Villars was selected as the general to be intrusted with the last hopes of France. He proved himself equal to the responsibility. Carefully entrenching himself in strong positions, while he trained his recruits and collected supplies, he trusted to the great ally Time whom he knew could not fail him. At last as the summer grew on Marlborough and Eugene, not daring to attack him in his camp near Lens, marched upon Mons, and Villars was forced to advance in order to relieve it. He took up an almost impregnable position at Malplaquet, resting his two flanks on wooded heights, and holding the gap in the middle, which he had strongly entrenched, with his main force. There he awaited the onslaught of the allies. There was nothing for it but a front attack. The position, if taken at all, must be taken by a direct assault. On the 11th of September Marlborough and Eugene hurled their troops up the gap. It was not a battle, it was a carnage. Fighting desperately hand-to-hand, the victors of Blenheim and Ramillies at last forced the position. Villars himself was wounded, but Boufflers who succeeded to the command effected his retreat in good order. Mons remained the prize of the conquerors.
The battle of Malplaquet was more honourable to the vanquished than to the victors. It did not even re-establish Marlborough’s influence in England. In the year in which it was fought the duchess was dismissed from her court appointments. Dismissal of Marlborough, 1711. In the following year a definitely Tory and peace ministry was formed under Harley. It was obvious that the dismissal of Marlborough was only a question of time. Determined to run no risk, he contented himself with forcing Villars slowly back into France. At the beginning of 1711 he learned that the ministry had secretly opened negotiations for peace, and he proceeded methodically to drive Villars back from one position to another while awaiting the final blow. Political necessities had entirely superseded military opportunities. At last the blow fell. On December 31st, 1711, he was dismissed from a command which had long ceased to be a reality.
Defeat of the allies in Spain, 1710.
Meanwhile in Spain the necessities of Louis actually strengthened the position of Philip V. In 1709 all the French troops were withdrawn to defend their own frontiers. Stanhope and Stahremberg, who commanded the imperialists, accordingly advanced against Philip in 1710, drove him first out of Arragon, then almost out of Castile to Valladolid, and occupied Madrid. The result was a national movement of the Spaniards in favour of their king. Louis allowed Vendôme to take command of the Spanish army. The allies found it impossible to maintain themselves at Madrid, and retreated in two divisions upon Arragon. Vendôme manœuvring with great skill forced himself between them, surrounded Stanhope at Brihuega and obliged him to capitulate, then throwing himself on Stahremberg, routed him at Villa Viciosa, and drove him back to Barcelona. Again the Spaniards had emphatically pronounced their determination that Philip, and none but Philip, should reign over them.
In spite of this the allies were still endeavouring to compel Louis to make war upon his grandson. In the winter of 1709–10 negotiations were resumed at Gertruydenberg. Negotiations of Gertruydenberg. Louis consented to surrender Alsace, and offered not only to recognise the archduke Charles as king, but to forbid his subjects to serve in Spain, and even to provide supplies for the allied armies in Spain. But the allies were determined to put Louis openly to shame before the face of Europe, and insisted that he should force his grandson to resign the crown. Again the negotiations fell through. They were not renewed. Directly a Tory ministry came into power they opened private communications with Louis without taking their allies into their confidence. The treaty of Utrecht, 1713. By September 1711 an agreement was arrived at between France and England alone, and preliminaries of peace settled. These were then communicated to the Dutch and the other allies, and were accepted with some protests by all except the Emperor. In accordance with the preliminaries a congress was held at Utrecht in 1712, and the final peace drawn up there and signed in 1713.
The war continued by the Emperor.
The Emperor still stubbornly refused to yield. In 1711, that terrible year of mortality among princely houses, Joseph I. had died, and the archduke Charles was now Emperor. His pride would not suffer him to surrender the crown of Spain to his rival, and Eugene was instructed to push on military operations in spite of the defection of the English. Without the aid of Marlborough even Eugene was powerless against the patriotism of France. Beaten at the bridge of Denain by Villars in 1712, he was driven back to the frontier of the Netherlands, and had in consequence of the conclusion of the peace to transfer his army to the upper Rhine. Treaties of Rastadt and Baden. But misfortune pursued him there. In 1713 Villars burst into Alsace, crossed the Rhine at Strasburg, forced Eugene from his entrenched camp at Freiburg, and obliged the Emperor at last to consent to make peace. The definitive treaties were eventually signed at Rastadt and Baden in 1714.
Terms of the Peace of Utrecht.
By the treaties of Utrecht, Rastadt, and Baden, generally grouped together under the name of the Peace of Utrecht, the following arrangements were effected.
(1) Philip V. was recognised as King of Spain and the Indies, on the condition that the crowns of France and Spain should never be united on the same head.