Stanhope was eager to make the most of the success gained at Saragossa and press on to Madrid, but Archduke Charles had his doubts, writing to his wife rather crisply that ‘If this plan of the English should succeed all the glory will be theirs; if it fail, all the loss will be mine.’31 Von Starhemberg was also reluctant to advance too far and too quickly to the south, and his inclination was instead pursue Philip V and his beaten army. A more promising course would certainly have been to attempt to bring Philip to battle once more, and inflict a final and decisive defeat before Vendôme and his reinforcements could take the field; however, the lure of the undefended capital of Spain was too strong.32 An opportunity would be missed, and a measure of Philip V’s enduring success in the wider context was clearly seen on 28 September when the archduke entered Madrid. The king had gone with his family and a large retinue of Spanish notables to Valladolid a couple of weeks previously. The welcome that the Austrian claimant received was very cool, with houses shut up and no formalities offered, contrasting markedly with the enthusiastic reception of Philip on his arrival at Valladolid. ‘I am very pleased,’ the king wrote mendaciously, ‘that the English have brought the Archduke to Madrid; he will have occasion to see the disposition of the people in my capital.’33
The arrival of the allied army in Madrid enabled the colours lost at the awful defeat at Almanza three years’ earlier to be recovered by their rightful owners:
General Stanhope sent a Captain with fifty troopers to the convent of Our Lady of Arocha to take away all the colours and standards that had been laid there by Philip V since the start of the war. They were distributed to soldiers from each nation that they had been captured from, especially at the battle of Almanza. They carried them in triumph through the streets of this city with as much pride as if they had been taken in battle, rather than down from the walls of a church.34
It was hoped that concerns about the provisioning of the allied army would be addressed by opening up lines of communication and supply both southwards to Valencia and westwards to Portugal. Stanhope went on with a strong detachment to occupy Toledo, where it was hoped he would be joined by the Anglo-Portuguese forces advancing from the frontier. ‘We will have a garrison in Toledo,’ Stanhope wrote to the Earl of Galway, ‘and upon notice from you, will, if you judge necessary, make one or two marches even beyond that place.’35 However, the Portuguese troops commanded by the Count de Vila Verde, having taken Barca Rota and Xeres de los Caballeros, then received instructions to retire westwards and promptly did so. Stanhope, it was said with prophetic gloominess, ‘had carried his men on but won’t know how to get them back again’.36 The extended allied position was dangerous, and their army in Castile was out on the end of a very long, unsupported and bending branch.
While these stirring events unfolded in Spain, Great Britain and France had re-opened the confidential discussions to see what terms for a general peace might be arranged. The government in London had changed with the anti-war Tory party coming to power in Parliament in 1710. Such negotiations, while informal, cut across the terms of the treaty signed by the British and the Dutch, and across the more overt negotiations that had been in progress for some time, only to fall flat over the controversial clauses. The Tories, committed to a ‘good’ peace and tired of endless war, had gained the ascendancy in London, and could not be ignored. What could be achieved remained to be seen, but the unexpected success for the allies at Saragossa and the occupation of Madrid, had repercussions in those protracted discussions, with a British minister telling his French counterpart, the Marquis de Torcy: ‘We must wait for the face of things in Spain to change a little before negotiation, and see if the King of Spain will be absolutely driven out by his rival King Charles.’37 The British were not alone in the alliance in feeling that they had every reason to play for time, while the war in Spain tottered onwards.
