Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 60, No. 369, July 1846

No sooner was Tournay taken than the allied generals turned their eyes to Mons, the next great fortress on the road to Paris, and which, with Valenciennes, constituted the only remaining strongholds that lay on that line between them and Paris. So anxious was Marlborough to hasten operations against this important town, that on the very day on which the white flag was displayed from the citadel of Tournay, he dispatched Lord Orkney with all the grenadiers of the army, and twenty squadrons, to surprise Ghislain, and secure the passage of the Haine. On the 3d, the Prince of Hesse-Cassel was dispatched after him with 4000 foot and 60 squadrons. Lord Orkney, on arriving on the banks of the Haine, found the passage so strongly guarded that he did not deem it prudent to alarm the enemy by attempting to force them. The Prince of Hesse-Cassel, however, was more fortunate. He marched with such extraordinary diligence, that he got over forty-nine English miles in fifty-six successive hours; a rapidity of advance, for such a distance, that had never been surpassed at that, though it has been outdone in later times.²⁵ By this means he reached the Haine on the other side of Mons, and surprised the passage near Obourg, at two in the morning of the 6th, and at noon he entered the French lines of the Trouille without opposition, the enemy retiring with precipitation as he advanced. He immediately extended his forces over the valley of the Trouille, fixed his headquarters at the abbey of Belian, and with his right occupied in strength the important plateau of Jemappes, which intercepted the communication between Mons and Valenciennes. It was on this height that the famous battle was fought between the French Republicans under Dumourier in 1792: another proof among the many which history affords how frequently the crisis of war, at long distances of time from each other, takes place in the same place. By this decisive movement Marlborough gained an immense advantage; – Mons was now passed and invested on the side of France; and the formidable lines, thirty leagues in length, on which Marshal Villars had been labouring with such assiduity during the two preceding months, were turned and rendered of no avail.²⁶

While the Prince of Hesse-Cassel, with the advanced guard of the army, gained this brilliant success, Marlborough was rapidly following with the main body in the same direction. The force besieging Tournay crossed the Scheldt at the bridge of that town, and joined the covering force under Eugene. From thence they advanced to Sirant, where they were joined by Lord Orkney with his detachment, which had failed in passing the Haine. On the 6th, having learned of the success of the Prince of Hesse-Cassel, who had turned the enemy's lines, and got between Mons and France, the allied generals pushed on with the utmost expedition, and leaving their army to form the investment of Mons, joined the prince in the abbey of Belian. Both commanders bestowed on him the highest compliments for the advantages he had gained; but he replied, "The French have deprived me of the glory due to such a compliment, since they have not even waited my arrival." In truth, such had been the celerity and skill of his dispositions, that they had rendered resistance hopeless, and achieved success without the necessity of striking a blow. Meanwhile Marshal Boufflers, hearing a battle was imminent, arrived in the camp as a volunteer, to serve under Villars, his junior in military service; a noble example of disinterested patriotism, which, not less than the justly popular character of that distinguished general, raised the enthusiasm of the French soldiers to the very highest pitch.²⁷ Every thing announced a more sanguinary and important conflict between the renowned commanders and gallant armies now arrayed on the opposite sides, than had yet taken place since the commencement of the war.²⁸

