Masters of the Battlefield

by Davis, Paul K.

  A number of opportunities for service and combat followed over the next few years. In 1768 Churchill volunteered to serve in Tangier, a North African outpost included in the dowry of King Charles’s wife. Here soldiers and marines fought Moors on land and sea, gaining the type of hard-fought experience that later soldiers would find on the Northwest Frontier of India.2 He followed this by serving aboard ships in the Mediterranean fleet fighting the pirates of Algiers. In 1672 England went once again to war with the United Provinces (Holland) as an ally of France. In this conflict he served on the Duke of York’s flagship and distinguished himself in combat, so much so that Prince James named him an officer in the Marine Company over men with greater time in service. This also gained him a position in James’s court. A career in the navy at this point seemed to be in the offing, but he was soon fighting on land.

  James had an illegitimate nephew, the Duke of Monmouth, who led a force of British soldiers to assist the French army fighting the Dutch. His unit was posted under the command of the premier French general of the time, Marshal Vicomte Turenne. Again Churchill was in the thick of the fighting. Turenne, a master general, had little respect for the British troops’ value and had no qualms about using them in combat, where they suffered high casualty rates.3 Churchill was involved in three assaults against the Dutch fortress at Maastricht, the final one breaking through and producing victory. For this success, Churchill was not only praised by Turenne for his bravery but was also congratulated by French king Louis XIV, who had observed the battle. In February 1674 the Dutch signed a peace agreement, but not all British troops went home. Churchill remained in service as commander of an English regiment in French service. He thus saw more action, fighting in three battles in the second half of 1674.4 These actions were under the direction of Turenne, allowing Churchill even more exposure to the master’s touch. In the winter campaign across the Vosges Mountains he learned firsthand the value of forced marches and careful organization.5

  He returned to England with glory and further recognition in James’s court. He also began courting a lady-in-waiting, Sarah Jennings, a fifteen-year-old maid of honor to James’s second wife.6 They were a perfect match, in spite of the ten-year age difference. They married two years later. When James’s daughter Anne married Prince George of Denmark in 1683, personal and political connections blossomed. Churchill escorted George from Denmark to England for the wedding, and Sarah moved to join Anne’s household, where soon the two became fast friends.

  These connections became more important as Prince James, Duke of York, became King James II in February 1685. In early summer the Duke of Monmouth invaded England in order to press his own claim to the throne. Churchill was quick to respond, and put his experiences in both Tangier and France to good use. In the biography of his forebear, Charles Spencer writes, “As soon as he heard that Monmouth had landed at Lyme … Churchill set out to head off the threat. With him went only a small column of foot and an inconsequential body of horse. However, Churchill’s march echoed the approach of his mentor, Marshal Turenne, by relying on speed and decisiveness to surprise the enemy. He appreciated that the key to defeating Monmouth was to harry him. The renegade duke could not be allowed to settle.”7 By keeping Monmouth on the move, Churchill prevented him from gathering either supplies or supporters. Some West Country militia rallied to him, but constant harassment by Churchill’s professionals wore them down physically and psychologically. At the Battle of Sedgemoor on 5 July 1685 the royal troops easily defeated the last of the rebel force.

  Unfortunately, James began pushing a strong Catholic agenda in spite of the conditions laid out during the Restoration. The Churchills, both Protestant, had to walk a fine line as King James drew John increasingly into his inner circle. Churchill tried to warn the king against antagonizing Parliament, but to little avail. A covert group of Protestant military officers began to gather around Churchill. Always able to smooth over any opposition or confrontation, he found his powers of diplomacy stretched to the limit.

  Everything came to a head in 1688 when James had a son. This indicated the potential for a long-term Catholic dynasty in a Protestant country, and James’s appointments of Catholics to important positions in government and the military motivated many in Parliament to look somewhere else for a replacement king. As negotiations began with Stadtholder William of Orange, married to James’s sister Mary (a Protestant), Churchill continued to try to moderate James’s religious activity, but without success. Forced into a choice, John picked his faith over his monarch and pledged loyalty to William when he came to the throne in the Glorious Revolution of 1688, the bloodless coup that confirmed the Protestant faith as dominant in England.

  His choice was not well rewarded. William was suspicious of Churchill and realized the potential problems that could arise from his close relationship with Anne, who also had a claim to the throne. Churchill did what he could to assure the new monarch of his loyalty, even convincing Anne to cede any claim to the throne while William or Mary lived. Still, William remained suspicious, even though he did grant Churchill the title of Earl of Marlborough. With the Dutch in the middle of yet another war with France and William in need of all the troops he could get, an English force was detailed to Holland. William allowed Marlborough to maintain his rank as lieutenant general. As the English army was undergoing reorganization and Catholics were under investigation, many men had left the army to join James in Ireland; still, 8,000 were detailed to Flanders with Marlborough in command.8 Marlborough did his job well, organizing and training the soldiers and performing admirably in combat.

