy stands almost without a parallel in its history. The battalions formed under a cross-fire of artillery, remained halted under the same fire, advanced slowly for half a mile in perfect order under the same fire, and marched up to within pistol-shot of the French infantry to receive their volley before they discharged a shot. They shattered the French battalions to pieces, repulsed three separate attacks of cavalry, halted under a heavy cannonade, retired for some distance and re-formed under a cross-fire, advanced again with both artillery and musketry playing on front and flanks, made the bravest brigade in the French service recoil, repelled another desperate attack of cavalry, and retired slowly and orderly under a cross-fire almost to the end. By consent of all the British commanders it was Ingoldsby’s misunderstanding of his orders and his failure to capture the Redoubt d’Eu that lost the battle; and Ingoldsby was duly tried by court-martial for his behaviour. He was, however, acquitted of all but an error in judgment; and indeed there was no question of cowardice, for he accompanied the remainder of the infantry in its advance with his own detachment and was severely wounded. It is customary to blame Cumberland for dashing his head against a wall in attempting such an attack; and no doubt he was guilty of a tactical blunder in assaulting a re-entrant angle before the salient had been carried. But he could hardly have been expected to count on such bad luck as the failure of Ingoldsby on one flank and of the Dutch on the other. The sheer audacity of his advance went near to give him the victory. Saxe owned that he never dreamed that any General would attempt such a stroke, or that any troops would execute it. Cumberland is blamed also for not attacking either the Redoubt d’Eu or Fontenoy after he had penetrated into the French camp. This charge is less easy to rebut, for the French always know when they are beaten, and seeing their left rolled up and troops advancing on Fontenoy in flank and rear would probably have given up the game for lost, and that the more readily since their ammunition in Fontenoy was for the moment nearly exhausted. Even so, however, Saxe’s reserves were always at hand at Ramecroix, and would have required to be held in check. Another puzzling question, namely, why Cumberland did not make greater use of his artillery in the action, is answered by the fact that the contractors for the horsing of the guns ran off with the horses early in the day. Such an occurrence was by no means unusual, and yet it never happened to Marlborough, not even at Malplaquet. Altogether, the conclusion seems to be that Cumberland stumbled on to a brilliant feat of arms by mistake, and, though seconded by his troops with bravery equal to his own, was not a General of sufficient capacity to turn his success to account.

At the close of the action Cumberland retreated to Ath and encamped under the guns of that fortress, leaving his wounded to the mercy of the French, who, by a strange perversion of their usual chivalry, treated them with shameful barbarity. Among the wounded, strangely enough, were a few of the new sect of Methodists founded by John Wesley, who faced death and wounds with the stern exultation that had once inspired the troopers of Cromwell. One of them wrote to Wesley that, even after a bullet in each arm had forced him to retire from the field, he hardly knew whether he was on earth or in heaven, such was the sweetness of the day. This man and a few more of his kind probably helped their fellow-sufferers through the misery of the days following the battle, until Cumberland’s furious remonstrances with Saxe procured for them better treatment.

From Ath Cumberland fell back to Lessines and drew out such British corps as were in garrison in Flanders, to replace those which had suffered most heavily in the action. Meanwhile Tournay, very shortly after the battle, fell by treachery into the hands of the French; and Saxe’s field-army being thus raised to a force nearly double that of the Allies, Cumberland was reduced to utter helplessness. The mischief of Fontenoy lay not in the repulse and the loss of men, for the British did not consider themselves to have been beaten, but in the destruction of all confidence in the Dutch troops. The troubles which had harassed Wade to despair now reappeared. Cumberland, notwithstanding his inferiority in strength, was expected somehow to defend Flanders, Brabant, and above all Brussels, and yet simultaneously to keep an active army in the field. Worse than this, he attempted to fulfil the expectation. Against his better judgment he weakened his force still further by detaching a force for the garrison of Mons,[83] after which, instead of taking up a strong position on the Scheldt to cover Ghent at all hazards, he yielded to the pressure of the Austrians and crossed the Dender to protect Brussels.[84] Halting too long between two opinions he at last sent off a detachment for the defence of Ghent, half of which was cut off and driven back with heavy loss, while the other half, after enduring much rough usage on the march, entered Ghent only to see the town surprised by the French on the following day. ◆June 30./July 11.◆ Four British regiments took part in this unlucky enterprise and suffered severely, while the Royal Scots and the Twenty-third, which had been despatched to Ghent after Fontenoy, of course became prisoners.[85] Moreover, a vast quantity of British military stores were captured in Ghent, although Cumberland had a week before ordered that they should be removed.[86] After this blow Cumberland retired to Vilvorde, a little to the north of Brussels, still hoping to cover both that city and Antwerp, and so to preserve his communications both with Germany and with the sea. Here again he sacrificed his better judgment to the clamour of the Austrians, for he would much have preferred to secure Antwerp only. His position was in fact most critical, and he was keenly alive to it.[87] Just when his anxiety was greatest there came a letter from the Secretary of State, announcing that invasion of England was imminent, and hoping that troops could be spared from Flanders without prejudice to his operations. “What!” answered Ligonier indignantly; “are you aware that the enemy has seventy thousand men against our thirty thousand, and that they can place a superior force on the canal before us and send another army round between us and Antwerp, to cut off our supplies and force us to fight at a disadvantage? ◆August.◆ This is our position, and this is the result of providing His Royal Highness with insufficient troops; and yet you speak of our having a corps to spare to defend England!”[88]

