The War of the Spanish Succession (1701-1714)

by James Falkner

  Marlborough was not at all optimistic of success in the Low Countries in the coming year, even though the States-General had given assurances that their generals would be more amenable to offensive action if the prospects for success were good. The allied army was still gathering for the coming campaign, and contingents of foreign troops – Hanoverian, Prussian and Danish – had yet to reach the appointed rendezvous, as their terms of service were still being discussed and alleged arrears of pay argued over. Queen Anne appealed to her brother-in-law the King of Denmark on 23 April 1706 that:

  The Duke of Marlborough is projecting an important undertaking against the enemy, and the friendship which I have for you making me rely on your own, I hope that you will consent to allow Your Majesty’s troops now under the said General’s command, to march wherever he thinks best for the good of the service.18

  The king was not immediately convinced, and the dispute over payment for the Danish troops rumbled on, even as the campaign opened.

  In the meantime, Villeroi had received a number of letters from Louis XIV and the French Minister for War, urging him to get on with things and take the offensive against the allies. The Duc de St Simon wrote that:

  The Marshal, piqued with these reiterated orders, which he considered as reflections upon his courage, determined to risk anything in order to satisfy the desire of the King. But the King did not wish this. At the same time that he wished for a battle in Flanders, he wished to place Villeroi in a state to fight it. He sent orders, therefore, to Marsin to take eighteen battalions and twenty squadrons of his army, to proceed to the Moselle, where he would find twenty others, and then to march with the whole into Flanders and join Marshal Villeroi.19

  Louis XIV clearly understood that Villeroi needed this augmentation in bayonet strength before bringing on a general engagement; however, he also understood the rash bravery of a man of limited abilities anxious to prove his worth once more, and, St Simon went on: ‘He prohibited the latter from doing anything until this reinforcement reached him. Four couriers, one after the other, carried this prohibition to the Marshal; but he had determined to give battle without assistance, and he did so.’

  Villeroi was concerned that Marlborough would move to attack the French-held fortress of Namur, and on 19 May 1706 he left his concentration area around Louvain and moved his 60,000-strong French, Walloon and Bavarian army to the southwards to take up a position on the low ridge-line near to the village of Ramillies. His march was reported to Marlborough almost immediately, and in response the allied commander brought his as yet still incomplete army south through Merdorp to take up a position on the same ridgeline. By doing so the duke expected to confront Vilereoi as he advanced, but the French commander got into position first. The march had been pressed at a good speed, although Villeroi made better time overall, but the duke delayed for a day to allow the Danish troops, both horse and foot, to come up from their cantonments, where they had orders not to join the campaign until their arrears of pay were settled. The valuable Prussian and Hanoverian contingents were still absent also, for disputes over the precise terms of their service remained unresolved.

  On the morning of Sunday 23 May Marlborough with 62,000 troops found that Villeroi had established himself in a three-mile wide defensive position running from Taviers on the Mehaigne stream in the south to Autre-Église on the Petite Gheete stream in the north. ‘The position which he had taken up was one which was well known to be bad,’ St Simon remarked. ‘The late Marshal Luxembourg had declared it so, and had avoided it.’20 In fact, the ground chosen was both favourable and unfavourable whether for attack or defence, depending upon the way the battle was handled. The necessity to hold the outlying villages of Taviers and Autre-Église at either end of the ridge-line, extended the frontage Villeroi had to cover. However, the northern part of his position was marshy and difficult to cross which aided his defensive arrangements, while the wide open plain to the south of Ramillies village was ideal for the deployment of his numerous and well-equipped cavalry. On the other hand, as Marlborough approached from the east his flanks were at some risk of French envelopment from the troops in Taviers and Autre-Église, had Villeroi taken this bold course. Still, as he advanced on a narrower front the duke had the valuable ability of easily passing troops from one flank to another, ‘cutting across the chord of the arc’ as it were, while his opponent in responding would have to move troops the longer route around the outside of the curve. Marlborough was not discouraged by the marshy obstacles in the north of the field as he quite rightly saw that he would be able to pass infantry across them without too much difficulty. That confidence was in contradiction of earnest advice he had been given by his staff officers, but the duke had taken the chance to scout the ground the previous autumn, and as a result felt that the terrain was passable.

