Chapter XXIII: Part 23

Buonaparte had no faith in retreats; he said a general’s only business was to conquer. His error, as a great captain, is proved by his history; he never knew how to retreat, and the consequence was St. Helena. In this siege we behold Condé’s retreat very little inferior in glory to Turenne’s victory.

VERCHERES.

A.D. 1697.

Although this cannot be termed a siege, still, being of the nature of one, and very extraordinary in its circumstances, we cannot resist giving it to our readers.

Mademoiselle de Verchères, little more than fifteen years of age, was walking on the banks of the St. Lawrence, when she heard the hissing of bullets, and beheld a party of Iroquois on the point of surrounding her. She fled at her best speed, and they pursued her; she threw herself into the fort, shut the gates, and gave the alarm. She heard the cries of the terrified women, and fearing they would impede rather than assist the defence, she shut them up in a secure place. A single soldier was on duty in the fort. She flew to join him, put on a hat and a uniform coat, armed herself with a musket, showed herself on the walls, and fired on the Iroquois. She then affected a loud manly voice, pretended to have a numerous troop under her command, and flew from sentry-box to sentry-box, as if to distribute the posts. Warming with her work, the heroine then loaded a cannon, and discharged it herself. This spread terror among the Iroquois; it at the same time warned the garrisons of the neighbouring forts to be on the defensive, and quickly the banks of the river resounded with the roar of artillery.

Thus this young person saved the fort of Verchères, and, perhaps, the whole colony. This courage, hereditary in her family, seemed to be transmitted to the women as well as to the men. Her mother, two years before, had displayed the same intrepidity. The place had been invested by the Iroquois at a time when the garrison was absent. There were only three soldiers, who were all killed. When Madame de Verchères saw the last fall, while defending herself like a brave man, in a redoubt fifty paces from the fort, she armed herself in haste, advanced alone along the covered way, gained the redoubt before the enemy could scale it, fired at them, and at every shot brought down an assailant. They were astonished and terrified, and were on the point of flying before a woman, when the approach of a body of French completed their dispersion.

Thus we see as much courage and presence of mind may be displayed in a siege in which there is only one defender, as if numerous hosts were engaged.

STRALSUND.

A.D. 1713.

