A Popular History of England, From the Earliest Times to the Reign of Queen Victoria; Vol. IV

by François Guizot

The new cabinet had just been formed, under the direction of Lord Carteret, soon afterwards, in right of his mother, Lord Granville. Pulteney had declined all office. "I have too often protested my disinterestedness to occupy any place," he had said. When he perceived that influence as well as power had escaped him, it was too late to retrace his steps. The ministry as formed was already discussed in Parliament, as well as throughout the country, and was experiencing an opposition which would ere long become formidable. Carteret was intelligent, brilliant and amiable, unequal and uncertain. He allowed himself to be led, at times, even as far as debauchery: he always remained eloquent and adroit in diplomatic maneuvres. He had concentrated all his efforts on the maintenance of the king's favor, often neglecting his partisans, and relying on corruption to rally his friends. "What do the judges and bishops matter to me?" said he, contemptuously; "my concern is to make kings and emperors, and to preserve the European balance." "Very well," replied the office-seeker, so cavalierly denied; "those who do care for judges and bishops will be appealed to."

Thus began already the power of the Pelhams, who were more careful than Carteret to use such means of influence as the exercise of high offices placed in the hands of ministers or their friends.

The war was still being waged in Germany. With the fall of Walpole, England's neutrality had ended. Already a body of troops had taken the road for Flanders. Women of distinction, with the Duchess of Marlborough at their head, had collected by subscription the sum of one hundred thousand pounds sterling, which they successfully offered to the haughty Maria-Theresa. The king had taken into his pay six thousand Hessian soldiers. The cabinet proposed to raise in Hanover a body of sixteen thousand at England's expense. The opposition violently inveighed against this measure. "It is too evident," said Pitt, "that this great kingdom, which is powerful and formidable, is regarded as a province of a pitiful Electorate, and that troops are only raised in pursuance of a design long matured, in order to swallow up all the resources of our unhappy country." The proposal passed, however, and the king put himself at the head of the forces he had collected in Germany. The States-General of Holland had united their troops with his. The fortune of war had changed. Charles VII., a fugitive in his turn, driven from his hereditary States, which Marshal Broglie had evacuated, had no longer any hope, save in the aid of France. She alone sustained all the burden of the war, which she had not yet officially declared. In England they laughed at the state of matters in Europe. "Our situation is absurd," said Horace Walpole, the intelligent son of the great minister, who was constantly dabbling in politics, as in literature. "We have declared war on Spain without making it, and we make war on France without having declared it."

King George II., as well as his second son, the Duke of Cumberland, gave proof of striking bravery on the 17th of July, 1743, at the battle Dettingen, which was disastrous to France, despite the able preparations of Marshal Noailles. An imprudence of his nephew, the Duke de Grammont, decided the fate of the day. But the jealousy which existed between the English and German generals hindered the course of operations. A treaty concluded at Worms, on the 13th of September, between England, Austria and Sardinia, was badly received by Parliament, which, with good reason, deemed it more favorable to the interests of Hanover than to those of England. The name Hanoverian began to be used as an insult, and was applied at times to the king himself. All the influence that Walpole had preserved in Parliament, and his speech in the House of Lords, were necessary to obtain the maintenance of the foreign troops. Lord Wilmington had just died, and at this time it was by the advice of Walpole that Henry Pelham was called to fill his place at the head of the Treasury. One year later, in the month of November, 1744, a division occurred in the cabinet. In spite of the personal favor of the king, Carteret, then Lord Granville, yielded to the influence of Henry Pelham and his brother-in-law, the Duke of Newcastle. War was at length officially declared between France and England. The new ministers lately raised to power in the name of English interests, as against the German proclivities of the king, continued to hire Hanoverian troops. At the opening of the campaign of 1745, the Duke of Cumberland found himself at the head of the allies.