  By early afternoon the armies were in place, and after a furious opening cannonade, Overkirk attacked with Dutch troops and secured Taviers in the south, while Marlborough pushed British and Danish infantry across the marshes of the Petite Gheete to the north. The fighting was heavy, but the Earl of Orkney managed to get his troops into the hamlet of Offuz to the north, before being recalled by Marlborough to support the attacks on Ramillies and the French cavalry to the south. Marshal Villeroi, however, was concerned at the risk posed by Orkney’s persistent attacks, and concentrated his attention and reserves in the northern part of the field, while his own cavalry to the south were being worn down by the repeated attacks of Dutch and Danish squadrons under the command of Overkirk. Too late Villeroi realised the danger, and as he attempted to re-deploy his reserves in the early evening to meet the escalating crisis on his right, the Danish cavalry put in a slashing flank attack that rolled up the opposing army from end to end. ‘The word sauve qui peut went through the great part [of the army],’ Irish soldier of fortune Peter Drake wrote, ‘and put all in confusion. Then might be seen whole brigades running in disorder.’21

  Marshal Villeroi’s fine and well-equipped army was broken and trying only to find safety behind the shelter of the river Dyle. The beaten French and Bavarian commanders met by the light of flaming torches in the main square of Louvain that night, and all were agreed that after such a crushing defeat flight was the only course open to them. ‘We had the finest army in the world,’ the Elector of Bavaria wrote soon afterwards, ‘but the defeat is so great, and the terror that is in our troops so horrible, that I know not what the morrow will bring forth.’22 Huge quantities of stores and munitions were burned or dumped into the river Dyle, or abandoned to the pursing allied cavalry, and the defeated army, in little form or order, withdrew to the westwards as hastily as possible. Villeroi announced the defeat to Versailles in courtly terms: ‘I have the honour to inform your Majesty of the unlucky day of the 23rd … Our right wing had been absolutely defeated.’23 The scale of the losses suffered, it was soon found, was simply staggering, both in terms of men, guns, stores, territory and, irretrievably, French prestige and morale. Marlborough wrote to his wife the next day to let her know of the victory, and in passing, of his remarkable escape when a French roundshot just missed him:

  On Sunday last we fought, and that God Almighty has been pleased to give us a victory. I must leave the particulars to this bearer Colonel Richards, for having been on horseback all Sunday, and after the battle marching all night, my head aches to that degree, that it is very uneasy to me to write. Poor Bringfield, holding my stirrup for me, and helping me on horseback, was killed. I am told he leaves his wife and mother in a poor condition.24

  Marlborough’s victorious troops were in close pursuit, and there was no chance for the French to recover their poise short of abandoning large areas of valuable territory, and important towns such as Louvain, Brussels, Antwerp, Ghent, Bruges and (after a stiff fight and bombardment) the valuable port of Ostend. Overkirk’s notification of the success to the States-General ran, ‘It has pleased Almighty God to grant your Arms and those of your allies a complete and perfect victor
y over our enemies.’25 It was commented that it seemed that the allied army had just thrown itself upon an unlatched door and simply fallen through. Marlborough was able to go on and lay siege to Menin, Ath and Dendermonde and soon his army stood on the very borders of northern France, having captured almost the whole of the immensely valuable Spanish Netherlands in a few short weeks. Major John Blackader, campaigning with his regiment in Flanders, wrote that ‘towns that we thought would have endured a long siege are giving up and yielding without a stroke … What the French got in a night by stealth at the King of Spain’s death they have lost again in a day.’26 The speed and scale of Marlborough’s advance after the victory was breathtaking, and even the duke seemed to be astonished by its extent, writing on 31 May to the Duchess: ‘So many towns have submitted since the battle, that it really looks more like a dream than the truth.’27