Charles XII. of Sweden, when he had taken refuge in Turkey, after being beaten by Peter of Russia, at length exhausted the obstinacy which had detained him so long at Demirtocka, meditating on means to excite the Ottoman Porte against his great rival, passed all at once, with characteristic energy, from excessive inactivity to equally excessive exertion. He set out from Demirtocka with prodigious speed, crossed the hereditary states of the emperor, Franconia and Mecklenburg, on horseback, and arrived at Stralsund when least expected. His first proceeding was to protest against the sequestration of the city of Stettin. He hastened to declare that, not having made any convention, he was not obliged to recognise that which his generals had done in his absence to place Pomerania and Stettin in a state of sequestration. With a character so obstinate as that of this prince, no other argument could be employed but force. Frederick William, king of Prussia, declared that he would not allow the Swedes to enter Saxony, and immediately joined the league of the Russians, Saxons, and Hanoverians. In order to force, with the strong hand, the king of Sweden to hold his engagements, he ordered a body of Prussian troops to advance close to Stettin. Charles XII. took possession of Anclam, Wolgaste, and Gripswalde, in which were Prussian garrisons; nevertheless, with a slight show of prudence, he dismissed the Prussian troops without violence. At the commencement of the following campaign, the Swedes dislodged the Prussians from the isle of Usedom, and made prisoners of a detachment of five hundred men. By this act of hostility they broke the neutrality of the Prussians, and became the aggressors. Frederick William, jealous of Charles’s glory, and irritated at this proceeding, declared war against Sweden. Twenty thousand Prussians joined the Saxons and the Danes in Pomerania. Europe then beheld two kings, in person, besieging another shut up in Stralsund; but this king was Charles XII., fighting at the head of fifteen thousand warlike Swedes, loving to idolatry the heroism of their prince. Besides, his great reputation and the prejudices of the universe fought in his favour. In the army of the allies, the king of Prussia examined the plans, decided upon the operations, and persuaded the Danes to adopt his views. The king of Denmark, a bad soldier, and not at all military in his tastes, had only come to Stralsund in the hope of seeing Charles XII. humiliated. Under these two kings the prince of Anhalt was the soul of all the military enterprises. “He was,” says the king of Prussia, in his Memoirs, “a man of a violent and obstinate character, who, with the valour of a hero, had the experience of the finest campaigns of Prince Eugene. His manners were ferocious, his ambition boundless; deeply versed in the art of sieges, a fortunate soldier, a bad citizen, he was capable of all the enterprises of both Marius and Sylla, if fortune had seconded his ambition.” This army laid siege to Stralsund, a city on the shores of the Baltic, the Swedish fleet being able to supply it constantly with provisions, munitions, and troops. Its situation is strong; an impracticable marsh defends two-thirds of its circumference; the only side by which it is accessible is furnished by a good intrenchment, which from the north extends to the sea-shore, and touches on the marsh towards the east. In this intrenchment were encamped twelve thousand Swedes, with Charles XII. at their head. The besiegers removed successively all the obstacles opposed to them. The first point was to drive away the Swedish fleet from the coasts of Pomerania, in order to deprive the Swedes of the succours they might receive by sea. Nevertheless the king of Denmark was unwilling to risk an action with a squadron he had on those coasts. All the influence of the king of Prussia was required to persuade him of the necessity for such a contest. The two kings were spectators of the action, which took place at a short distance from the shore, and threw the sea open to the allies. The Prussians afterwards drove the Swedes from the isle of Usedom, and took the fort of Pennamende at the point of the sword. They shortly afterwards prepared to attack the intrenchments. A Prussian officer singularly facilitated this undertaking, the most difficult and most dangerous of the whole siege. Being perfectly acquainted with the ground, he knew that the arm of the sea which washes the intrenchments was neither deep nor muddy; he sounded it by night, and found that it was possible to ford it, to turn this post by its left, and thus take the Swedes in flank and rear. This project was successfully executed. They attacked them by night; whilst one Prussian corps marched straight to the intrenchments, another passed along the sea-shore, and were in the Swedish camp before they were perceived. The surprise of an unexpected attack, the confusion natural to a night affair, and, above all, the numbers of the body which fell upon their flanks, threw them quickly into a state of rout: they abandoned their intrenchments, and sought refuge in the city. Enraged at being deserted by his own troops, Charles would have continued to fight alone. His generals dragged him from the scene of action, and had much difficulty in saving him from the hands of the allies; all who did not promptly gain Stralsund were either killed or made prisoners. The numbers taken in this attack amounted to more than four hundred men. The more closely to press the city, it became necessary for the allies to render themselves masters of the isle of Rugen, whence the besieged could likewise obtain succours. The prince of Anhalt, at the head of twenty thousand men, crossed in transports the space which divides Pomerania. This fleet kept the same order of battle the troops observed on the land. They pretended to land on the eastern coast, but turning suddenly to the left, the prince of Anhalt disembarked his troops at the port of Strezow, where the enemy did not expect him. He posted himself in a quarter of a circle, so that his two wings leant upon the sea, and during the whole day caused intrenchments to be dug, fortified by _chevaux de frise_. His disposition was such, that two lines of infantry supported his intrenchment. His cavalry formed the third, with the exception of six squadrons which he had posted without the lines, in order to be able to fall upon the left flank of those who might attack him on that side. Charles XII., deceived by the prince of Anhalt’s feint, could not arrive in time to oppose the disembarkation. Aware of the importance of this isle, he advanced by night upon the Prussians, although he had but four thousand men. He marched at the head of his infantry, which he led to the very edge of the ditch, assisting to pull up the _chevaux de frise_ which bordered it with his own hands; he was slightly wounded in this attack, and General Dureng was killed at his side. The inequality of numbers, the darkness of the night, the six Prussian squadrons, but still more than all the king’s wound, made the Swedes lose the fruits of their valour. Fortune had turned her back upon that nation; everything seemed to tend to its decline. The king retired to have his wound dressed; his discomfited troops fled. The next day twelve hundred Swedes were made prisoners at Lafich-Schanz, and the isle of Rugen was entirely occupied by the allies. After this misfortune Charles XII. returned to Stralsund. That city was almost reduced to extremity. The besiegers having gained the counterscarp, had already begun to construct their gallery upon the principal fosse. It was the character of the king of Sweden to bear up firmly against reverses; he endeavoured to withstand his ill-fortune, and was able to preserve an inexpressible _sang-froid_ under all circumstances. The citizens, far from murmuring, filled with admiration for their master, whose exertions, sobriety, and courage astonished them, had all become soldiers under him. One day, when the king was dictating letters for Sweden to a secretary, a bomb fell upon the house, penetrated the roof, and burst close to the king’s apartment. At the noise of the bomb and the crash of the house, which seemed falling about their ears, the pen fell from the hand of the secretary. “What’s the matter?” said the king, with a tranquil air; “why don’t you write on?” “Oh, sire, the bomb!” “Well,” rejoined the king, “what has the bomb to do with the letter I am dictating to you? Go on!” When he saw the breach open, he wanted to defend it in person, the besiegers threatening to give a general assault. His generals threw themselves at his feet to conjure him not to risk his life so uselessly. Seeing their prayers had no effect, they pointed out to him the danger to which he exposed himself of falling into the hands of his enemies. This apprehension at length made him determine to abandon the city. He embarked in a light boat, in which he passed, favoured by the darkness, through the Danish fleet which blockaded Stralsund, and gained with much trouble one of his own vessels, which conveyed him to Sweden. Fourteen years before, he had left this city as a conqueror about to subdue the world; he returned thither a fugitive, pursued by his enemies, despoiled of his finest provinces, and abandoned by his army. As soon as the king was gone, the garrison of Stralsund capitulated, and surrendered themselves prisoners of war.

FREDERIKSHALL.

A.D. 1718.

Charles XII. being desirous, for the second time, of making the conquest of Norway, laid siege to Frederikshall, an important place, situated at the mouth of the river Tistendall, near the Channel of Denmark. It was in the month of December, 1718. The winter was severe, and the cold killed a number of soldiers. The works, nevertheless, advanced quickly, and the city was soon pressed very closely.