Holland was exhausted by the conflict, its effort in terms of manpower and money over the preceding eight years had been immense and ‘her strength was ebbing away with the drain of war’.38 Unlike the late 1690s, when William III could negotiate with the French on behalf of both the Maritime Powers to their mutual benefit, the two sets of politicians in London and at The Hague pursued the same general course but with differing ambitions and aspirations. The need for a peace that the Dutch sought was obscured by the lure of a new treaty offered by astute British politicians, mindful of the concurrent need to keep them in the war for the time being. Everything that Holland sought was offered – even the British monopoly on trade agreed between Archduke Charles and Earl Stanhope in 1707 was set to one side so that Dutch merchants could equally benefit from the commercial opportunities that would come with eventual peace. Minorca would be given up to Charles, freeing trade routes in the western Mediterranean from any British stranglehold, although there was no mention of leaving Gibraltar. Equally alluring was the offer of a greatly enlarged battier in the southern Netherlands; the towns of Nieupoort, Ypres, Menin, Tournai, Condé, Valenciennes, Mauberge, Charleroi, Namur, Hal, Dendermode and even Lille, in addition to the forts at Knokke and Damme, would pass into the hands of Dutch garrisons, with all the tax-raising potential and commercial opportunities that went with them, denuding the Habsburg claimant of those same sums and prospects in the process. Only the port of Ostend, vital for British interests, was excluded from what the Dutch had sought. Upper Guelderland, promised to the King in Prussia in return for his valiant support for the Grand Alliance was to go to Holland instead (the king, naturally enough, was not consulted).
The new Barrier Treaty was signed in October 1709, and ratified before the end of the year. In this way the Dutch aimed too high and in effect signed away their future, binding themselves to more years of ruinously expensive war, but the fact that the terms of the treaty would not be deliverable when peace at last came could not be foreseen or perhaps even imagined. When the negotiations with the French resumed at Gertruydenberg early in 1710, the Dutch were resolute in their support for the British demand of the throne in Madrid for the Archduke and nothing less. Again Louis XIV had to undertake to remove his grandson by force if need be, but the absurdity of this repeated demand was apparent to those astute enough, or willing enough, to see it: ‘Nothing but seeing so great men believe it, could ever incline me to think France reduced so low to accept such conditions.’39
The allied campaign in Flanders in 1710 proceeded at a stately and outwardly victorious pace. Unwilling to risk another outright battle such as that fought at Malplaquet the previous autumn, Villars stuck to his lines of defence, and trusted to his fortress belt to fight his battles. This was a wise policy, and although Marlborough and Eugene were successful and seized a string of French-held fortresses, they were each valiantly defended and the cost in casualties and effort was high. There was little glamour in such a campaign, and the duke’s critics in London were more strident in their complaints concerning his conduct of the war. Louis XIV regretted the loss of these places, of course, but he was buying time while the allied resolve, energy and unity of purpose gradually weakened. During the siege of Douai, Villars wrote to Versailles for advice, and the king’s reply was illuminating:
It is not possible for me to give precise orders from this distance. I have explained to you my idea, and you know well the reasons that make me hope to be able to oblige my enemies to raise the siege of Douai. Their army would have small chances to retreat if you should succeed in defeating them. While they still await some troops that have not yet come up … However, if you find the enemy too well posted to be able to attack them without reasonable hopes for success, it would be rash to engage them.40
The French garrison in Douai submitted at the end of June, and were granted the honours of war and permitted to march out. Marlborough wrote to London: ‘Douai and Fort Scarpe being surrendered, the giving up of the latter will save us a good deal of time and a great many men’s lives.’41 Two weeks later the Duke had invested Bethune, and went on to lay siege to and capture
both Aire-sur-la-Lys and St Venant, but when the campaign season in the Low Countries came to a weary close that autumn, the allied losses in this gruelling warfare were startling. In the four sieges undertaken, the army’s losses totalled over 19,000 killed and wounded, with thousands more soldiers languishing in hospitals due to the rigours of operating in the foul weather that had set in. The French casualties, by comparison, were relatively modest, at just some 6,000 killed and wounded, in addition to prisoners taken and paroled. Villars was suffering still from the musket-ball lodged in his knee, and in mid-September had sought the king’s permission to retire and take the curative waters at Aix-la-Chapelle, which was given with some evident reluctance: ‘I desire the complete recovery of your wound too much not to consent to anything that will contribute to it. You may leave on the 20th of this month.’42 Marshal d’Harcourt took over the command of the army for the time being.