  Understandably, Villeroi was held to blame for this disaster to both French interests in north-western Europe and to the French claimant in Madrid, who had now lost one of the most valuable parts of the Spanish empire with its vast tax revenues and recruiting potential. ‘In this way, with the exception of Namur, Mons and a very few other places, all the Spanish Low Countries were lost.’ St Simon recalled.28 In the face of such astonishing events, the civic authorities in the region promptly and prudently declared their allegiance to the Habsburg claimant, Archduke Charles. Despite such utter defeat, Villeroi proved reluctant to relinquish his command, and at last Louis XIV had to announce that his old friend had resigned. The marshal was kindly received on his return to Versailles, but was never entrusted with a field command again. ‘We have not been fortunate in Flanders’, the King wrote with masterly understatement to his grandson in Madrid.29 Villeroi was replaced by the Duc de Vendôme, fresh from his successes in Italy. French troops were brought in from distant garrisons and far-off campaigns to make good the losses suffered at Ramillies, and Marshal Villars’ gains on the Rhine at Hagenau, attempts to recover Landau and operations in Italy were all abandoned or put at risk by this necessary diversion of effort. The psychological shock of such a defeat could not readily be made good, however, and the lasting effect of such complete and astonishing success as Marlborough had achieved was profound.

  For the Dutch the victory at Ramillies gave them perhaps their most cherished aim, the restoration of the Barrier against the French – those towns so carelessly stripped away from them by Louis XIV five years earlier. For Archduke Charles, his prospects brightened immeasurably, and he could now look to establish his own administration in the southern Netherlands. This inevitably caused a degree of friction with the Dutch who, in addition to expecting to garrison their Barrier Towns once more, hoped to recoup some of the enormous cost of the war that they had incurred so far by taxing the populace. The archduke, understandably, saw those same tax revenues as belonging to him, and hoped to use those same monies raised to defray some of his own considerable expenses. Marlborough was also reluctant to see Ostend designated as a part of the Barrier, as this valuable port gave him direct access to southern England for both communication and supply, and he preferred to see the place firmly in the hands of British soldiers. In actual fact, had sober and well-measured counsels prevailed, it might now have been realised, that the parties to the Grand Alliance had attained what they set out to achieve. ‘The Treaty of Grand Alliance of September 1701 does not bind the allies to recover Spain and the Spanish Americas from Philip, but only to obtain security and compensation for his kingship.’30 How far four years of bitter war had carried the main parties forward in their intentions, with only one additional clause entered in 1703, that to ensure a Protestant succession to the throne in London. The treaty with Portugal, of course, had largely been based on the attempt to install Archduke Charles as the king in Madrid, but that arrangement was subsidiary to the aims of the main treaty of alliance. The aims had changed, to fit circumstances for the involvement of Portugal and the Protestant succession, and could presumably change again to mutual benefit. The key point seemed to go unnoticed, that the main aim of the alliance, to divide the Spanish empire, had now been achieved.

  The destruction of one of Louis XIV’s main field armies at Blenheim in 1704 had stripped him of the ability to manoeuvre strategically, impose his will on others by force and win the war outright – such losses could not easily be made good. The subsequent destruction of another army, at Ramillies two years later, was nothing short of a catastrophe for the French cause, and in effect the king had lost the war – he could only now fight on the defensive, and hope for as good a peace as could be obtained by negotiation. To that end, he could still mount local offensive campaigns, but the empire that his grandson had inherited from Carlos II was now de facto divided and, barring some inexplicable and very unlikely error by the allies, likely to remain so. The archduke had possession of the southern Netherlands and much of Italy, the Dutch regained their Barrier, while British trade would benefit from the crippled state of the French and Spanish navies and the grip Queen Anne’s troops had on Gibraltar. Philip V would remain in Madrid, certainly, but his removal was not an aim of the alliance as originally agreed, and there was no realistic prospect of a union of the crowns of France and Spain, so that any lingering concern on that score was largely manufactured. Louis XIV had plenty of legitimate heirs without having to involve his second grandson. Any such a union would have been absurdly impracticable anyway. Madrid had no intention of being ruled from Versailles, even allowing for present French influence at the Spanish court, while there was no prospect that France would ever be subordinate to a king in Madrid.