“On the 11th of December,” says Voltaire, “the king went, at nine o’clock in the evening, to visit the trenches, and not finding the parallels advanced to his mind, he appeared much dissatisfied. M. Mégrel, a French engineer, who conducted the siege, assured him that the place would be taken in eight days. ‘We shall see,’ said the king, and continued his examination of the works, in company with the engineer. He stopped at a place where the _boyau_ made an angle with the parallel. He knelt down upon the interior talus, and, resting his elbows upon the parapet, he remained for some time watching the labourers, who were continuing the trenches by star-light.”

Almost half the person of the king was exposed to a battery of cannon pointed at the right angle, where he was, and which was firing cartridges. At this moment his officers saw him fall upon the parapet, breathing a heavy sigh. They rushed towards him, but Charles XII. was no more. A ball, weighing half a pound, had struck him on the temple, and had made a hole in which three fingers could be introduced. When dying, he had had the strength to place, as by a natural movement, his hand upon the guard of his sword. Mégrel, an indifferent and singular man, was content with saying, as he surveyed the lifeless monarch: “_We may retire, the piece is played out._” To keep the knowledge of this misfortune from the troops, until the prince of Hesse, Charles’s brother-in-law, should be informed of it, his body was enveloped in a grey mantle, with a wig and hat upon his head. In this disguise, the king was conveyed away, under the name of Captain Carlsberg.

SCHWEIDNITZ.

A.D. 1761.

As one of our principal objects is to lay before young military students sieges in which masters of the art of war have been engaged, we cannot pass by two of this city, both containing lessons worthy of being remembered.

The capture of Schweidnitz offers a fresh proof that no precaution is unnecessary in war. The smallest negligence in the service of places contiguous to the enemy, is most frequently punished by unexpected reverses. Five hundred prisoners were negligently guarded in the fortress of Schweidnitz. Amongst them was a Major Rocca, a clever Italian partisan. This major formed the idea of placing the fortress in which he was confined in the hands of the Austrians. He had the address to insinuate himself so completely into the good graces of the commander, that he had liberty to walk among all the works, to become acquainted with the places of all the sentinels and of all the _corps-de-garde_; he frequently saw the Austrians, prisoners like himself, intrigued in the city, and regularly informed General Laudon of all he saw, perceived, or imagined, that would facilitate the surprise of Schweidnitz. According to these instructions, the general drew up his plan of attack, which he executed in the night between the 30th of September and the 1st of October. He distributed twenty battalions in four attacks, one upon the Breslau gate, another upon the Striegau gate, the third upon the fort of Boeckendorff, and the fourth upon the Water fort. M. de Zastrow, governor of Schweidnitz, having some suspicions of the enemy’s intentions, called his garrison to arms about the middle of the night, and spread them about the works; but he committed the faults of not giving his officers instructions how to act, of not sending cavalry to a certain distance on the look-out, and of not discharging fire-bombs to throw a light upon the approach of the enemy. The Austrians advanced to the palisades, without being discovered. There were only twelve cannon fired upon them, and the musketry was so weak that it did them no harm. The guard of the Striegau gate was surprised, and they penetrated thence through the works. During this confusion, the Austrian prisoners threw off the mask, took possession of the interior gate of the city, threw it open to the enemy’s advancing troops, and made themselves masters of the whole place. The only person who held out was the commander of the Water fort; but his resistance was useless. Such an unexpected misfortune changed all the plans of the king of Prussia, who could only, during the remainder of this campaign, defend, against a superior enemy, the fortresses and territories he had left.

SECOND SIEGE, A.D. 1762.

The principal object of the next campaign was, for the king of Prussia, the recapture of Schweidnitz. Frederick had not one man more than was requisite for the execution of this important enterprise. Seventy thousand Austrians composed the army of Marshal Daun and the corps of Laudon, Hadduck, Brentano, De Beck, and Ellershausen. The Prussian army was not inferior, but troops must be detached from it for the siege, of which M. de Tauziern had the direction. He invested the place on the 4th of August, and opened the trenches on the 7th; they commenced at Briqueterie, and turned towards Warben, to embrace the polygon of Jauernick, upon which the principal attack was directed. M. de Guasco made a sortie, but it did not answer his expectations; the Prussian dragoons beating the Austrians back into the place. The king of Prussia thought that Laudon, in order to succour the place, would take the route of Sibelberg, Warther, and Langen-Brelau; he went, therefore, to place himself at Pfaffendorff, whilst he caused the post of Peila to be taken by the prince of Bevern. Everything happened as the king of Prussia had foreseen. Marshal Daun took the route of Langen-Brelau, attacked the Prussians at Peila, was beaten and retreated. The check experienced by Marshal Daun gave M. de Guasco a bad augury of the fate of the place, and he made an attempt to obtain an advantageous capitulation, with a free departure for his garrison. The king of Prussia refused to comply, because it would have been a capital error to allow ten thousand men to march out of a city, of which, with a little patience, he should render himself master; the Prussian army would be weakened at least by four thousand men necessary to garrison Schweidnitz, and the Prussian strength would be lessened to the amount of fourteen thousand men. The king of Prussia repaired in person, on the 20th of September, before Schweidnitz, in order to push on the works with more vigour. Lefebvre, the chief engineer, was opposed to Gribeauvel, esteemed one of the first men of the age for the defence of places. Lefebvre was soon outwitted by the activity of the French engineer, who countermined his mines and thwarted all his plans. Frederick was obliged to take the details of the siege upon himself; the third parallel was lengthened; a battery in breach was placed there; ricochets were there established against Briqueterie, with another battery upon Kuhberg; and the works of the Austrians were taken in rear. Some branches of the mines of the besieged were likewise sprung. The garrison made two sorties, and dislodged the Prussians from a crowned tunnel, from which they wished to debouch by fresh branches. These manœuvres prolonged the duration of the siege, because they rendered a subterranean war necessary. All the cannon of the place were, however, either _évasés_[17] or dismounted; provisions were beginning to be scarce, and the enemy would have been compelled to surrender on that account, if a bomb, falling in front of the powder-magazine of Jauernick, had not set fire to it, knocked down a part of that fort, and killed three hundred Austrian grenadiers. This accident, which laid the place open, obliged M. de Guasco to beat a parley; he surrendered himself and his garrison prisoners of war, on the 9th of October, and they were marched away into Prussia.

