An intercepted letter, in cipher, from Prince Eugene to the Emperor, which fell into our hands proved, subsequently, that this course would have been the right one to adopt; but the proof came too late; the deciphering table having been forgotten at Versailles.36
Frustrating as this may have been, whether the superficially useful information could have been gleaned and then passed on to Marshal Marsin to put into action before the Imperial army had moved on must be in some doubt. In any case, Reggio was passed by Eugene’s marching troops on 14 August, and Piacenza five days later, all without hindrance from Marsin, whose attention was distracted by the arrival at Verona of a 4,000-strong contingent of Hessian reinforcements for Eugene’s army. The river Tonora was crossed above Allessandia, and on 1 September 1706 Prince Eugene and Victor-Amadeus joined forces at Villa Stelloni about twenty miles to the south of the besieged city of Turin. This was a remarkable military achievement, likened to and ranking with Marlborough’s march to the Danube in 1704. It was accomplished by Prince Eugene with daring and skilful flair, in marching around the flank of a larger enemy army, keeping them at arm’s length along the route of a forced march some 150 miles long, with precarious supplies and no hope of assistance if the army was opposed by any substantial formed body of troops at any one point on the route. The initiative in the whole campaign in northern Italy now lay with the allies – a remarkable turn-around in fortune over the previous six months.
The young Duc d’Orleans, nephew of Louis XIV and therefore a Prince of the Blood, had arrived at Turin on 28 August to lend a hand in the siege. His presence, as on other notable occasions, was in fact a distraction, as there was nothing really for him to do but he was bound to be attended to on account of his rank and standing at Versailles. Orleans was nominally in command of the operations but the actual command lay with La Feuillade and Marsin, neither of whom seemed inclined to harken to his advice and comments nor really to each other. Given Orleans’ lack of military experience, despite his well-intentioned suggestions, this neglect to grip the command problem presented to the two marshals is not all that surprising. Despite their superior numbers, French operations were now dragging as the initiative was so clearly lost to them, and on the 4 September Eugene began to cross the river Po to take up a position near Pianezza; his forward troops were now less than three miles from the beleaguered defences of the city. Two days later the prince moved to threaten the portion of the French siege works, the outward-facing lines of circumvallation, that had still not been completed on the western side of Turin. The Duc d’Orleans urged that the siege be suspended so that the army could concentrate to meet Eugene’s advance, but Marsin brushed the comment aside, and pointedly reminded him that he had no authority over the conduct of the siege operations.
The most critical stage in a formal siege was now reached, a stage that should by any measure, and with a degree of careful planning, have been avoided. The army investing the fortress, and quite rightly directing its attentions to that onerous task, relied implicitly upon the covering army to keep any opposing force, whose intention must be to relieve the garrison in the fortress, firmly at a safe distance. The French commanders had failed to accomplish this essential task, Eugene was close at hand and the success of the siege, as a result, hung in the balance.
A general attack was ordered by the prince on 7 September 1706, and at a third attempt Prussian troops broke through the French position on the right. Eugene recalled that:
The right wing was at first repulsed, because it could not attack as soon as the left. Anhalt [Leopold, Prince of Anhalt-Dessau] set all to rights again with his brave Prussian infantry, and I at the head of some squadrons. For an hour and a half some advantages were gained on either side; it was a carnage but not a battle. Our troops at length leaped into the entrenchments of the French, but threw themselves into disorder in the pursuit … In rallying the latter, one of my pages and a valet de chamber were killed behind me, and my horse, wounded with a carbine shot, threw me into a ditch.37
Marsin was, as he had predicted, mortally wounded in the fighting, and Orleans was wounded in two places.38 Eugene wrote that if the Marshal ‘had come out to the attack me first, and to turn [outflank] me, I should have been a good deal embarrassed’.39 Count von Daun successfully sallied out from the defences to meet the relieving army, and in the process the siege was utterly broken. The Marquis de Langallerie, who fought under Eugene that day, recalled that:
By Noon the victory was entirely ours, and the city entirely delivered, for the Enemy abandoned the Attack, and all their Camp retired with the remains of their Army to the other side of the Po. The rest of the day was spent in taking several Cassines and Redoubts possessed by the Enemy, who all yielded themselves Prisoners of War, and his Royal Highness [Victor-Amadeus] entered triumphantly his Capital that evening.40
Prince Eugene remembered the marquis well, describing him rather cuttingly as ‘imprudent, who turned out ill, but to whom I was then much attached for bravery and intelligence’.41
The day of battle had been costly, with some 9,000 French casualties, including many unwounded prisoners, and 5,000 allied killed and wounded. Marshal Marsin lay dying, and the Duc d’Orleans would have withdrawn towards Lombardy to draw support from the many French held fortresses in the region, but the road was barred. Instead the battered French army, its commanders despairing of continuing the struggle and leaving behind their valuable siege train, fell back towards the French frontier and effectively abandoned the campaign in Italy. An officer who took part in the flight of the French troops wrote to a friend of ‘the disorder in which they fought the battle of Turin, and the confusion that prevailed among us when we turned our backs on an army, which, even after the engagement, was greatly inferior to ours. I shall draw a veil over this disagreeable scene’.42
Prince Eugene elatedly remarked to Victor-Amadeus, on hearing the inexplicable direction that the French retreat took, that ‘Italy is ours, Cousin’.43 The result of this remarkable campaign, the weight of which had mostly lain on the shoulders of the prince, was that Vienna was from that point onwards able to virtually ignore French and Spanish interests, and dictate affairs in Italy pretty well as it saw fit. Eugene, despite nursing a head wound and numerous grazes and bruises from his fall sustained during the battle, wrote to the Duke of Marlborough on the evening of the day of victory, giving due thanks for the financial support that he had obtained, and the influence used to ensure that reinforcements of German troops had been sent south to join the campaign in good time:
You have had so great a share of it by the succours you have procured, that you must permit me to thank you again. Marshal Marsin is taken prisoner and mortally wounded. The troops have greatly signalized themselves. In a few days I will send you a correct account; and in the meantime refer you to that which you will hear from the bearer of this letter [the Baron de Hohendorff], who is well informed, has seen everything, and is competent to give you an accurate relation.44
The political impact for the allied cause of the twin victories in 1706 was profound. The loss of the southern Netherlands, with its large tax-gathering potential, and defeat in strategically important northern Italy, were a severe shock for Louis XIV and his grandson. The costs incurred by the king’s treasury in sustaining the war, both for France and in large measure for Spain were staggering, while the prospects for recovery in both theatres of war appeared very slim.