During these rapid and vigorous movements, which entirely turned and broke through his much-vaunted lines of defence, Villars remained with the great body of his forces in a state of inactivity. Aware he was to be attacked, but ignorant where the blow was first likely to fall, he judged, and probably rightly, that it would be hazardous to weaken his lines at any one point by accumulating forces at another. No sooner, however, did he receive intelligence of the march of the Prince of Hesse-Cassel, than he broke up from the lines of Douay, and hastily collecting his forces, advanced towards that adventurous commander. At two in the morning of the 4th, he arrived in front of him with his cavalry; but conceiving the whole allied army was before him, he did not venture to make an attack at a time when his great superiority of force would have enabled him to do it with every chance of success. The movement of Villars, however, and general feux-de-joie which resounded through the French lines on the arrival of Marshal Boufflers, warned the allied leaders that a general battle was at hand; and orders were in consequence given to the whole army to advance at four o'clock on the afternoon of the 7th. A detachment of Eugene's troops was left to watch Mons, the garrison of which consisted only of eleven weak battalions and a regiment of horse, not mustering above five thousand combatants; and the whole remainder of the allied army, ninety thousand strong, pressed forward in dense masses into the level and marshy plain in the middle of which Mons is situated. They advanced in different columns, headed by Marlborough and Eugene; and never was a more magnificent spectacle presented, than when they emerged from the woods upon the plain, and ascended in the finest order, with their whole cavalry and artillery, as well as infantry, the undulating ground which lies to the south of that town. They arrived at night, and bivouacked on the heights of Quaregnon, near Genly, and thence on to the village of Quevy, in a line not three miles in length, and only five distant from the enemy; so that it was evident a general battle would take place on the following day, unless Villars was prepared to abandon Mons to its fate.²⁹

The French marshal, however, had no intention of declining the combat. His army was entirely fresh, and in the finest order; it had engaged in no previous operations; whereas a bloody siege, and subsequent fatiguing marches in bad weather, had sensibly weakened the strength, though they had not depressed the spirits, of the allied soldiers. The vast efforts of the French government, joined to the multitude of recruits whom the public distress had impelled into the army, had in an extraordinary degree recruited his ranks. After making provision for all the garrisons and detached posts with which he was charged, he could bring into the field no less than a hundred and thirty battalions, and two hundred and sixty squadrons; and as they had all been raised to their full complement, they mustered sixty-five thousand infantry, and twenty-six thousand horse, with eighty guns; in all, with the artillery, ninety-five thousand combatants. This vast array had the advantage of being almost entirely of one nation, speaking one language, and animated with one spirit; while the allied force was a motley array of many different faces and nations of men, held together by no other bond but the strong one of military success and confidence in their chief. Both armies were of nearly equal strength, under the command of the ablest and most intrepid commanders of their day; the soldiers of both had acted long together, and acquired confidence in each other; and both contained that intermixture of the fire of young, with the caution of veteran troops, which is of the happiest augury for military success. It was hard to say, between such antagonists, to which side the scales of victory would incline.³⁰

The face of the country occupied by the French army, and which was to be the theatre of the great battle which was approaching, is an irregular plateau, interspersed by woods and intersected by streams, and elevated from a hundred and fifty to two hundred feet above the meadows of the Trouille. Mons and Bavay, the villages of Quevrain and Giory, formed the angular points of this broken surface. Extensive woods on all the principal eminences both give diversity and beauty to the landscape, and, in a military point of view, added much to the strength of the position as defensible ground against an enemy. Near Malplaquet, on the west of the ridge, is a small heath, and immediately to the south of it the ground descends by a rapid slope to the Hon, which finds its way by a circuitous route by the rear of the French position to the Trouille, which it joins near Condé. The streams from Malplaquet to the northward all flow by a gentle slope through steep wooded banks to the Trouille, into which they fall near Mons. The woods on the plateau are the remains of a great natural forest which formerly covered the whole of these uplands, and out of which the clearings round the villages and hamlets which now exist, have been cut by the hands of laborious industry. Two woods near the summit level of the ground are of great extent, and deserve particular notice. The first, called the wood of Louvière, stretches from Longueville in a north-easterly direction to Cauchie; the second, named the wood Taisnière, of still larger size, extends from the Chaussée de Bois to the village of Bouson. Between these woods are two openings, or Trouées as they are called in the country – the Trouée de la Louvière, and the Trouée d'Aulnoet. Generally speaking, the ground occupied by the French, and which was to be the theatre of the battle, may be described as a rough and woody natural barrier, stretching across the high plateau which separates the Haine and the Trouille, and pervious only by the two openings of Louvière and Aulnoet, both of which are in a very great degree susceptible of defence.³¹

