Villeroy had chosen his ground with some skill. His right occupied the village of Tavières, which stood on a slight eminence above the Mehaigne, and was protected by that stream. His centre rested upon the village of Ramillies, which, with the mound called the tumulus of Ottomond behind it, formed the key of the position. His left was defended by the marshes in which the stream of the little Gheet rises. The bulk of his troops were massed at Tavières and Ramillies, and his left being so well defended by the nature of the ground was very weakly held. The quick eye of Marlborough soon detected this defect. He saw too that owing to the nature of the ground within his own position he could move troops from his own right to his centre without being observed by the enemy. On these two facts he based his plan of battle. Early in the morning of the 23d of May he directed a strong and imposing attack against the French left. Villeroy thinking that he was going to force his way over the marshes of the little Gheet, as he had forced his way over the marshes of the Nebel, began to hurry up troops from his centre in hot haste to defend his threatened left. Directly Marlborough saw this movement, he marched the bulk of his troops from his right to his centre under cover of the ground, so that the operation could not be seen by the enemy, merely leaving enough men before the French left to keep Villeroy persuaded that the main attack was still being made in that quarter. When all was prepared he suddenly launched the bulk of his army upon the weakened French centre between Tavières and Ramillies. Tavières was carried by the impetuous rush but the battle was not yet won. The Maison du Roi, mindful of their old fame, and burning to avenge the disgrace of Blenheim, checked the advance of the allies upon Ramillies by repeated and heroic charges. The French infantry hurried back to their old posts from the left, and round the village of Ramillies the battle swayed backwards and forwards for some time. At last the French fell slowly back, the village was won, and the centre of the French position forced. Villeroy gave the signal for a retreat which quickly changed into a rout. His army was destroyed as a fighting force. In rapid succession the chief towns of the Netherlands opened their gates to the victorious allies, and the French were driven back to the line of the frontier fortresses.
Expedition of the Archduke Charles to Spain.
The battle of Turin and the battle of Ramillies had reduced France to the line of her frontiers, but in the next year a gleam of success visited the arms of her indefatigable master. Marlborough was too much occupied with the negotiations at Altranstädt and hampered by the badness of the weather to attempt anything of importance, while on the Rhine Villars succeeded in capturing the lines of Stolhofen and preventing the imperialists from moving. But the best news came from Spain. In the year 1703 through the exertions of Methuen, the English ambassador at Lisbon, a treaty had been negotiated between England and Portugal, which had the effect of making Portugal the devoted political adherent of England for more than a century, and of introducing English statesmen to the too seductive influences of port wine. By the accession of Portugal to the Grand Alliance an opening was made for the archduke Charles to make good his claims to his kingdom. In 1704 he landed at Lisbon with a force of 12,000 English and Dutch troops under Schomberg with the object of invading Spain. The expedition met with little success and Galway replaced Schomberg in 1705. In the same year the English ministry sent the earl of Peterborough at the head of 5000 men to the assistance of the duke of Savoy, but gave him permission to employ himself in Spain if he found an opportunity. Peterborough, who was a man of brilliant imagination and boastful temperament, induced the archduke to trust himself to his guidance. Sailing round the coast of Spain he landed in Catalonia, captured Barcelona, chiefly through the efforts of prince George of Darmstadt in October 1705, and quickly made himself master of Arragon.
His power limited to Catalonia.
In the following year Galway determined to support the success achieved in Arragon by marching upon Madrid from Portugal. The French armies were engaged in a fruitless siege of Barcelona, and Galway occupied Madrid and proclaimed the archduke Charles as king almost without opposition. But now the political wisdom of the determination of Louis not to force a foreign king upon the Spaniards against their will showed itself. A national opposition to Charles quickly grew up in 1706, just as it did a century later to Joseph Buonaparte. Wherever the English soldiers were quartered, all was submission. Directly their backs were turned all was opposition. To make things worse disease broke out among the troops, and Galway found it necessary to retire from Madrid and join Charles and Peterborough in Arragon. In the next year he determined to repeat the attempt, and leaving Charles at Barcelona sailed down to Valencia, and marched from there on Madrid. At Almanza he was met by Berwick, who had lately been strongly reinforced from the army of Italy, and was completely crushed. Valencia and Arragon were lost, and the power of Charles limited to the turbulent province of Catalonia. From that time the allies ceased for some years to make any serious efforts to oust Philip V. by force from the throne of Spain. Galway was recalled and Stanhope appointed in his place, but with the exception of the capture of Port Mahon in Minorca in 1708 he was unable to achieve anything of importance. Having failed in open warfare the allies found diplomacy a better weapon with which to effect the retirement of Philip V.
Great efforts of Louis in 1708.