Saxe’s plan for reducing the Allies was in fact uniformly the same throughout the whole of the war, namely to cut off their communications with the sea on one side and with Germany on the other. Even before he began to press Cumberland northward toward Antwerp, he had detached a force to lay siege to Ostend, which was the English base. Cumberland, on his side, had advised that the dykes should be broken down and the country inundated in order to preserve it, and both Dutch and Austrians had promised that this should be done; but as usual it was not done, and before the end of August Ostend had surrendered to the French. ◆Aug. 13/24.◆ The English base was then perforce shifted to Antwerp. But by this time the requests for the return of troops to England had become urgent and imperative orders. ◆Sept.–Oct.◆ First ten battalions were recalled, then the rest of the foot, and at last practically the whole of the army, including Cumberland himself.[89] The cause was the Jacobite rebellion which was stamped out by the victory of Culloden in April 1746.

AUTHORITIES.—The official account of Fontenoy was drawn up by Ligonier in French and translated into English, with some omissions, for publication. The French version is far the better and will be found in the State Papers. The account in the _Life of the Duke of Cumberland_ is poor, though valuable as having been drawn up from the reports of the English Generals. Of the French accounts Voltaire’s is the best known, and, as might be expected from such a hand, admirably spirited. More valuable are the accounts in the _Conquête des Pays Bas_, in the _Mémoires du Maréchal de Saxe_, where Saxe’s own report may be read, in the _Campagnes des Pays Bas_, and in Espagnac. The newspapers furnish a few picturesque incidents of some value.

VOL. II BOOK VII. CHAPTER VII

◆1746.◆

The virtual evacuation of the Low Countries by the British, in consequence of the Jacobite Rebellion, was an advantage too obvious to be overlooked by the French. At the end of January, though winter-quarters were not yet broken up, they severed the communication between Antwerp and Brussels, and a week later took the town of Brussels itself by escalade. The citadel, after defending itself for a fortnight, went the way of the town, and the capital of the Spanish Netherlands was turned into a French place of arms.[90] The consternation in Holland was great, and was increased when the French presently besieged and captured Antwerp. ◆May 20/31.◆ Meanwhile the British Commander, Lord Dunmore, who had been left in the Netherlands with a few squadrons of cavalry, could only look on in absolute helplessness. It was not until June that the Hessian troops in British pay and a few British battalions could be embarked, together with General Ligonier to command them, from England; and it was not until July, owing to foul winds, that they were finally landed at Williamstadt. The change of base was significant in itself, for, since the capture of Ostend and Antwerp, there was no haven for British ships except in the United Provinces. Even after the disembarkation these forces were found to be still unready to take the field. The Hessians had not a grain of powder among them, and there were neither horses for the artillery nor waggons for the baggage. Again, to add small difficulties to great, the Austrian General, Batthyany, having no British officer as his peer in command, denied to the British troops the place of honour at the right of the line. It was a trifling matter, but yet sufficient to embarrass counsel, destroy harmony, and delay operations.[91]

While the Allies were thus painfully drawing their forces together, the activity of the French never ceased. ◆June 30./July 11.◆ The Prince of Conti was detached with a considerable force to the Haine, where he quickly reduced Mons and St. Ghislain, thus throwing down almost the last relics of the Austrian barrier in the south. ◆July 13/24.◆ Thence moving to the Sambre, Conti laid siege to Charleroi. It was now sufficiently clear that the plan of the French campaign was to operate on the line of the Meuse for the invasion of Holland. Maestricht once taken, the rest would be easy, for most of the Dutch army were prisoners in the hands of the French; and, with the possession of the line of the Meuse, communication between the Allied forces of England and of Austria would be cut off. But before Maestricht could be touched, Namur must first be captured; and the campaign of 1746 accordingly centred about Namur.