  A good peace, carefully negotiated and to mutual benefit, was surely at hand, but a measure of how far opinion had changed was seen in a letter sent by the Duke of Marlborough to Antonius Heinsius, the Grand Pensionary of Holland, on 10 September 1706:

  I must be of the opinion of my country, that both by treaty and interest we are obliged to preserve the monarchy of Spain entire. At the same time, as a friend, I must acknowledge that I believe France can hardly be brought to a peace, unless something is given to the Duke of Anjou. (Author’s own italics)31

  The duke was far from being alone in taking this line, but the whole approach, of imposing a settlement and perhaps scattering a few favours, was a significant error on the part of the Grand Alliance. This misjudgement of the nature of the French king, his robust people, and also his increasingly strong-willed grandson in Madrid would cost dearly.

  With the opening of the campaign in Italy in April 1706, Prince Eugene had made his way from Vienna to join the army, only to learn that the Duc de Vendôme had inflicted a severe defeat on the troops commanded in his absence by Graf Reventlau, in a costly battle at Calcinato. With typical energy, Eugene drew his battered army together again and re-established order and discipline, managing to maintain his troops as effective in the field in a remarkably short time after the defeat. Of Reventlau’s failure on the day, the prince mildly commented that is showed that ‘not everyone can command an army’.32 Eugene was now to face two armies rather than just one, for Louis XIV had decided that Vendôme should keep Eugene at bay, while Marshal de la Feuillade (‘very young and inexperienced’ according to St Simon)33 attacked Turin, defended by only the remnant of Victor-Amadeus’s army and some 7,000 Imperial troops commanded by Graf von Daun. By the second week in May 1706 the French investment of Turin was complete with formal lines of contravallation and circumvallation being constructed.34 Victor-Amadeus had left the city with 6,000 Savoyard cavalry just before the investment was complete, and conducted a well-directed and skilful campaign with this small army to delay and frustrate the French operations. La Feuillade pursued the duke into the Luserna valley, neglecting to press forward the siege instead, but for all the marching and counter-marching that was involved could not bring him to battle.

  Vendôme took up a defensive posture on the river Adige, constructing stout earthworks to improve his positions stretching south and eastwards from Vero
na, and there seemed little likelihood that Eugene would have the strength to break through to relieve Turin. At the end of May, however, news came in of the catastrophe for French arms at Ramillies in the southern Netherlands, and the wholesale destruction of Marshal Villeroi’s army at the hands of the Duke of Marlborough. An urgent command soon came from Versailles summoning Vendôme north, to take up the command in Flanders and to try and save something from the wreck in that region. The shocking defeat for France at Ramillies also steadied the nerves of Venice and other Italian states, who no longer saw any advantage in allying themselves to Louis XIV and his fading fortunes, or forming an armed league against the allies.

  Map 5: Prince Eugene’s march to relieve Turin, May–September 1706.

  With such distractions, and Vendôme’s mind perhaps elsewhere, the conduct of the French campaign in northern Italy sagged noticeably. Early in July Eugene got his 30,000-strong army across the Adige at Rovigo, a good forty miles downstream from Verona, and by crossing the river Po near to Ferrara neatly outflanked the waiting French army holding the line of the river. ‘Prince Eugene will not be able to disturb the siege of Turin,’ Vendôme wrote to Versailles with remarkably misplaced confidence, ‘we have too many positions in which to stop him, for his ever dreaming of bringing relief.’35 He now had to leave his army headquarters and hurry north to new responsibilities, and Marshal Ferdinand Marsin, who had fought so hard and so well at Blenheim two years earlier, came from the Moselle to assume the command of the French army covering the operations against Turin. He had to withdraw towards Cremona to avoid being outflanked by Eugene’s march. The progress of the imperial army was both rapid and impressive, given the general lack of supplies and money, and much of the marching was done at night to shield the toiling soldiers from exertions in the withering heat of an Italian summer. The prince kept to the south of the river Po, with that obstacle between his army and any attempt by the French to come and interrupt his progress. A chance to strike at the advance of Eugene’s army was missed, and the Duc de St Simon recalled that: