But the enemy’s cavalry, composed of the élite of the French Army, were now advancing; the King drew his sword and placed himself at the head of his Grenadiers. Waving his sword, he cheered them on, the last King of England who led his soldiers into battle.
“Now boys,” he cried, “now for the honour of England; fire and behave bravely, and the French will soon run!”
All this was very fine, but the French did not run, at first; they came on in a wild charge and considerably shook our infantry, so much so, that it required all the energy of the King and his son—who, with the rank of Major-General, led the left wing—to get them steady again. The father and son certainly did not spare themselves on this day; even when the Duke was wounded in the leg he refused to leave the field. No wonder that poor Frederick at home was boiling with jealousy.
Maréchal Noailles from the other side of the river, where he was organizing a supporting movement, saw his nephew’s error, and hastened back to Dettingen; but he arrived too late.
King George, at the head of a brigade of infantry, had swept the French from their position and cleared the road to Hanau and the much needed food and stores. The French loss in the retreat was frightfully heavy, and the French Maréchal very wisely drew off the remainder of his troops to the other side of the river, with a list of killed and wounded which totalled up to six thousand men.
Thus ended the Battle of Dettingen, concerning King George’s part in which, Justin McCarthy in his “Four Georges,” makes the following comment:—
“George behaved with a great courage and spirit. If the poor, stupid, puffy, plucky little man did but know what a strange, picturesque, memorable figure he was as he stood up against the enemy at the Battle of Dettingen! The last King of England who ever appeared with his army in the battlefield. There, as he gets down off his unruly horse, determined to trust to his own stout legs—because as he says, they will not run away—there is the last successor of the Williams, and the Edwards, and the Henrys; the last successor of the Conqueror, and Edward the First, and the Black Prince, and Henry the Fourth, and Henry of Agincourt, and William of Nassau; the last English King who faces a foe in battle.”
FOOTNOTES:
[66] Marlborough to Lord Godolphin, September, 1702. To Sir H. Mann, July 19th, 1743.