The palpable lessons in these two sieges are--in the first, the imprudence of the governor in granting opportunities for treachery in prisoners; and in the second, the consummate prudence of the king of Prussia in not allowing the garrison to march out free, for the sake of quickly terminating the siege.

ISMAIL.

A.D. 1790.

This siege is particularly interesting at the present moment, from the same parties being engaged in a war arising from the same motives as those which led to this sanguinary and memorable contest.

The position of Ismaïl, situated upon the Danube, in Bessarabia, tempted the court of St. Petersburg, then at war with the Turks, to endeavour to make the conquest of it. This was one of the most important cities of the Turkish empire in its European provinces. It had a numerous population, and a garrison of forty-three thousand men, commanded by Auduslu Pacha, one of the best of the Ottoman generals. Provisions and munitions were abundant, and its artillery powerful. Its walls, having a circuit of a mile from one bank of the Danube to the other, were from three to four toises high; at their feet was a fosse from seven to eight toises deep; they were crowned by pieces of large calibre. Between the polygons of Bender and Brock, there was a _fausse-braie_, near a cavalier, capable of containing many thousand soldiers. The water side was strongly defended by batteries making a horizontal fire. At the beginning of November, 1790, General Sudowitsch, with several bodies of troops, made the approaches upon Ismaïl, whilst Admiral Ribas blockaded it with a flotilla of a hundred row-boats. They obtained some advantages at sea, but the rigours of the winter obliged Sudowitsch to raise the siege. When informed of this, the court of St. Petersburg, accustomed to find no difficulty insurmountable, ordered Field-marshal Potemkin to return immediately before Ismaïl and take possession of it. The marshal felt all the difficulties of the undertaking, but he obeyed. Arrived upon the Pruth, he detached Lieutenant-General Potemkin with orders to bury himself under the ruins of Ismaïl; but his efforts were not more successful than those of Sudowitsch. Suwarrow then came up with a regiment of infantry, a thousand Arnauts, and two hundred Cossacks. The land army consisted of twenty-eight thousand men, of whom near one-half were Cossacks. The first care was to exercise these irregular troops in the manœuvres of an assault. Many days were employed in reconnaissances, in order that the general officers might be well acquainted with the posts they were to attack. When all the observations necessary had been made, batteries were raised, to lead the Turks to believe that they were preparing to make a regular siege, and not to carry Ismaïl by assault. On the 9th of December, Suwarrow sent the seraskier a letter from Prince Potemkin, to persuade him to surrender. The seraskier replied that he advised the Russians to retire, if they were unwilling to experience absolute want in an advanced season, and perish with famine and misery before a place amply provided with everything. Suwarrow, the next day, sent another note to the seraskier, in which he announced to him, that if he did not hoist the white flag that very day, the place should be taken by assault and the whole garrison be put to the sword. Many Turks were inclined to surrender; but the seraskier was resolved to risk everything, and made no reply. Suwarrow immediately assembled a council of war, and spoke as follows to his troops: “Brave warriors, remember to-day all your victories, and continue to prove that nothing can resist the arms of Russians. The affair in hand is not one that can be deferred, but it concerns an important place, the possession of which will decide the glory of the campaign, and which the proud Ottomans consider impregnable. Twice already has the Russian army laid siege to Ismaïl, and twice has it retreated from it. There only remains for us, as the third attempt, to conquer or to die with glory.” This speech inflamed the ardour of his soldiers, and an assault was decided upon. Suwarrow received a courier from Prince Potemkin, recommending him not to risk an assault if he was not sure of succeeding. Suwarrow replied in these few lines: “My plan is settled. The Russian army has already been twice at the gates of Ismaïl; it would be disgraceful for it to retire a third time.” Some Cossacks deserted in the evening, and informed the Ottomans of the approaching attack. The principal part of the garrison remained all night upon the ramparts. To make the Turks believe they were short of powder, the Russians fired but little during the night which preceded the assault. All measures being taken, by four o’clock in the morning the columns were formed: there were six on the land side and three upon the Danube. The Cossacks destined to mount to the assault were all on foot, and their lances had almost all been reduced to five feet in length, to render them more useful in the _mêlée_. The first column by water, commanded by General Islenief, consisted of two battalions of grenadiers, one battalion of chasseurs, and two thousand five hundred Cossacks. They had on board their shallops a hundred and thirty pieces of cannon. The second column had the same number of boats and cannon. In the third, and in the reserve, were two hundred and thirty-seven pieces of cannon, divided among a great number of barks, flat-bottomed boats, and floating batteries. Among the troops embarked were the prince de Ligni, the colonel duke de Richelieu, and the count de Langeron. A circumstance is remembered in which the count de Langeron, an emigrant, exhibited to the haughty Potemkin, the czarina’s favourite, a pride worthy of a Frenchman. Langeron, as an emigrant, was talking with him about the troubles which agitated France. “Colonel,” said he, “your compatriots are mad; I should require nothing but my grooms to bring them to reason.” Langeron could not suffer his nation to thus spoken of, and replied haughtily,--“Prince, I do not think that you and all your army could do it.”