For the first fortnight of July the Allies remained at Terheyden, a little to the north of Breda, Saxe’s army lying some thirty miles south-westward of them about Antwerp. ◆July 6/17.◆ On the 17th of July the Allies at last got on the march, still with some faint hopes of saving Charleroi, and proceeded south-eastward, a movement which Saxe at once parried by marching parallel with them to the Dyle between Arschot and Louvain. Pushing forward, despite endless difficulties of transport and forage, through a wretched barren country, the Allies, now under command of Prince Charles of Lorraine, reached Peer, turned southward across the Denier at Hasselt, and by the 27th of July were at Borchloen. ◆July 16/27.◆ They were thus actually on the eastern side of the French main army, within reach of the Mehaigne and not without good hope of saving Namur if not Charleroi. ◆July 21./Aug. 1.◆ On the 1st of August they crossed the Mehaigne, only to learn to their bitter disappointment that Charleroi had surrendered that very morning. Saxe meanwhile, with the principal part of his army, still lay entrenched at Louvain, with detachments pushed forward to Tirlemont and Gembloux. The Allies continued their march before the eyes of these detachments to Masy on the Orneau, and there took up a position between that river and the head-waters of the Mehaigne, fronting to the north-east. This was the line approved through many generations of war as the best for the protection of Namur.[92]

Saxe now drew nearer to them, and the two armies lay opposite to each other, in many places not more than a musket-shot apart, both entrenched to the teeth. The Allies so far had decidedly gained a success, but they were outnumbered by the French by three to two, and they were confined within a narrow space wherein subsistence was extremely difficult; while, if they moved, Namur was lost. Ligonier, who was most uneasy over the situation, longed for five thousand cavalry with which to make a dash at Malines and so to call the enemy back in haste to defend Brussels and Antwerp.[93] Prince Charles, however, was averse from operations of such a nature. His hope was that Saxe would offer him battle on the historic plain of Ramillies, where, notwithstanding the disparity of numbers, he trusted that the quality of his troops and the traditions of victory would enable him to prevail. But Saxe had no intention of doing anything of the kind. He did indeed shift his position farther to the north and east, with the field of Ramillies in his rear, but it was not to offer battle. ◆Aug. 18/29.◆ Pushing out detachments to eastward he captured Huy, and cutting off the Allies’ communications with Liège and Maestricht forced them to cross the Meuse and to fall back on Maestricht from the other side of the river. Cross the Meuse the Allies accordingly did, unmolested, to Ligonier’s great relief, by twenty thousand French who were stationed on the eastern bank of the stream. They then opened communication with Maestricht, five leagues away, while Saxe extended his army comfortably with its face to the eastward along the line of the Jaar from Warem to Tongres, waiting till want of forage should compel the Allies to recross the Meuse. ◆Sept. 2/13.◆ Back they came over the river within a fortnight, as he had expected, and the Marshal, without attempting to dispute the passage, retreated quietly for a few miles, knowing full well that his enemy could not follow him from lack of bread. Ligonier never in his life longed so intensely for the end of a campaign.[94]

On the 17th of September the Allies advanced upon the French and offered battle. ◆Sept. 6/17.◆ Saxe answered by retiring to an impregnable position between Tongres and the Demer. There was no occasion for him to fight, when his enemies were short of provisions and their cavalry was going to ruin from want of forage. So there the two armies remained once more, within sight of each other but unwilling to fight, because an attack on the entrenchments of either host would have led to the certain destruction of the attacking force.◆Aug. 30./Sept. 10.◆ But meanwhile the trenches had been opened before Namur by a French corps under the Prince of Clermont, and within nine days the town had fallen. Ligonier again urged his design, for which he had prepared the necessary magazines, to upset Saxe’s plans by a dash upon Antwerp, but he could find no support in the council of war; so there was nothing for the Allies to do but to wait until some further French success should compel them to move. Such a success was not long in coming. The castle of Namur surrendered after a miserable defence of but eleven days; Clermont’s corps was released for operations in the field, and the Allies were forced to fall back for the protection of Liège. ◆Sept. 27./Oct. 7.◆ Accordingly, on the 7th of October they crossed the Jaar, not without annoyance from the enemy, and took up a new position, which gave them indeed possession of Liège, but placed them between the Meuse in their rear, and an army of nearly twice their strength on the Jaar before their front.[95]

ROUCOUX
Sep. 30th/Oct. 11th 1746
]