The allied army consisted of one hundred and thirty-nine battalions, and two hundred and fifty-three squadrons, with one hundred and five guns; mustering ninety-three thousand combatants. The two armies, therefore, were as nearly as possible equal in point of military strength – a slight numerical superiority on the part of the French being compensated by a superiority of twenty-five guns on that of the Allies. Among the French nobles present at the battle, were no less than twelve who were afterwards marshals of France.³² The son of James II., under the name of the Chevalier of St George, who combined the graces of youth with the hereditary valour of his race, was there; St Hilaire and Folard, whose works afterwards threw such light on military science, were to be found in its ranks. The Garde-du-corps, Mousquetaires gris, Grenadiers à cheval, French, Swiss, and Bavarian guards, as well as the Irish brigade, stood among the combatants. The reverses of Louis had called forth the flower of the nobility, as well as the last reserves of the monarchy.³³

Early on the morning of the 9th, Marlborough and Eugene were on the look-out at the Mill of Sart, with a strong escort, consisting of thirty squadrons of horse. From the reports brought in, it was soon ascertained that the whole enemy's army was in march towards the plain of Malplaquet, on the west of the plateau, and that Villars himself was occupying the woods of Lasnière and Taisnière. His headquarters were at Blaugnies, in the rear of the centre. The two armies were now only a league and a half separate, and Marlborough and Eugene were clear for immediately attacking the enemy, before they could add to the natural strength of their position by intrenchnents. But the Dutch deputies, Hooft and Goslinga, interfered, as they had done on a similar occasion between Wavre and Waterloo, and so far modified this resolution as to induce a council of war, summoned on the occasion, to determine not to fight till the troops from Tournay were within reach, and St Ghislain, which commanded a passage over the Haine, was taken. This was done next day, the fort being carried by escalade, and its garrison of two hundred men made prisoners; and on the day following, all the reserves from Tournay came up. But these advantages, which in themselves were not inconsiderable, were dearly purchased by the time which Villars gained for strengthening his position. Instead of pushing on to attack the allies, as Marlborough and Eugene had expected, to raise the siege of Mons, that able commander employed himself with the utmost skill and vigour in throwing up intrenchments in every part of his position. The nature of the ground singularly favoured his efforts. The heights he occupied, plentifully interspersed with woods and eminences, formed a concave semicircle, the artillery from which enfiladed on all sides the little plain of Malplaquet, so as to render it literally, in Dumont's words, "une trouée d'enfer." Around this semicircle, redoubts, palisades, abattis, and stockades, were disposed with such skill and judgment, that, literally speaking, there was not a single inequality of ground, (and there were many,) which was not turned to good account. The two trouées or openings, in particular, already mentioned, by which it was foreseen the Allies would endeavour to force an entrance, were so enfiladed by cross batteries as to be wellnigh unassailable. Twenty pieces of artillery were placed on a redoubt situated on an eminence near the centre of the field; the remainder were arranged along the field-works constructed along the lines. Half the army laboured at these works without a moment's intermission during the whole of the 9th and 10th, while the other were under arms, ready to repel any attack which might be hazarded. With such vigour were the operations conducted, that by the night of the 10th, the position was deemed impregnable.³⁴

During these two days, which were passed in inactivity, awaiting the coming up of the reinforcements from Tournay, which the council of war had deemed indispensable to the commencement of operations, Marlborough and Eugene had repeatedly reconnoitred the enemy's position, and were fully aware of its growing strength. Despairing of openly forcing such formidable lines, defended by so numerous and gallant an army, they resolved to combine their first attack with a powerful demonstration in rear. With this view, the rear-guard, which was coming up from Tournay under General Withers, of nineteen battalions and ten squadrons, received orders not to join the main body of the army, but, stopping short at St Ghislain, to cross the Haine there, and, traversing the wood of Blangris by a country road, assail the extreme left of the enemy at the farm of La Folie, when the combat was seriously engaged in front. Forty battalions of Eugene's army, under Baron Schulemberg, were to attack the wood of Taisnière, supported by forty pieces of cannon, so placed that their shot reached every part of the wood. To distract the enemy's attention, other attacks were directed along the whole line; but the main effort was to be made by Eugene's corps on the wood of Taisnière; and it was from the co-operation of the attack of Schulemberg on its flank, that decisive success was expected.³⁵ All the corps had reached their respective points of destination on the evening of the 10th. Schulemberg was near La Folie; Eugene was grouped, in four lines, in front of Taisnière; and the men lay down to sleep, anxiously awaiting the dawn of the eventful morrow.³⁶

At three in the morning of the 11th, divine service was performed, with the utmost decorum, at the head of every regiment, and listened to by the soldiers, after the example of their chief, with the most devout attention. The awful nature of the occasion, the momentous interests at stake, the uncertainty who might survive to the close of the day, the protracted struggle now to be brought to a decisive issue, had banished all lighter feelings, and impressed a noble character on that impressive solemnity. A thick fog overspread the field, under cover of which the troops marched, with the utmost regularity, to their appointed stations: the guns were brought forward to the grand battery in the centre, which was protected on either side by an épaulement to prevent an enfilade. No sooner did the French outposts give notice that the Allies were preparing for an attack, than the whole army stood to their arms, and all the working parties, who were still toiling in the trenches, cast aside their tools, and joyfully resumed their places in the ranks. Never, since the commencement of the war, had the spirit of the French soldier been so high, or so enthusiastic a feeling infused into every bosom. With confidence they looked forward to regaining the laurels, under their beloved commander, Marshal Villars, which had been withered in eight successive campaigns, and arresting the flood of conquest which threatened to overwhelm their country. No sooner did he mount on horseback at seven, than loud cries of "Vive le Roi!" "Vive le Maréchal de Villars!" burst from their ranks. He himself took the command of the left, giving the post of honour on the right, in courtesy, to Marshal Boufflers. On the allied side, enthusiasm was not so loudly expressed, but confidence was not the less strongly felt. They relied with reason on the tried and splendid abilities of their chiefs, on their own experienced constancy and success in the field. They had the confidence of veteran soldiers, who had long fought and conquered together. In allusion to the numerous field-works before them, and which almost concealed the enemy's ranks from their view, the sarcastic expression passed through the ranks, "We are again about to make war on moles." The fog still lingered on the ground, so as to prevent the gunners seeing to take aim; but at half-past seven it cleared up; the sun broke forth with uncommon brilliancy, and immediately the fire commenced with the utmost vigour from the artillery on both sides.³⁷

For about half an hour the cannon continued to thunder, so as to reach every part of the field of battle with their balls, when Marlborough moved forward his troops in échelon, the right in front, in order to commence his projected attack on the French centre and left. The Dutch, who were on the left, agreeably to the orders they had received, halted when within range of grape, and a violent cannonade was merely exchanged on both sides; but Count Lottum, who commanded the centre of twenty battalions, continued to press on, regardless of the storm of shot and grape with which he was assailed, and when well into the enemy's line, he brought up his left shoulders, and in three lines attacked the right of the wood of Taisnière. Schulemberg, at the same time, with his forty battalions to the right of Lottum, advanced against the wood of Taisnière in front; while Lord Orkney, with his fifteen battalions, as Lottum's men inclined to the right, marched straight forward to the ground they had occupied, and attacked the intrenchment before him in the opening. Eugene, who was with Schulemberg's men, advanced without firing a shot, though suffering dreadfully from the grape of the batteries, till within pistol-shot of the batteries. They were there, however, received by so terrible a discharge of all arms from the intrenchments – the French soldiers laying their pieces deliberately over the parapet, and taking aim within twenty yards of their opponents – that they recoiled above two hundred yards, and were only brought back to the charge by the heroic efforts of Eugene, who exposed his person in the very front of the line. Meanwhile, three battalions brought up from the blockade of Mons stole unperceived, amidst the tumult in front, into the south-eastern angle of the wood of Taisnière, and were making some progress, when they were met by three battalions of French troops, and a vehement fire of musketry soon rang in the recesses of the wood.