The weather, which had been fine and serene during the night, grew cloudy towards daybreak, and a thick fog enveloped the horizon till nine o’clock. All the columns marched in silence. At the aspect of the walls, the whole army halted in consternation. Suwarrow exclaimed to those who were near him, “You see those walls; they are very high; but the empress commands us to take possession of them.” He then suddenly fell upon his knees, arose, and marched to the assault, followed by all his army. The Turks did not fire a shot till the Russians were within three or four hundred paces of them, but then saluted them with a shower of _mitrailles_, which did them great injury. They however approached the fosse, in which there was in several places water up to the shoulders, threw in their fascines, planted their ladders against the ramparts, many parts of which were so high that they were obliged to tie two together, although every one was five toises long. As in some places the besiegers did not find this expedient quick enough, they assisted each other with as much vivacity as address, and climbed up the ramparts with the aid of their bayonets. The arquebusiers fired from the edge of the fosse upon the Turks who defended the ramparts, to prevent them from beating back the assailants. The second column, commanded by the Marshal de Lasci, arrived first, but was not assisted with sufficient energy by the first and third. The first had had to overcome a great difficulty: it had met with a chain of strong palisades, which extended to the banks of the Danube. The grenadiers, who were at the extremity of the palisades, rushed against them, one after the other, to turn them; and those most distant from that spot jumped over them. Another fosse was yet to be got over before they reached the ramparts. The Russian grenadiers took possession of the first bastion, and attacked without order the cavalier which was between that work and the second; but in doing so, they lost many men. Kutusow, who had taken the two left polygons on the side of the left bank of the Danube, would have arrived upon the rampart at the same time as the second column, if he had not been obliged to send assistance to the fourth and fifth columns, which had met with a vigorous resistance. The fosse was full of water at the place where these columns were obliged to cross; the men, being up to their middles, soaked their long Cossack clothes, and had great trouble in disengaging themselves from them. They mounted the ladders, but when they came to the ramparts, they could not maintain themselves there; the two columns were thrown back at the same time. They were separated by the gate of Bender; eight or ten thousand Turks made a sortie from that gate, uttering frightful war-cries. Among these were a great number of women armed with poniards. The besieged charged all at once, in all parts; the infantry of the reserve came to the rescue, and made way with their bayonets; the Cossacks, finding themselves supported, repulsed the Turks. Such as could not gain the bridge to re-enter Ismaïl, were cut in pieces or smothered in the fosse. The Russians then made a fresh effort, surmounted all resistance, and established themselves upon the rampart of the bastion which was assigned to them. Kutusow, however, remarked that the two battalions of reserve, although masters of the rampart, could not yet hold out against the enemy; he in consequence sent them a battalion of chasseurs, who enabled them to keep their position. Every bastion having a powder-magazine under the rampart, the conquerors immediately established a strong guard there, in order that the enemy might not be able to set fire to it and blow up the troops. There consequently followed slight actions between the besiegers and the besieged, who still continued to endeavour to introduce themselves there, but they could not succeed; so that no accident happened. Day began to appear, and every one could ascertain his position, which, till that time, had only been indicated by the different war-cries of the two nations. Whilst the Turkish infantry was fighting in the fosses near the Bender gate, a numerous body of cavalry fell upon the camp of the besiegers, where the Cossacks received them with so much vigour, that scarcely any of them returned, and the Bender gate fell into the hands of the Russians.

Whilst the land columns were marching against Ismaïl, other columns were formed upon the Danube. The first, composed of a hundred boats, manned by troops, prepared to make a descent, advanced in two lines, keeping up a continual fire; the second line, consisting of brigantines, floating batteries, double shallops, and _lançons_, followed it. The fire became still more warm as these two lines approached each other. The Turks had on the water side a work of small height, but great strength, furnished with eighty-three cannon of large calibre, fifteen mortars, and a howitzer of six hundred pounds of balls. The fire of the mortars of the second line covered the cannonade of the first; when they had arrived at some hundreds of paces from the shore, the second line divided, and placed itself on the two wings of the first; in this fashion it formed a half-circle. Both sides kept up a warm fire of _mitrailles_, and the combat lasted an hour. But as it was still night, some Russian battalions only suffered, without any vessel being sunk. About seven in the morning the total descent was effected. The Turks had abandoned the few vessels they had left. The resistance was brave and persistent, particularly on this side, which was defended by more than ten thousand Turks. The greater part of these were put to the sword, the rest saved themselves in the _chanas_, or houses solidly built with stone.

At eight o’clock, the Russians were masters of the ramparts on the water side, as well as on that of the land. A terrible conflict then commenced in the interior of the city, in the streets and public places, to which the inhabitants came from all parts. There were skirmishes beyond number, both sides fighting with equal inveteracy. The Turks defended themselves with desperation, maintaining an incessant fire from the windows, particularly in the narrow streets. The Russians swept the larger ones with the fire of twenty field-pieces, to which the Turks, having no cannon but in their chanas, could not respond. There were two thousand Turks in the first chana that was attacked: they made great havoc among the Russians with their artillery. Suwarrow ordered it to be taken, and it was escaladed, in spite of a determined resistance, and, for the first time, during the day some hundreds of prisoners were made; the unfortunate Auduslu Pacha had taken refuge in a still more considerable chana. The combat there lasted more than two hours; cannon were required to batter in the gate. Two thousand of the best Janissaries defended themselves in this place with all the rage of despair; but the Russian grenadiers rushed in the moment there was an opening, with advanced bayonets, and all were cut to pieces, with the exception of a very few hundred prisoners: the pacha was of this number. He came out into the open place; a chasseur perceiving a rich poniard in his girdle, thought it his duty to take it from him. As several Turks still had arms, a Janissary, who was near the seraskier, endeavouring to repulse the chasseur with his sabre, wounded a captain of chasseurs in the face. The Russians instantly charged their bayonets upon all that remained: they massacred the greater part, the brave seraskier being of the number: scarcely a hundred men of his immediate train escaped. Petty conflicts still continued in every place capable of the slightest defence; every post was carried at a heavy expense of blood. The terrible resistance made by the Turks was more like frantic rage than the opposition of trained soldiers; the women even fearlessly encountered the Russians, armed with poniards and other weapons. All the Russian commanders faced danger with heroic courage, and their soldiers as bravely seconded them; the _mêlée_ lasted ten entire hours, without the Russians in the least heeding the superiority of the Turks in number. The city was given up to pillage; thirty-three thousand Ottomans there perished in one day! and ten thousand were made prisoners! A single man had saved himself in a fortified house; he was slightly wounded, but contrived to drop from a window into the Danube, where he was fortunate enough to meet with a plank, by means of which he gained the opposite shore. This man carried the vizier the news of the loss of Ismaïl; there were no less than six sultans among the dead. The Russians lost fifteen thousand men. Suwarrow wrote Prince Potemkin these few words: “_The Russian flag floats over the ramparts of Ismaïl._” He was equally laconic to the empress Catherine II. “_Madame, the haughty Ismaïl is at your feet._” The booty of this city was valued at ten millions of piastres. Inaccessible to every interested view, Suwarrow, according to his custom, abstained from sharing any part of it; satisfied with the harvest of glory he had reaped, he disdained wealth. But he did not, in a similar spirit, respect the rights of humanity; the massacre of thirty-three thousand men in one day, with the murder of women, children, and unarmed soldiers, procured him the name of _Muley_ Ismaïl, in allusion to the barbarous emperor of Morocco, who had borne that name. The empress of Russia caused a medal to be struck to perpetuate the memory of this important conquest. A year after, Ismaïl, which had cost so much blood, was restored to the Turks as a guarantee of the peace between the two powers--and forty-eight thousand human beings had been slaughtered, and countless women and children had perished or been rendered miserable, to secure the conquest of it!

“O, but man, proud man!
Dressed in a little brief authority,
Most ignorant of what he’s most assured,
His glassy essence,--like an angry ape,
Plays such fantastic tricks before high heaven,
As make the angels weep!”

BOMMEL.

A.D. 1599.

If this siege were not interesting on account of its forming part of the noble struggle which rescued the Netherlands from the domination of the Spaniards, it would command our notice from being the time and place when one of the great scientific operations of war was first brought into use.

The Spaniards having penetrated, in 1599, into the island of Bommel, formed by the Wahal, in the duchy of Gueldres, hastened to lay siege to the capital city of that island. Prince Maurice came to its succour, with the greater part of his army. He encamped on the opposite bank of the Wahal, reinforced the garrison with a thousand men, and, with great rapidity, threw two bridges over the river, above and below the besieged city; the first, destined for the infantry, was but a collection of little barks; but the second, for the cavalry, was composed of large pontoons, and was wide enough for the passage of two chariots abreast. Having completed this operation, he ordered three thousand infantry and four hundred horse, whom he charged most particularly with the defence of Bommel, to cross over into the island. This place being too small for such a numerous garrison, it was lodged without, and immediately covered itself with a good intrenchment, well flanked with redoubts, and defended by a wide ditch. This intrenchment furnished the first model of what has since been called the _covered way_.[18] This happy invention contributed much to the failure of the Spanish expedition. They had not yet perfected their intrenchments, when the Dutch artillery, established on the banks of the Wahal, the fire of the armed barks, and that of the place, thundered all at once against their ramparts. The Spaniards, however, after many efforts, succeeded in sheltering themselves from this multiplied tempest; they raised good intrenchments, they placed cannon in battery, and began to assail in earnest both the city and the intrenched camp. The besieged did not oppose a less number of works or less courage to the Spanish attacks. Towards the end of May, the garrison of Bommel fell all at once upon every one of the enemy’s quarters; it might have been supposed that they came to fight a regular battle, and not to clear out trenches or overthrow works. Both sides fought with the greatest resolution; but at length the resistance of the Spaniards disheartened the Dutch, and they retreated after a contest of three hours. They returned to the charge the following night, persuaded that they should surprise the besiegers. They succeeded in the first moments; but the Spaniards having recovered themselves, the Dutch were obliged to abandon their attack. Three days after, they perseveringly made fresh efforts, which proved likewise unfortunate. Fatigued with their endeavours to overcome so many obstacles and such obstinate enemies, the Spaniards, finding they made no considerable progress, determined to raise the siege towards the end of June, after having lost two thousand men.