◆Sept. 29./Oct. 10.◆

Now at last Saxe resolved to strike a blow. On the 10th of October he crossed the Jaar with evident intention of an attack, and the Allied army received orders to be ready for action before the following dawn. The Allies’ position faced very nearly due west, the army being drawn up astride of the two paved roads leading into Liège from Tongres and St. Trond. Their extreme right rested on the Jaar and was covered by the villages of Slins, Fexhe, and Enick, all of which were strongly entrenched and occupied by the Austrians. South of Enick extended an open plain from that village to the village of Liers, and in this plain was posted the Hanoverian infantry and four British battalions, the Eighth, Nineteenth, Thirty-third, and Forty-third Foot, with the Hessian infantry on their left, in rear of Liers. The Hanoverian cavalry prolonged the line southward to the village of Varoux, and the Sixth and Seventh Dragoons and Scots Greys continued it to the village of Roucoux, from which point Dutch troops carried it on to the village of Ance, which formed the extreme left of the position. Ligonier did not like the situation, for he did not see how the turning of the left flank could be prevented if, as would certainly be the case, the French should seriously attempt it. Prince Charles, knowing that, if his right were turned, his retreat to Maestricht would be cut off, had taken care to hold the right flank in real strength and dared not weaken it; but the position, with the Meuse in its rear, was perilously shallow, while the convergence of two ravines from the Jaar and Mehaigne into its centre allowed of but one narrow way of communication between the right and the left of the army. The defects of the Allies’ dispositions were in fact not unlike those which had proved fatal to King William at Landen; and Ligonier’s anxiety was proved to rest on all too good foundation.

◆Sept. 30./Oct. 11.◆

The morning of the 11th of October opened with bad news for the Allies. The French had been admitted into Liège by the inhabitants behind the backs of the Dutch, so that the Prince of Waldeck, who commanded on the left, was obliged to withdraw eight battalions from Roucoux and post them _en potence_ on his left flank, with his cavalry in support. Thus the defence of Roucoux, as well as of Liers and Varoux, was left to eight battalions of British, Hanoverians, and Hessians only. This made the outlook for the Allied left the worse, since it was evident that the brunt of the French attack would fall upon it. Saxe gave Prince Charles little time for reflection. He had one hundred and twenty thousand men against eighty thousand, and he knew that of the eighty thousand at least one-third were tied to the Austrian entrenchments about the Jaar. He opened the action by a furious assault upon the Dutch on the left wing, his infantry being formed in dense columns, so that the attack could be renewed continually by fresh troops. Simultaneously fifty-five battalions in three similar columns were launched upon Liers, Varoux, and Roucoux. Outmatched though they were, Dutch, Germans, and British all fought splendidly and repelled more than one attack. But, to use Ligonier’s words, as soon as two French brigades had been repulsed in each village, a third brigade ran in; and the eight battalions, though they still held Liers, were forced to withdraw both from Roucoux and Varoux. Being rallied, however, by Ligonier, they advanced again and recaptured both villages; and the Nineteenth and Forty-third took up a position in a hollow road which they held to the last. The Dutch now began to retire across the rear of the position from the left, in good order despite of heavy losses, while Ligonier checked the enemy in the plain with the British cavalry. When the Dutch had passed, he ordered his own men to retreat in the same direction, still covering the movement with the cavalry and with the Thirteenth and Twenty-sixth Foot, which had been sent to the field from the garrison of Maestricht. The Austrians formed a rear-guard in turn when the British and their German comrades had passed; and thus the whole army filed off, unpursued and in perfect order, and crossed the Meuse in safety on the following morning.

The action may be looked upon as a fortunate escape for the Allies, since it was impossible, humanly speaking, that it could have issued favourably for them. Prince Charles, in seeking to cover both Liège and Maestricht, had attempted too much. His army thus occupied too wide a front, the villages in the centre were too weakly held, there was hardly anywhere a second line of infantry, and the left flank could not be sustained against so superior an enemy. The total loss of the Allies was about five thousand men, which was sufficiently severe considering that but a third of the army was engaged. The casualties of the British were three hundred and fifty killed and wounded, of whom no fewer than two hundred belonged to the Forty-third. The French lost as many men as the Allies, or more, and gained little by the action except eight guns captured from the British, Hanoverians, and Hessians. Had not the Allied troops been far better in quality and discipline than the French, they must have been lost during their retreat with superior numbers both in flank and rear. Both armies presently retired into winter-quarters, and the campaign ended far less disastrously than might have been feared for the Allies.[96]