There had, however, been a corresponding lack of success for the alliance elsewhere, most particularly in Spain despite the successful holding of Valencia and Catalonia, but also on the Rhine where Villars had held firm, and in Hungary where rebellion against imperial authority smouldered on under the direction of Prince Rakoczy. This running sore in the side of the imperial war effort might have been settled, but the success at Ramillies in May 1706 had seemed to stiffen the resolve on the emperor’s advisers in Vienna, and Rakoczy wrote to the Duke of Marlborough that ‘we are affected here through the insupportable
arrogance which your rapid conquests breed in the hearts of the imperial Ministers’.45 Emperor Joseph, however, would have none of this and declared that he would give up both Spain and Italy sooner than part with any part of Hungary or Transylvania. With so much achieved in the campaigns that year, and the southern Netherlands comfortably in allied hands, thoughts and concerns in Vienna turned to the east, and the attention of Austria from then onwards was never so devoted to the wider common cause of the Grand Alliance as before.
Holland had regained its Barrier against future French aggression, Austria had substantial gains in Italy and the Low Countries, and Savoy was secure, while Britain firmly held Gibraltar, and the allies were in possession of a large part of eastern Spain, with their cruising squadrons dominating much of the Mediterranean, so that the Maritime Powers could count expanded trade in the region amongst their rewards. The division of the old Spanish empire was in practice achieved, France was smitten, and French power and prestige demonstrably weakened by repeated failure on the field of battle – Louis XIV would not again be able to dominate affairs as he had been used to do. On the face of things, the Grand Alliance had won the war militarily, and now it just had to win the peace. In this task the allies proved incompetent; with so much gained, the argument ran, and France so apparently prostrated, nothing that was demanded would not be meekly delivered up by Louis XIV and his grandson. These were the fatal judgements of politicians and diplomats settled in comfortable chambers far removed from anything that reeked remotely of a field of battle. A gross miscalculation was made, that ensured that the war had to go on, when with judicious negotiation, it might have now been brought to a conclusion. This was a significant error, and what might have been had cheaply by judicious negotiation was instead arrogantly demanded and consequently thrown away.
Negotiations were opened confidentially to find a means to conclude a peace satisfactory to all parties, but these made little progress with the ambitions of the allies now so greatly inflated by their successes, even though the original aims of the Treaty of Grand Alliance were pretty well obtained. However, great success breeds exorbitant ambition, and the talk in Parliament in London was increasingly that there could be ‘No Peace without Spain’ and that Archduke Charles must be placed on the throne in Madrid, and Philip V deposed. Plainly this was only likely to be done if there was military success on the field in Spain, and so far the allies had found this to be elusive. This had not even been an objective of the Grand Alliance when it was formed, and proved to be a fatal and ultimately unattainable extension of war aims.