BARCELONA.

A.D. 1705.

However unimportant it may appear in the vast page of history, no English account of sieges can be complete without a notice of that of Barcelona, in which he who may be called the last of our knights maintained so nobly that British good faith which we claim as our proudest characteristic.

In 1705, the earl of Peterborough commanded the army of the Archduke Charles, competitor with Philip V., the grandson of Louis XIV., in conjunction with the prince of Darmstadt. The siege was dragged on to a great length, and Peterborough was thinking of re-embarking his English soldiers, when he learnt that the prince of Darmstadt had been killed in carrying the intrenchments which covered Mount Joire and the city. A few days after, a bomb burst in the fort over the powder-magazine; the fort was taken, and the city consented to capitulate. The viceroy was conferring with Peterborough at the city gates, and the articles were not yet signed, when, on a sudden, cries and screams of distress were heard in the city: “You are betraying us!” exclaimed the viceroy; “we are capitulating loyally, and there are your English, who have entered the city by the ramparts, slaughtering, pillaging, and violating.” “You are mistaken,” replied Peterborough, “it must be the troops of the prince of Darmstadt. There is only one means of saving your city; let me enter the place at once with my English; I will make all quiet, and will then return to the gate, to complete the capitulation.” The tone with which he spoke this convinced the Spanish governor of his good faith, and he was allowed to enter Barcelona with his officers. As he expected, he found the Germans and Catalans sacking the houses of the principal citizens; he made them abandon their prey, and drove them out. Among the victims about to be sacrificed to the lust of the soldiery was the duchess of Popoli; he extricated her from the hands of the ruffians, and restored her to her husband. When the tumult was appeased, he returned to the gate and terminated the capitulation, offering a fine example of observance of his word given to a conquered enemy.

Lord Peterborough was certainly more an eccentric man than a great one, and yet, like Don Quixote’s, many of his eccentricities had a strong leaning to the side of greatness. Plutarch would have made a fine story of the above anecdote; it belongs to the character of the real hero, of whom, though abounding in great soldiers, modern history contains so few.

To show the importance of such a trait to the reputation of a nation, we have only to observe with what high praise the historians of other countries mention this act of simple good faith.

GIBRALTAR.

A.D. 1779–1783.

As in the history of mankind there are some persons so remarkable and universally known as to make a notice of them almost a work of supererogation, so there are events, which, from the interest they have excited, and the consequences that have attended them, demand, in a work of this description, a much less detailed account than others of less importance: they have created deep and widely-spread excitement during their enactment, and have produced historians worthy to commemorate them. And such is the siege of Gibraltar. This stupendous rock has now remained in the hands of the British one hundred and fifty years! We can only judge of the anomaly of this circumstance by bringing it home by comparison. Suppose the Spaniards, in their zeal for religion, had determined to seize upon the rocky point of the Land’s End, in Cornwall, or the Isle of Anglesea, in Wales, to facilitate their intercourse with Catholic Ireland, this would have been with them quite as legitimate an object as our trade with the Levant is to us. And yet we hold it, in spite of all the hostile efforts of the Spaniards to retake it; and what is still more strange, in spite of treaties of peace, at which such chance acquisitions are generally restored to the right owner. In the same manner the British held Calais, a French town, from the reign of Edward III., 1346, to that of Henry II. of France and Mary of England, when it was taken by surprise by the duke of Guise in 1557. As may be naturally supposed, the proud Spaniards have not quietly submitted to such a disgrace as that of having an inseparable portion of their country held by a foreign and frequently rival power: they have made several efforts to regain it, the most conspicuous of which comes within the scope of this work.

But, as we said above, the history of this siege has been so well written and is so generally known, that Drinkwater has placed it in the same position as Homer has that of Troy;--we could not pass it by, but yet we are not called upon to be particular in our account of it: the world does not stand in need of our history; it has one, better than any we could produce. Gibraltar was one of the fruits of the War of Succession: England took up arms to keep a Bourbon from the throne of Spain, and, during the conflict, an enterprising admiral, Sir George Rooke, added this gem to her crown. There are politicians who think the retention more a point of honour than a real advantage, but such discussions are not within our limits.

The war of 1762 did not present a favourable opportunity for retaking Gibraltar; Chatham was too vigorous a minister to allow a chance of such a loss; but England being at war with her colonies and with France, encouraged Spain, in 1779, to come to a rupture with her, for the well-understood purpose of attempting the great object of the national wish. That this was so, was rendered plain by preparations to cut off the African supplies of provisions to the rock, before war had actually taken place.