The fortunes of Philip V had appeared to be bleak after a summer of repeated defeat at Almenara, Saragossa and the loss of Madrid, and increasing numbers of Spanish grandees began to hesitantly indicate their belated and rather opportunistic support for the Habsburg cause. In such deteriorating circumstances Louis XIV had to intervene once more or perhaps see his grandson, and French interests in Spain, ruined. Negotiations with the representatives of the Grand Alliance to try and arrange a peace stuttered on, but were suspended in July. The Duc de Vendôme, brashly confident as ever, had been sent to take lead the campaign in the peninsula with 8,000 fresh French troops, and much urgently needed supplies and munitions. On 20 September Vendôme arrived in Valladolid to confer with Philip V and to formulate a new strategy to remedy the losses of the summer. The French commander was impressed by the quality of the Spanish troops he saw, and reported favourably to Versailles on the subject. Louis XIV understood, and found the means to reinforce the effort in Spain still more. It was decided that the Marquis de Bay should take command once more in Estramadura to hold off the Portuguese, while simultaneously the Duc de Noailles would attack Catalonia from the north. Vendôme would manoeuvre against the main allied army in Castile and try to catch Stanhope’s exposed detachment on the river Tagus in the process. By 6 October 1710 Vendôme, whose reputation for indolence was often belied by driving energy on campaign, was at Salamanca with 14,000 troops, and he quickly pushed forward to Placentia and then Almaraz on the Tagus, where he destroyed the important bridge across the river. Stanhope was some thirty miles to the east, and he withdrew to Toledo while the French commander followed him to establish his own camp at Talavera de la Reina. By now Vendôme’s army had increased to 25,000 horse and foot, and any lingering hopes that Stanhope might combine forces, or even establish a line of supply, with the Portuguese under the Count de Villa Verde were well and truly dead.
In the meantime, von Starhemberg was reluctant to winter his soldiers in Castile, with existing lines of supply and communication to Catalonia exposed and susceptible to interference. Madrid remained unwelcoming, and the archduke, bitterly disappointed at the reception he had received, left for Saragossa and then Barcelona in early November. The allied campaign had been a failure, early successes had not been followed up, and what could be saved was to be saved, but little more. Von Starhemberg and his army marched out on 11 November, and Philip V escorted by 4,000 cavalry re-entered the capital on 3 December, receiving a rapturous welcome from the populace: ‘It took many hours for his triumphal carriage to pass through the main streets, since the crowds were immense.’43 This was the true measure of Philip’s success and strength, and conversely also of the fatal weakness of that of Archduke Charles, in the matter of the throne of Spain. True to form, Philip refused to take part in any premature victory celebrations or vindictive reprisals, and left Madrid on 6 December to join Vendôme on campaign in his pursuit of the allied army.
Von Starhemberg combined forces with Stanhope once more at Chinchon between the Tagus and Jarama rivers. The allied army then withdrew towards Catalonia in three separate columns, the main force under von Starhemberg with Stanhope and the Marquis de Atalaya marching on either side; to try and use a single road would make progress and gathering supplies difficult, and Vendôme was bound to be in pursuit. This much was practical and made sense, but command and control of the movement was all the more complicated in the process, and the ability of any one column to support either of the others was in doubt. Stanhope was harassed by French cavalry and local irregulars on the route, and had to turn repeatedly and beat them off. ‘We kept on marching very slowly, and every little while facing about towards the enemy.’44 On 8 December the 4,000-strong British detachment, four regiments of horse and eight of foot – all not at anything like full strength – was overtaken at Brihuega on the right bank of the river Tajuna. Stanhope had halted there to gather and grind grain so that his troops could have bread, and was unaware that his opponents had made such good time in their pursuit and were closing in on him. As the danger became apparent an urgent request was belatedly sent to the field-marshal, who was twelve miles away at Cifuentes, to march to Stanhope’s aid. It was to no avail, and after a sharp bombardment by Vendôme’s gunners on Tuesday 9 December, the walls of Brihguega were stormed and fierce fighting raged through the streets of the small town. A British dragoon recalled that:
We were posted at a gate of the town, where our officers thought it to be the weakest of the all the town’s, and as the enemy knew, for they set the gate on fire three times, but we did put it out as fast and kept them out to that degree that could not be well expected, for we had no cannon … we should have kept them out longer but now our ammunition began to be wanting that our men was [were] forced to be careful with it.45
After a gallant defence of the dilapidated defences, with 150 soldiers falling in the fighting for the gateway alone, and with their ammunition almost exhausted, the British troops had no choice but to submit to Vendôme’s stormers. ‘When the parley was heard,’ the anonymous dragoon wrote, ‘they came to our breastwork and talked with us … the reason we got good quarters [terms], was that the enemy knew that our General Starhemberg was coming to our relief.’46 Signal guns had been fired by von Starhemberg to indicate to his ally that he was closing in as quickly as he could, but in the confusion of the street fighting these guns were not heard or not understood. Stanhope’s explanation of the reason behind the capitulation, given in his report on his eventual release from captivity, was that ‘I thought myself in confidence obliged to try and save so many brave men who had done good service to the Queen, and will, I hope, live to do so again’.47 Good terms were certainly granted by the French commander for the capitulation of Stanhope’s small force, some 3,000 of whom were marched away as unwounded prisoners. Unfortunately those good terms were not always observed and some of the prisoners, particularly the junior ranks, were brutally treated before they were eventually exchanged. The clear victory for Vendôme was welcome, but had still not been bought cheaply, as his casualties were nearly 1,300 killed and wounded that cold and clear day in December.