The security of Spain and the defeat of the imperialists on the Rhine in 1707 nerved Louis to make a great effort in 1708 to recover the ground which he had lost. He fitted out a fleet to land the Chevalier in Scotland and take advantage of the hostility felt to the Act of Union with England, which had been lately passed. He placed one army under Berwick on the Moselle to watch Eugene and the imperialists, while the main force under Vendôme advanced and occupied almost without opposition the great towns of Ghent and Bruges in Flanders, and established itself behind the Scheldt, prepared to move forward when Berwick was ready to co-operate. In July, finding Marlborough still inactive, Vendôme advanced his right wing as far as Mons, and laid siege to Oudenarde in the centre, thus spreading himself out in an extended line over the whole country between Mons and Bruges. Marlborough saw his opportunity. Sending in haste to Eugene to join him with his cavalry he struck sharply at the centre of the French position. Vendôme at once perceived his mistake and concentrated his army on Oudenarde by a hurried retreat. Marlborough and Eugene followed him with all speed, pushed his rear guard over the Scheldt, and finally forced it to turn and give battle a few miles from Oudenarde on the left bank of the river. The battle did not begin till three o’clock in the afternoon. It was a soldiers’ fight. Each regiment as it came up took ground as it best could and engaged. But the allies had the advantage of a single command. The battle of Oudenarde, 1708. The French generals Vendôme and the duke of Burgundy in the excitement and hurry of a disorganised melée gave contradictory orders, and made confusion worse confounded. Eventually Marlborough succeeded in outnumbering the French right, turning it and driving it off the field. That operation put an end to the battle. The French retired on Ghent. Marlborough had succeeded in interposing his army between the French and the frontier. Nothing stood between him and Paris except the great fortresses of the frontier, of which Lille was the greatest. It is said that he wished to neglect that fortress altogether and march straight upon Paris, but the scheme was too bold even for Eugene, considering that Boufflers held the place with 15,000 men and Berwick was at Mons with 30,000. In August the siege was begun. Eugene took charge of the trenches, while Marlborough, posted between the Lys and the Scheldt, protected the convoys coming from Ostend, and prevented Berwick or Vendôme from marching to the assistance of the doomed city. Neither dared to attempt a rescue. Capture of Lille. They contented themselves with trying to cut off convoys. After an attempt of this sort had been entirely defeated at Wynendaal on September 27th, more by the valour of General Webb than by the skill of Marlborough, Lille could hold out no longer. On the 22nd of October the city surrendered. Vendôme made his way safely to Mons, which with Namur now remained the only great fortress in the hands of France. Paris lay open to the advance of the allies.
Unpopularity of the war in England.
But just in proportion as the opportunities for a brilliant and decisive campaign were opening out to the allies their ability to take advantage of them was diminishing. In England the strain of the long war was making itself felt in spite of the accessions to her colonies and trade which her supremacy over the sea was daily making. Tory feeling reasserted itself directly the danger to European liberty and English commerce passed away after the battle of Blenheim. No one in England cared one straw whether Bourbon or Habsburg sat on the throne of Spain, as long as the free and peaceful development of Europe and England went quietly on. Within the precincts of the court itself a revolution was in progress, and every courtier knew that the ascendency of the duchess of Marlborough over the mind of Anne was a thing of the past. In this state of affairs Marlborough did not dare to run the risk of a doubtful campaign. In the field he restricted himself to the commonplace. In the cabinet he professed himself willing to listen to suggestions of peace. Exhaustion of France. Louis was overjoyed at the news. France was in a state of extreme exhaustion. Her veteran armies were destroyed, her magazines empty, her generals discredited. The taxes had reached a point beyond which taxation could no further go. Offices were created by the hundred to be sold for what they would fetch. Loans could be raised no longer. The capitation tax was made permanent, and even births, marriages and deaths were obliged to contribute to the revenue. To make the misery still more intolerable the terribly severe winter of 1708–9 destroyed the fruit-trees and the vines, and brought the horrors of famine into the fairest districts of France. Early in 1709 negotiations were begun at the Hague, but it soon appeared that the allies were determined not merely to humiliate Louis but to disgrace him. They demanded as a condition precedent to entering on negotiations for a final treaty of peace, that Louis was to surrender Mons and Namur, evacuate Alsace including Strasburg, and force his grandson Philip V. to retire from Spain. Appeal of Louis to France against the demands of the allies. The obligation to make war upon his own grandson in the interests of the enemy was more than Louis, dispirited as he was, could with honour accept. He determined to appeal to French patriotism against terms so cruelly unjust. France responded nobly to his call. Men volunteered everywhere to protect the sacred soil of France from the invader. Nobles sent their plate, ladies their jewels, and the peasants their hoarded sous to organise a national army. Never was Louis more truly king and leader of his people than when in the days of his humiliation he sent the last army of France to the front in 1709.
Battle of Malplaquet, 1709.