Gibraltar is situated in Andalusia, the most southern province of Spain. The rock is seven miles in circumference, running out into the sea in the form of a promontory of more than three miles in length, and is joined to the continent by an isthmus of low sand. The promontory, or rock, at the foot of which stands the town, is upwards of one thousand three hundred feet in height, and appears to have been formerly surrounded by the sea. The breadth of the isthmus at the foot of the rock is about nine hundred yards, but grows much wider as it approaches the country. Across this isthmus, at about a mile’s distance from the garrison, the Spaniards have drawn up a fortified line, extending one thousand seven hundred yards, and embracing both shores, with a strong fort of masonry at each end. That both parties, under such extraordinary circumstances, should exhaust art in their means of defence, and be always on the watch against surprise, we may readily imagine; but what gives the garrison a great advantage in this respect is its commanding height, from which it can see everything that approaches it, by either land or sea. Thus in the whole of this long siege, they appear to have been able to ascertain all that was going on in the enemy’s camp, and to descry every hostile vessel in time to be prepared for it.

Until we come to the great _finale_, this siege was little more than a blockade, and that imperfect. And yet, with the exception of the “Iliad,” we know of none that is so interesting. Drinkwater’s account has exactly the same charm as Robinson Crusoe’s journal; the events are so minute, and brought so completely home to the apprehension of the reader by the plain and graphic style of the author, that you forget it is an awful reality, and enjoy it as you would a fiction. But such a narrative we cannot adopt into our pages: to transfer it wholly would be dishonest towards a fine work; to garble it would not redound to our credit.

When the re-capture of this member of their own country was undertaken, as there was much difficulty, there was proportionate glory in the enterprise, and the eyes of all Europe were turned towards the Herculean straits. Every exertion was made by Spain--neither labour, money, nor blood was spared. The valour of her troops was ably directed by her generals, and persistently exercised through length of time and difficulties of obstacles enough to cool the ardour of the most devoted partisans. But in addition to the immense advantage of situation, upon a lofty impregnable rock, open to almost constant succour by sea, the British garrison had the still further good fortune of being commanded by a governor most admirably suited to the post. As you read the details of this memorable siege, you cannot help being struck with the idea that General Elliott’s government was a parental one. Never-flinching courage, sleepless watchfulness, consummate prudence, and far-discerning foresight, were joined in him to a kindliness of heart and an urbanity of manners, that made all he required from the troops and officers he was placed over a labour of love. And yet his _bonhomie_ did not overcome his judgment; though never severe, he was never falsely indulgent; he could punish when he was called upon to do so for the public good, as readily, though not as willingly, as he could encourage merit or devotedness by promotion or reward. It may be asserted that Elliott was never so placed as to display the genius of a great commander: but this we deny. In a difficult, isolated position, he was in no instance at a loss; no danger approached him that he was not prepared to meet, and no opportunity for gaining an advantage offered itself that he did not seize.

The two points were,--for the English, the rock, town, and fortress of Gibraltar; for the Spaniards and French, Algeziras, a town situated on the other side of the bay, five and a half miles from Gibraltar. Algeziras had been a city of great importance, and in the middle of the fourteenth century was wrested by Alonzo XI., king of Castile, from the hands of the Moors. This appears to have been a kind of crusade, and one in which the English chivalry took a prominent part; John of Gaunt, and the earls of Derby, Leicester, Salisbury, and Lincoln, all being present. It is likewise said that cannon were first used by the Moors in this siege against their assailants, and were adopted by the English, two years after, at the battle of Crecy, from observing the powerful effects of them. The Spaniards had the great advantage of being masters of the country behind and around them; and though the English had a small naval force in their port, they never had sufficient to prevent constant annoyances from the gun and bomb-boats of Algeziras. Many an anticipated succour, in a vessel which was viewed with delight from the rock, was cut off by the Spanish boats, and carried into Algeziras before the eyes of the disappointed garrison.

With the commencement of the war in 1779, the siege of Gibraltar may be said to have begun. It was, in truth, but an imperfect blockade, but it subjected the garrison to all the watchfulness, labour, and preparation of a real siege. The Spaniards were actively employed in fortifying all their best points; they encamped before the garrison, and erected additional batteries in their lines, but still did not fire upon the town or fort. General Elliott, however, found their proceedings so unmistakable in their purpose, and knowing that war had been declared, he saluted them at their works with a few rounds of shot.

This took place on the 5th of July, 1779; and from that date to the 26th of November, 1781, the siege or blockade was one continuance of mutual attempts at annoyance, interspersed with occasional want of provisions and attacks of the scurvy on the part of the garrison, frequent boat-assaults, always attended with repulses, on the side of the allies; with a strange but perpetual desertion of individuals from both garrison and army. But at the last-named period the enemy had constructed such formidable batteries, and appeared to be approaching so inconveniently near, that General Elliott determined upon the bold expedient of a sortie. This was effected with his usual prudence, foresight, and spirit. As soon as the gates were shut, and the evening gun fired, a considerable detachment was ordered to assemble on the Red Sands, at midnight, with devils, fire-fagots, and working implements, to make a sortie on the enemy’s batteries; the general and other officers to be employed were in the mean time convened, _and, lest some matters might have escaped him in the multiplicity of arrangements, the governor desired every person to propose, without restraint, whatever would, in his or their opinion, further promote the success of the enterprise_. We place the last passage in italics, as a lesson to self-sufficient commanders: no captain ever more completely performed the duties intrusted to him by his country, and yet he was never averse to receiving advice from the lowest of his staff. On a subsequent occasion an important use of red-hot shot was suggested to him, by Lieutenant-General Boyd, his second in command, and, without the least of the paltry jealousy some superiors would have felt, he not only openly adopted the idea, but intrusted the execution of it to his friend who had thought of it.