The very next day Vendôme clashed with von Starhemberg and the main allied army at the village of Villaviciosa, about two miles upstream from Brihuega. Philip V had the command of the Franco-Spanish right wing in the battle, and his cavalry charged and swept through the allied camp with the Dutch generals Belcastel and St-Amand amongst those killed in the melee. The field-marshal kept his composure and reinforced his line where it was most threatened and his troops stood their ground admirably. After an afternoon and evening of heavy combat, von Starhemberg had fought Vendôme to a standstill, and camped on the field that night. Technically the victor, the Austrian was heavily outnumbered and to stay risked catastrophe. He withdrew his army the following morning, intact but badly mauled, having suffered almost 4,000 casualties and the loss of many heavy guns which could not be got away. Also abandoned were the French and Spanish guns seized in the battle, after they had been spiked and the carriages smashed. Vendôme, who had lost a similar number of men in t
he battle, let his opponents go: his army was equally battered and enough had been achieved. The French commander was criticised for not following von Starhemberg and trying to bring him to battle once more, but his troops had been too hard hit at both Brihuega and Villaviciosa to do anything more for the time being. Vendôme still claimed the action to be a victory, of course, but it could only count as a heavily qualified one.
Philip V’s rather specious report to his grandfather on the events of the day read, ‘the debris of the enemy retired in much haste, licking their wounds’.48 The allied army reached Saragossa in fairly good order on 23 December, where much of the stores and materiel collected for the campaign had to be burned. With insufficient strength to hold on to Aragon, the allies began to withdraw to Tarragona and Barcelona on 6 January 1711 with little more than 7,000 troops still under command, including those few British units that had not been at the defeat at Brihuega. Desertions and sickness had taken a heavy toll in the aftermath of the recent reverses. Archduke Charles certainly maintained a foothold of sorts between the Catalan triangle of Barcelona, Igualada and Tarragona, but Vendôme had achieved a notable success in those autumn and winter months and re-occupied all of Castile and Aragon without further real opposition. The Habsburg cause in Spain was now irretrievably damaged, and this was increasingly acknowledged to be so – King Philip V was back in Madrid and likely to remain there.
Although wintry weather had set in, the Duc de Noailles pursued his campaign from Roussillon with a 19,000-strong army, and began a siege of Gerona on 15 December. The fortress was well provisioned, and sitting close to the junction of the river Donia with the Ter, was difficult to approach with battering artillery. The garrison, commanded by Count Tattenbach, resisted well and an outwork known as Fort Rouge was only abandoned after it had been undermined and seriously damaged. The French battery positions were then flooded due to heavy rain and the rivers rising, and it was not unitl 14 January 1711 that Noailles could re-establish his siege operations properly. A breach in the main walls began to be made, and on 23 January a storming party took possession of the covered way preparatory to entering the breach itself. Count Tattenbach had long understood that he could not expect to be relieved by von Starhemberg, and having done his best in adverse circumstances he submitted the next day. He and his troops were granted the honours of war for their well-handled defence of the fortress, and permitted to march out with colours flying and drums bravely beating.
The War of the Spanish Succession (1701-1714) Page 24
