The nucleus or advance guard of the army was assembled in Italy, and marched by way of Mont Cenis and through Savoy, Burgundy, and Lorraine to Thionville, then a town of the Netherlands, now included in France. In August 1567 it crossed the border, and continued its march to Brussels, meeting with no opposition on the way. Alva at once placed garrisons in the principal towns, and commenced the erection of fortresses to overawe them, the principal of which was the famous citadel of Antwerp. He sent letters to the different cities, signed by the king, commanding them to render absolute obedience to him. The next step was the arrest and close confinement of as many of the nobles as he could get hold of who had at any time opposed any arbitrary act of the sovereign. The counts Egmont and Hoorn were entrapped by letters to them from the king, praising their conduct and declaring his confidence in them. Conscious of having done no wrong, and lulled into a feeling of security by these assurances from Philippe, they placed themselves in the power of Alva, and found themselves his prisoners.
Proceedings of the Duke of Alva.
Then was established that murderous mockery of a tribunal, known as the Council of Blood. It was composed of a number of creatures of Alva, some of whom were Flemish nobles of the worst type ready to pour out the blood of their countrymen at his bidding, others Spaniards of the same character. It dispensed with legal formalities, and made nought of charters and privileges. The whole population of the Netherlands was at its mercy. Its agents sent in lists of names, and with hardly a pretence of examination, men, scores of men at a time, were sentenced to confiscation of all their property and death on the scaffold. This infamous Council of Blood met for the first time on the 20th of September 1567 in an apartment of Alva’s residence in Brussels. His intention was to crush out all opposition to absolutism, to exterminate all adherents of the reformed religion, and to raise a large revenue by confiscation of property.
Everyone who valued freedom and could flee from the provinces did so now without delay. The neighbouring German states were crowded with refugees, and in many Flemish and Dutch towns industry entirely ceased, for artisans and mechanics had abandoned them in despair. It is highly probable that the larger number of those so-called Germans who settled in South Africa in later years were really descendants of Netherlanders who left their fatherland at this time.
Historical Sketches.
Margaret of Parma was nominally regent still, but on the 9th of December 1567 she resigned, and the monster Alva became governor-general of the provinces.
The prince of Orange, his brothers Louis and Adolf of Nassau, Count Hoogstraaten, and several other nobles of less note had retired into Germany before the arrival of the Spanish troops. Alva confiscated their property in the Netherlands, but they had possessions beyond the border which he could not reach. They had been faithful subjects of Philippe to this time, though they had striven by peaceful means to preserve the constitutions of the provinces, but now they could not look calmly on while the very life was being trampled out of their country. In April 1568 Orange engaged troops in Germany, and sent three small armies into the Netherlands in hope that the people would rise in a body and assist to drive the Spaniards out. But he was disappointed. The people were for the moment completely cowed. Two of his armies were utterly annihilated by the disciplined Spanish troops, and though the third, commanded by his brother Louis, gained a victory at Heiligerlee, near Winschoten, in the province of Groningen, it led to no substantial result. Count Adolf of Nassau fell in this battle. So the war for freedom began, a war that was carried on without intermission for forty-one years.
Alva with an overpowering force marched against Count Louis, and on the 21st of July 1568 attacked him at Jemmingen, a village on the left bank of the Ems near its entrance into the Dollart, within the German border. It was not so much a battle as a slaughter that followed. Of ten thousand men under his command, the count lost seven thousand slain, and with difficulty made his escape from the disastrous field while the remainder were scattering in every direction. Alva then proceeded to Utrecht, where he reviewed an army of thirty thousand infantry and seven thousand cavalry, a force that he believed sufficient to overawe the whole of the northern provinces.
Successes of Alva.
Early in October the prince of Orange invaded Brabant from Germany with thirty thousand men, of whom nine thousand were cavalry. Many of these were undisciplined refugees, but some were trained German soldiers. Several smaller bands joined the prince subsequently, though not a city opened its gates to him, so great was the terror that Alva inspired. The difficulty of providing food for such a number of men for any length of time was insurmountable, and the Spanish general therefore did not choose to risk an engagement, but watched his opponent closely. On one occasion, on the 20th of October, he was able to cut off a rearguard of three thousand men under Count Hoogstraaten, and nearly exterminated them. Hoogstraaten himself escaped, but died of a wound a few days afterwards. The prince of Orange, disappointed in his expectation of a general rising, and without a single stronghold as a base of operations, was obliged to retreat to Germany and disband his troops. He had spent all the money he could raise, and was heavily in debt. Nothing could have been gloomier than the prospect then before him, but he still cherished hope and trusted in God. He had passed through different stages of religious belief, but did not openly join the Calvinist church until October 1573.