  The next few years were difficult for everyone. William had to suppress a Catholic campaign in Ireland, where Marlborough led a lightning campaign against Cork and Kinsale, which eased the burden on William’s primary campaign elsewhere. Marlborough landed near Cork with some 4,000 troops on 22 September 1690, linking up with cavalry from William’s army under the Duke of Würtemberg, who gave Marlborough his first taste of handling awkward allied generals as he would be obliged to do as long as he worked with the Dutch.9 He also was appointed to a Council of Nine to advise Mary on governing while William was in Ireland. Still, for the most part William preferred Dutch advisors (and soldiers), which did not sit well with many in England. A few, including Churchill, occasionally wrote to James II, who had gone into exile in France. In 1692, an argument between Queen Mary and her niece Princess Anne led William to dismiss Marlborough from his military and court positions. He even spent six months in the Tower of London accused of treason, until the charges were proven to have been the result of forged documents. Not until Mary died in 1695 did he recover his position and begin, finally, to receive some of William’s grudging appreciation.

  During Marlborough’s time off the scene, William continued the Nine Years War in Flanders against Louis XIV’s France. William was not a brilliant commander and the war was slow, owing to the fact that it consisted primarily of sieges of the seemingly countless fortresses along the frontier. Had Marlborough been in the king’s favor, he would have been obliged to accompany William on these campaigns and (as a subordinate commander) engage in a style of warfare alien to his nature. That certainly would not have endeared him to his king. He would only have chafed under such orders or violated them. In reality, his being out of the picture was better for him in the long run.10

  Several years after his return to service, war was brewing once again in Europe. Charles II of Spain was dying, and there were two potential claimants to the throne: Philip of Anjou (grandson to both Charles and Louis XIV) and the Habsburg archduke Charles of Austria, whose father was Holy Roman emperor Leopold (brother to Charles II of Spain). Given that the last war between the French and Anglo-Dutch forces (the war of the League of Augsburg, ended in 1697 by the Treaty of Ryswick) had been a great strain on French resources, Louis was not looking to get involved in another conflict any time soon. William, who hated Louis and feared his ambition, approached the powers in play to develop
a solution. This they did, without Spain’s input. The Partition Treaty of 1698 named an infant prince of Wittelsbach as a compromise monarch, with both France and the Holy Roman Empire receiving substantial territorial compensation for not pushing their own claims. After the baby prince died, a second treaty the following March gave Emperor Leopold’s son the throne in return for France receiving Naples, Milan, and Sicily. Unfortunately, Leopold wanted it all. “Leopold intransigently insisted that his son was the sole rightful heir, while Louis, dreading a war, proved reasonable beyond all expectations,” writes John Wolf.11 Louis agreed to the second treaty, but the Austrians did not.

  Nobody in Spain, however, wanted the Spanish Empire divided, nor did they believe that landlocked Austria should control Spain’s overseas colonies. With papal support, the Spanish aristocracy convinced the dying Charles to keep the empire together and will it to his grandson Philip of Anjou. When Charles finally died in November 1700 and his last will and testament was read, Louis had no real choice other than to support his grandson’s claim. Emperor Leopold readied for war, but England and Holland still pursued compromise. Then, Louis provoked both of them. In the name of Spain he sent French troops to occupy the fortresses of the Spanish Netherlands, modern Belgium. He then ordered all Dutch and English shipping banned from Spanish ports. Finally, after William died in early 1702, Louis recognized James II’s Catholic son over Protestant Anne as the rightful monarch. Challenges to Dutch security and income, and to England’s income and religion, were enough to convince the Dutch and the English to ally with Leopold and the Holy Roman Empire.

  Warfare of the Time

  THE THIRTY YEARS WAR had created across Europe immense fatigue, as well as immense fear. Reports on the devastation of the Germanic states vary, but a huge percentage of the population died and the physical and economic recovery took decades. Attempts were made to alleviate similar future suffering at the hands of marauding mercenaries by the widespread adoption of “rules of war” codified by Hugo Grotius. The Treaty of Westphalia that ended the war in 1648 had some of its foundations built on these rules. The primary goal was to stop making civilians victims of warfare, and the rise of professional armies that individuals such as Gustavus Adolphus implemented went a long way toward achieving that goal. The nation that set the pattern for increasing professionalism was not Sweden (whose star waned after Gustavus fell) but France.

  France’s suffering in the war had been more financial than otherwise, since the war was not fought on its soil. Still, the superior performance of professionals had been proven and, after a bit of its own civil war, the government began taking serious measures to upgrade the military. This began at roughly the same time a new monarch came to the throne, Louis XIV. He had the assistance of two able administrators who completely reworked the nature of France’s military structure. In 1668 Michel le Tellier was appointed to the post of secretary of state for military affairs; he was aided and ultimately succeeded in this position by his son, Francois Michel Tellier, better known as the Marquis de Louvois, who orchestrated the transformation of the army into a truly royal force, and became the first great civilian minister of war in any country.12 One of his major accomplishments (though not completely fulfilled) was to address the corruption among army officers. It was not uncommon to list more manpower in one’s unit than actually existed, in order to be provided with more money and supplies. Limited inspection visits made this easy, even though it could prove dangerous in wartime when one expected to field an army of a certain size when such numbers did not exist. Further, having responsible soldiers (rather than the traditional prison recruits) became a priority. Advancement became possible through merit and not just birth or purchase of a commission.