Chapter 8
Over the Seas to Spain
‘I thought fit to impart to you a new joy.’1
Whatever heartening successes were being gained by Prince Eugene and the Duke of Marlborough in Italy and the Low Countries, these mattered little for the expanded ambitions of the Grand Alliance if progress could not be made for the Austrian archduke’s cause in Spain. In the spring of 1706 Philip V attempted to recapture Barcelona, contrary to the advice of his grandfather in Versailles who urged a degree of caution: ‘I should have hesitated to recommend such a plan, but since you have made up your mind, it only remains for you to carefully consider the mode of carrying out your resolution.’2 Meanwhile, the newly-created Marshal Berwick was sent back to Spain, at Philip’s request, and he arrived in Madrid on 12 March. Concerned that the concentration of French and Spanish troops against Barcelona would leave Madrid exposed to an advance from Portugal, he ordered whatever troops could be gathered together to concentrate on holding the line in Estramadura. The Marquis de Villadarias in Andalusia refused a request to send troops to support Berwick, as he feared a fresh Anglo-Dutch attack on Cadiz, but the marshal was unconvinced, as any such attempt was unlikely while Barcelona was threatened by Philip V and Tessé’s army. Berwick went to Badajoz and found to his dismay that the best troops had already been taken from the garrison for the Barcelona operations, while the forces commanded by the Earl of Galway and the Marqués Das Minas, presently at Campo Mayor, were reported to number no fewer than 25,000. With no reinforcements coming from either Villadarias or from troops stationed in Galicia, Berwick made what hasty preparations he could to foil any advance by the allies but, as before, he found that adequate supplies were hard to obtain, and the force he could deploy was barely adequate for the task.
Operations to recover Barcelona continued in the meantime, and the French Mediterranean fleet under the command of the Comte de Toulouse anchored off the port on 1 April 1706, while General Legal arrived before the defences the next day with a force of some 9,000 troops. Philip V and Marshal Tessé joined him on 3 April, having bypassed the allied garrisons in Saragossa and Lerida, leaving their lines of supply and communications exposed as result. Meanwhile Marshal Noailles had advanced through Roussillion to take part in the operations, and the small allied garrison in Gerona was withdrawn as he approached. A skilful concentration of French and Spanish forces on land and sea had thus been achieved, with a besieging force 21,000 strong, the majority of whom were well-trained and equipped French soldiers. The Barcelona garrison under command of Count Uhlfeld comprised only about 3,000 troops, half of whom were irregulars with a tendency to please themselves where obeying orders were concerned. In addition the 5,000-strong city militia, enthusiastic and brave but ill-trained and poorly equipped, helped to man the defences where these were least exposed to attack. Reinforcements had been called for from the allied garrison in Tortosa and that withdrawn from Gerona, and Hamilton’s English Regiment of Foot arrived to augment the garrison just in time to avoid Tessé’s investment of the city. Meanwhile, the Count de Cifuentes was active with his Miquelets against the supply lines of Tessé’s army, harrying patrols and pickets, and raiding encampments under cover of dark.
The fortifications of Barcelona were in generally good condition, with the commanding outpost at the Montjuich having been strengthened by the chief engineer, Colonel Petit, to provide a useful bulwark against attack. A palisaded line of communication had been constructed and led from Montjuich to the main defences, allowing easy access to and from the town, and so a weakness in the defences that had been exploited by the allies when they took the place had been put right. On 4 April, Tessé attempted a coup de main, hoping to surprise the outwork with a sudden attack, but the effort was smartly repulsed by Hamilton’s Regiment, although French troops managed to drive some Catalan irregulars out of the Capuchin convent nearby. Recognising the need for a formal siege, Tessé now completed his investment of the city and began to construct lines of circumvallation to secure his own encampment.
Philip V took a keen interest in the proceedings, but whatever credit he thereby gained with the Spanish troops, who were undoubtedly glad to see their acknowledged king so active, his presence with the army was something of an irritation for Tessé, who found that his own authority was thereby undermined. ‘The king’s presence does more harm to his service than if he had stayed in Madrid,’ the marshal wrote rather peevishly to Versailles.3 The old problem of divided command was present once again. Philip’s personal safety was also a constant and lingering concern, and a raid by Cifuentes’s irregulars on the French and Spanish encampment on 5 April narrowly missed seizing him, although some of his camp equipment was carried off in triumph. The king thereafter slept on board one of Toulouse’s ships each night for security.
French engineers gradually reduced Fort Montjuich by skilful sapping, but the arrival of a powerful Anglo-Dutch squadron under command of Admiral Leake on 7 May forced Toulouse to sail away as he had firm instructions to avoid a general action at sea. The French naval commander had been warned of the allied warships’ approach by a Genoese merchantman, and Leake was just in time to see the topsails of the French fleet disappear over the distant horizon. The Earl of Peterborough, as active as ever, was with Leake having had himself rowed out to the flagship as the admiral passed the Valencian coastline. With allied reinforcements for the defenders being landed without real
hindrance, the siege of Barcelona quickly became a broken-backed enterprise, with the rear areas of the Franco-Spanish army under constant harrying from Catalan irregulars. Recognising the failure of the endeavour, on 11 May Philip V and his commanders abandoned their guns, stores and the hundreds of wounded, sick and convalescent soldiers, and withdrew, travelling on a circuitous passage through southern France, the fear being, apparently, that they might be exposed to attack on the road if they took a more direct route. A two-hour long total eclipse of the sun, the symbol of his grandfather, seemed to presage further misfortunes for the Bourbon claimant to the throne.
The young king wrote to his grandfather in a mood of understandable dejection: ‘I cannot express to you my grief at having to leave the Archduke in Barcelona, and I shall have no rest until I fight him wherever he is.’4 The Austrian claimant, however, was at the same time writing with quiet satisfaction to the Duke of Marlborough, that:
The War of the Spanish Succession (1701-1714) Page 17