Meanwhile, Marlborough in person led on D'Auvergne's cavalry in support of Lottum's men, who speedily were engaged in a most terrific conflict. They bore without flinching the fire of the French brigade du Roi, and, crossing a ravine and small morass, rushed with fixed bayonets, and the most determined resolution, right against the intrenchment. So vehement was the onset, so impetuous the rush, that some of the leading files actually reached the summit of the parapet, and those behind pushing vehemently on, the redoubt was carried amidst deafening cheers. But Villars was directly in rear of that work; and he immediately led up in person a brigade in the finest order, which expelled the assailants at the point of the bayonet, and regained the work. Marlborough upon this charged at the head of D'Auvergne's cavalry; and that gallant body of men, three thousand strong, dashed forward, entered the intrenchments, which were, at the same time, surmounted by some of Lottum's battalions. While this desperate conflict was going on in front and flank of the wood, Withers, with his corps brought up from Tournay, was silently, and with great caution, entering the wood on the side of La Folie, and had already made considerable progress before any great efforts were made to expel them. The advance of this corps in his rear rendered it impossible for Villars any longer to maintain the advanced line of works in the front of the wood; it was therefore abandoned, but slowly, and in admirable order – the troops retiring through the trees to the second line of works in their rear, which they prepared to defend to the last extremity.

While this bloody conflict was raging in and around the wood of Taisnière, the half-hour during which the Prince of Orange had been directed to suspend his attack had elapsed, and that gallant chief, impatient of inactivity when the battle was raging with such fury on his right, resolved to move forward in good earnest. The Scotch brigade, led on by the Marquis of Tullibardine, headed the column on the left; to their right were the Dutch, under Spaar and Oxenstiern; while the Prince of Hesse-Cassel, with twenty-one squadrons, was in reserve to support and follow the infantry into the works, when an opening was made. On the word "march" being given, the troops of these various nations, with rival courage, advanced to the attack. The Scotch Highlanders, headed by the gallant Tullibardine,³⁸ rushed impetuously forward to the attack, despite a tremendous fire of grape and musketry which issued from the works, and succeeded in reaching the top of the intrenchment. But before they could deploy, they were charged by the French infantry in close order, and driven out. Tullibardine met a glorious death in the redoubt he had won. Equally gallant was the assault, and unpropitious the result, of the Prince of Orange's attack on the right towards the French centre. There, too, by a vehement rush the intrenchment was carried; but the troops which surmounted it had no sooner penetrated in than they were attacked by Boufflers, at the head of fresh troops in close order in front, while a powerful battery opened with grape on their flank. This double attack proved irresistible; the assailants were pushed out of the works with dreadful slaughter. Spaar lay dead on the spot; Hamilton was carried off wounded. Seeing his men recoil, the Prince of Orange seized a standard, and advancing alone to the slope of the intrenchment, said aloud, "Follow me, my friends; here is your post." But it was all in vain. Boufflers' men from the French second line had now closed up with the first, which lined the works, and a dense mass of bayonets, six deep, bristled at their summit behind the embrasures of the guns. A dreadful rolling fire issued from them; their position could be marked by the ceaseless line of flame, even through the volumes of smoke which enveloped them on all sides; and at length, after displaying the most heroic valour, the Prince of Orange was obliged to draw off his men, with the loss of three thousand killed, and twice that number wounded. Instantly the brigade of Navarre issued with loud shouts out of the intrenchments. Several Dutch battalions were driven back, and some colours, with an advanced battery, fell into the enemy's hands. Boufflers supported this sally by his grenadiers à cheval; but the Prince of Hesse-Cassel came up with his well-appointed squadron on the other side, and, after a short struggle, drove the French back into their works.

