History of the Rise of the Huguenots, Vol. 2

by Henry Martyn Baird

[607] La Noue, c. xx.

[608] Ibid., ubi supra; De Thou, iv. (liv. xliv.) 150.

[609] Jacques de Crussol, Baron d'Acier (or, Assier), afterwards Duke d'Uzès, lieutenant-general of the royal armies in Languedoc, etc. According to the Abbé Le Laboureur (iii. 56-60), it was interest that induced him, a few years later, to become a Roman Catholic.

[610] Le Laboureur, Add. aux Mém. de Castelnau, ii. 588. The same author elsewhere (ii. 56-60) states the army as only 20,000. Jean de Serres, iii. 284, 285, and De Thou, iv. (liv. xliv.) 150-152, give an account of the difficulties encountered in bringing these troops to the place of rendezvous, and enumerate the leaders and contingents of the three provinces. According to the latter, the total was 23,000 men. See Agrippa d'Aubigné, liv. v., c. 5 (i. 271).

[611] Jean de Serres, iii. 286, 291, 292; De Thou, iv. (liv. xliv.), 153, 154; Agrippa d'Aubigné, ubi supra; Davila, bk. iv., p. 132, 133; Le Laboureur, ii. 588, 589. It is more than usually difficult to ascertain the loss of the Huguenots at Messignac. Jean de Serres, who states it at 600, and Davila, who says that it amounted to 2,000 foot and more than 4,000 horse, are the extremes. De Thou sets it down at more than 1,000; D'Aubigné at 1,000 or 1,200; Castelnau at 3,000 foot and 300 horse; and Le Laboureur, following him, at over 3,000 men.

[612] Hist. univ., liv. v., c. 6 (i. 273).

[613] "Discours envoyé de la Rochelle," accompanying La Mothe Fénélon's despatch of January 20, 1569. Correspondance diplomatique, i. 137, 138. Another letter of a later date gives even larger figures—30,000 foot (25,000 of them arquebusiers) and 7,000 or 8,000 horse, besides recruits expected from Montauban. Ibid., i. 147.

[614] Upwards of 23,000 horse and 200 ensigns of foot (which we may perhaps reckon at 40,000 men). Despatch of La Mothe Fénélon, Dec. 5, 1568, Corresp. diplomatique, i. 29.

[615] Mémoires de Tavannes, iii. 38. De Thou, iv. 154, assigns 18,000 foot and 3,000 horse to Condé; and 12,000 foot and 4,000 horse, exclusive of the Swiss (who, according to Tavannes, numbered 6,000), to Anjou.

[616] Jean de Serres, iii. 295, 296.