  Up-to-strength units received the best possible training and supplies. In order to accomplish the second item, the ministry developed a system of supply magazines. Regular food on campaign meant no need to pillage, which both maintained positive civil relations and gave soldiers fewer opportunities to leave camp, something that usually resulted in unmilitary activities and behavior. What Gustavus had tried to implement, regular food and pay, became established and successful policy under the French regime, which did much to expand the army significantly as well as increase the number of talented officers through the merit system.13 Other countries had to follow suit or be completely at France’s mercy.

  The infantry made up about one-fourth of the French army. Foot soldiers were organized by the turn of the century into battalions of thirteen companies of 40–50 men each, armed with matchlocks or flintlocks. The transition from the older, heavier, less dependable weapon had not completely taken place by 1700. Indeed, in the French army it almost did not take place at all. For some reason King Louis XIV disliked flintlocks, even for a time ordering they be abandoned, but luckily for him cooler heads convinced him otherwise.14 The flintlock offered an increased rate of fire, two to three shots per minute as opposed to two shots in three minutes with the matchlock. Without the need to worry about a long, burning fuse, soldiers needed less space to reload, so they could be lined up in tighter formations, increasing the firepower. There was another area in which the French had not advanced, and that was their rejection of the paper cartridge, carrying both powder and ball.15 Most other European armies had adopted the paper cartridge used by Gustavus. The French continued to deploy their men in five or six ranks, better for resisting attacks but not designed to put as much lead in the air as fewer ranks would have allowed.

  Two new things appeared among the French infantry under Louis XIV at the end of the seventeenth century. One was the socket bayonet invented by the fortification-engineering genius Sebastian Vauban, which led to the death of the pike. Earlier attempts at using bayonets resulted in the plug type, which was stuck in the barrel and therefore prevented the weapon from firing. A ring bayonet merely slipped over the barrel and easily fell off. Vauban’s device slipped over a lug that held the bayonet in place once it was rotated. With the bayonet’s ability to provide the sharp points that charging horses did not want to encounter, the pikeman was removed from the field by 1700. Thus, everyone on the line now had a musket, increasing firepower even more. The second was the introduction of the grenadiers, who along with their standard weaponry of flintlock, bayonet, sword, and hatchet carried 12–15 grenades. These were hollow iron shells filled with gunpowder, which had first appeared in the Middle Ages. In 1667 four men from each infantry company were trained in throwing grenades and termed “grenadiers”; four years later one company of grenadiers was assigned to each battalion. Physically large and strong, they became an elite soldiery designated for difficult assignments.16

  French cavalry was divided into three classes. Louis XIV’s time witnessed the introduction of cavalerie légère or light cavalry, which used to be the heavy cavalry. It was renamed because the new cavalrymen did not wear heavy armor as previously. In 1690 came the introduction of modern light cavalry, the hussars.17 The third class was the dragoons, or mounted infantry. Each carried a musket, pistol, saber, and shovel. The shovel meant that he could entrench himself just like regular infantry, but with his horse he could also be used in long-distance service such as transport escort.18 Regular cavalry were equipped with a sword with a three-foot straight blade, two flintlock pistols carried in saddle holsters, and a shorter musket called a carbine. Just as the grenadiers became elite infantry, Louis’s army introduced elite cavalrymen in the form of carabiniers who were given rifled carbines. In October 1690 they were formed into their own company. In late 1693 these companies were grouped into a new unit called Royal Carabiniers, 100 companies strong—a sort of elite reserve cavalry division.19

  In spite of the return of power tactics with the cavalry of Gustavus Adolphus’s Swedes, the French retained many of the older practices. The French cavalry was not used for shock, as Gustavus had used his, but as mobile musketeers.20 Just as in the older cavalry, they attacked in the caracole, using pistols or carbines. The main difference was t
hat the horsemen now fired in volleys of three ranks, expanding their firepower somewhat.21 The French tended to mass their cavalry on the wings with the infantry arrayed in the center. Nothing special is indicated in the early seventeenth-century sources about French artillery, an interesting omission, since artillery became one of the French specialties by the middle of the eighteenth century.

  The English and Dutch armies were organized along virtually parallel lines, which is probably not surprising given their common head of state. They were not, however, anywhere near as large as that fielded by Louis. Neither England nor the Dutch Republic could call up military force on a whim, since both had elected governments that held the purse strings. The Dutch army was far larger than that of England, since the Dutch had been fighting for generations, first against Spain and more recently against France. King James had attempted to increase and professionalize the English army, but his thinly concealed religious motives kept Parliament from allowing much of anything beyond a national defense force. When William came to the throne in 1688 the total enlistment was roughly 35,000–40,000 men, of which some 11,000 were based in the Netherlands. It had a number of veterans from the wars against the Dutch in the 1670s and more recently in the suppression of rebellion in Ireland. In order to assist his home country he expanded the English army to as many as 60,000, though many of them fought in Ireland. After the War of the League of Augsburg ended in 1697, the army was reduced to a mere 7,000.