Hearing that matters were in this precarious state on the left, Marlborough galloped from the right centre, accompanied by his staff, where Lotturn's infantry and D'Auvergne's horse had gained such important advantages. Matters erelong became so alarming, that Eugene also followed in the same direction. On his way along the rear of the line, the English general had a painful proof of the enthusiastic spirit with which his troops were animated, by seeing numbers of the wounded Dutch and Hanoverians, whose hurts had just been bound up by the surgeons, again hastening to the front, to join their comrades, though some, faint from the loss of blood, yet tottered under the weight of their muskets. The reserves were hastily directed to the menaced front, and by their aid the combat was in some degree restored in that quarter; while Marlborough and Eugene laboured to persuade the Prince of Orange, who was burning with anxiety at all hazards to renew the attack, that his operations were only intended as a feint, and that the real effort was to be made on the right, where considerable progress had already been made. Order was hardly restored in this quarter, when intelligence arrived from the right that the enemy were assuming the initiative in the wood of Taisnière, and were pressing hard both upon the troops at La Folie and in front of the wood. In fact, Villars, alarmed at the progress of the enemy on his left in the wood, had drawn considerable reinforcements from his centre, and sent them to the threatened quarter. Marlborough instantly saw the advantage which this weakening of the enemy's centre was likely to give him. While he hastened back, therefore, with all imaginable expedition to the right, to arrest the progress of the enemy in that quarter, he directed Lord Orkney to advance, supported by a powerful body of horse on each flank, directly in at the opening between the two woods, and if possible force the enemy's intrenchments in the centre, now stripped of their principal defenders.

These dispositions, adopted on the spur of the moment, and instantly acted upon, proved entirely successful. Eugene galloped to the extreme right, and renewed the attack with Schulemberg's men, while Withers again pressed on the rear of the wood near La Folie. So vigorous was the onset, that the Allies gained ground on both sides of the wood, and Villars hastening up with the French guards to restore the combat near La Folie, received a wound in the knee, when gallantly heading a charge of bayonets, which obliged him to quit the field. In the centre, still more decisive advantages were gained. Lord Orkney there made the attack with such vigour, that the intrenchments, now not adequately manned, were at once carried; and the horse, following rapidly on the traces of the foot soldiers, broke through at several openings made by the artillery, and spread themselves over the plain, cutting down in every direction. The grand battery of forty cannon in the allied centre received orders to advance. In the twinkling of an eye the guns were limbered up, and moving on at a quick trot. They soon passed the intrenchments in the centre, and facing to the right and left, opened a tremendous fire of canister and grape on the dense masses of the French cavalry which there stood in the rear of the infantry, who were almost all in front among the works. These noble troops, however, bore up gallantly against the storm, and even charged the allied horse before they had time to form within the lines; but they were unable to make any impression, and retired from the attack sorely shattered by the allied artillery.

The battle was now gained. Villars' position, how strong and gallantly defended soever, was no longer tenable. Pierced through in the centre, with a formidable enemy's battery thundering on either side, in the very heart of his line, on the reserve squadrons, turned and menaced with rout on the left, it was no longer possible to keep the field. Boufflers, upon whom, in the absence of Villars in consequence of his wound, the direction of affairs had devolved, accordingly prepared for a retreat; and he conducted it with consummate skill, as well as the most undaunted firmness. Collecting a body of two thousand chosen horse yet fresh, consisting of the élite of the horse-guards and garde-du-corps, he charged the allied horse which had penetrated into the centre, and was by this time much blown by its severe fatigues in the preceding part of the day. It was accordingly worsted and put to flight; but all the efforts of this noble body of horsemen were shattered against Orkney's infantry, which, posted on the reverse of the works they had won, poured in, when charged, so close and destructive a fire, as stretched half of the gallant cavaliers on the plain, and forced the remainder to a precipitate retreat. Still the indefatigable Boufflers made another effort. Drawing a large body of infantry from the works on his extreme right, which had been little engaged, he marched them to the left, and reforming his squadrons again, advanced to the charge. But Marlborough no sooner saw this, than he charged the garde-du-corps with a body of English horse which he himself led on, and drove them back, while the infantry staggered and reeled like a sinking ship under the terrific fire of the allied guns, which had penetrated the centre. At the same time the Prince of Orange and the Prince of Hesse-Cassel, perceiving that the intrenchments before them were stript of great part of their defenders, renewed the attack; in ten minutes these works were carried; a tremendous shout, heard along the whole line, announced that the whole left of the position had fallen into the hands of the Allies.