The Emperor Charles VII. had just died, and his son had treated with the Queen of Hungary. Already for two years Frederick II., being master of Silesia, had quitted the field of battle, and observed with curious and cool interest the struggles which were drenching Europe in blood, and serving to weaken his rivals. Uneasy at the progress which Maria Theresa was making, he re-entered the lists, however. King Louis XV. had taken the lead of his army. He had just arrived before Tournay, with the dauphin, who had recently been married to the daughter of the King of Spain. On the 9th of May, 1745, at the break of day, the hostile forces met near the little village of Fontenoy. The relation of this victory belongs to the history of France. Marshal Saxe, a foreigner, and a Protestant, was henceforth to maintain alone the glory and the high tradition of Louis Fourteenth's marshals. He was sick, and believed to be dying, but he caused himself to be borne on a litter at the head of the army. "The question is not to live, but to proceed," he had replied to Voltaire, who was astonished at sight of his preparations. The Austrians were few in number. The veteran general Königseck commanded a corps of eight thousand men. An attack directed by the English on the forest of Lane, which the French troops occupied, had been repulsed. General Ingoldsby had fallen back on the main body of the army, commanded by the Duke of Cumberland. "March straight before you, your highness," said Königseck to the prince. "The ravine in front of Fontenoy must be gained." The movements of the Dutch were slow and undecisive; the English gave way. They formed a deep and serried column, preceded and flanked by cannons. The French batteries thundered right and left; entire ranks fell in their tracks; they were soon replaced; cannons, dragged by hand opposite Fontenoy, and redoubts answered the French artillery. It was in vain that the French guards sought to capture the enemy's cannon. The two armies were at last face to face.

Frequent mention has been made of the interchange of courtesies, which took place between French and English officers, on both sides of the ravine. The English officers had saluted; Count Chabannes and the Duke de Biron, who were in advance, uncovered in their turn. "Gentlemen of the French guard, withdraw," cried Lord Charles Hay. "Withdraw yourselves, gentlemen of England," retorted Count d'Auteroche; "we are never the first to retreat." The English fusillade was mortal to the French guard. Their colonel, the Duke de Grammont, had been slain at the beginning of the battle. The soldiers yielded. The English crossed the ravine which protected Fontenoy. They advanced as though on parade; the majors each having a small cane in his hand, rested it lightly on the muskets of the soldiers, in order to regulate their fire. One after another the French regiments broke against this immovable column. The Duke of Cumberland had ceased to advance, but, impassive and victorious, through the calm bravery of his soldiers, he occupied the field of battle. Königseck sent him his felicitations.

Marshal Saxe had begged Louis XV. to retreat. "I know that he will do what he ought," replied the monarch, "but I stay where I am." The marshal had just concentrated his troops, in order to make a final effort. The Irish brigade in the French service, which was almost entirely composed of Jacobite exiles, headed the regiments which charged at once on the English. The Dutch had effected their retreat. The English column found itself overwhelmed. It finally gave way without disorder, and preserved to the end its bold front. The Duke of Cumberland, the last to retreat, as he had been the first to attack, recalled to his soldiers the glorious memories of Blenheim and Ramillies; he blew out the brains of an officer who took to flight. The military skill of the English generals had not equalled their heroism. The battle of Fontenoy gave the result of the campaign to France, but Queen Maria Theresa had just accomplished her great aim. Her husband had been raised to empire on the 13th of September, 1745. She had made a treaty with the King of Prussia. Louis XV. stood alone against Germany, which had become neutral, or which rallied round the reinstated empire. Great internal struggles henceforth absorbed the thoughts and efforts of England.

An attractive young man, bold and frivolous, Prince Charles Edward Stuart, the eldest son of the Chevalier St. George, had for a long time cherished the hope of recovering the throne of his fathers. Since the beginning of 1744, he had left Rome, where he was living with his father, attracted to Paris by the rumor of an invasion of England, which the ministers of Louis XV. desired to attempt. He was provided with letters patent, declaring him regent of the three kingdoms of England, Scotland and Ireland, the alter ego of the king, his father, charged, [in] his absence, with the exercise of royal authority. The projected attempt did not eventuate: the ships collected at Dunkirk were dispersed, as Prince Charles Edward had not been able to obtain an audience with Louis XV. For some time he maintained the strictest incognito. "I have taken a house a league from Paris, and I live there like a hermit," he wrote to his father. "This becomes however, the secret of the comedy." The repulse of the English at Fontenoy seemed a favorable opportunity to the young prince. "I have always had at heart," said he, "the re-establishment of my father's throne, but only with the aid of his own subjects." He was encouraged in his project by Cardinal de Tencin, who had lately obtained his hat by the influence of the dethroned monarch. "Why do you not try to cross in a ship to the north of Scotland?" he had said to the prince; "your presence can form a party and an army for you. France will be compelled to give you aid."

Charles Edward had kept his secret from the ministers of Louis XV. as he had kept it from King James. It was only on the 12th of June, 1745, that he wrote to his father, from the Chateau de Navarre, near Ivry: "Your Majesty would not desire me to have followed his example. You acted in 1715 as I do to-day, under very different circumstances; those which now present themselves are more encouraging. This will only transpire after the embarkation. The lot is cast. I have determined either to conquer or die, resolved that I am not to yield a foot so long as I shall have a man with me."