The infantry having advanced in the face of a storm of fire from the enemy's batteries, and commenced the assault, were forced to give way, when the French and Bavarians, issuing from their works, charged the broken ranks, but were driven back. The attack was renewed with similar results. The infantry, reduced in numbers and exhausted by repeated struggles, were giving way, when Lieutenant-General Lumley led the English horse to their aid, and prevented a repulse. The infantry renewed the attack, and eventually the enemy was driven from the works. At this moment the Fourth Horse and other cavalry gallopping forward, by a furious charge completed the victory.[25] The broken battalions and squadrons fled in confusion, pursued by the victorious British and German horsemen, who intercepted the fugitives on every side, and the carnage which followed was dreadful. Many of the French and Bavarians were intercepted on the way to Donawerth, others hurrying to the bridge of boats broke it down by their weight and perished in the river. Their commander, Count D'Arco, escaped with difficulty. Sixteen pieces of cannon, thirteen colours, all the tents, equipages, and a quantity of plate, fell into the hands of the victors. The loss of the regiment was not great;—Adjutant Skelton and several men and horses were killed, and others wounded; and its Colonel, Major-General Wood, was also wounded.[26]
This brilliant success was followed by other offensive operations, in which the Fourth Horse took part; but they were not engaged in executing that cruel order, in obedience to which the unfortunate country of Bavaria was enveloped in flames, and above 300 towns, villages, and hamlets were destroyed: this relentless severity was the work of the Germans.[27] At length another reinforcement of French troops arrived, and the united French and Bavarians took post in the valley of the Danube, near the village of Blenheim.
About three o'clock on the morning of the 13th of August the allied army advanced, and after traversing several miles of rugged ground, and overcoming many local difficulties, arrived in presence of the enemy; and the Fourth Horse, forming part of the cavalry of the left wing under Major-General Wood, had their post in the first line; the right wing being composed of Germans under Prince Eugene of Savoy. About noon the troops, advancing across the little river Nebel, by bridges prepared for the occasion, commenced the engagement, and a succession of attacks were made and resisted with great bravery on both sides. The Fourth Horse, with the other English cavalry regiments, were engaged in the early part of the action[28] with the household troops of France, and the superior spirit and power of the British horsemen were conspicuous, particularly in the unconquerable resolution with which they renewed the attack after a temporary repulse; yet the palm of victory was nobly contested, and the combatants fought hand to hand until the plain was covered with dead. After successive efforts made by the adverse armies—the one to advance, and the other to maintain its ground—the protracted contest drew to a crisis, and the French infantry began to shrink before the tempest of balls which thinned their ranks, while their cavalry, broken and dispirited, gave way, when nine battalions were cut to pieces or made prisoners. The enemy attempted to restore the battle, but the allied horse, once more rushing forward with tremendous force, decided the fate of the day. The enemy, after an irregular fire, fled in dismay, and the regiment which forms the subject of this memoir, after distinguishing itself in the charge, pursued the French squadrons with terrible clamour and confusion in the direction of Sonderheim, smiting them to the ground, and chasing them down the declivity near Blenheim into the Danube, where numbers were drowned. At the same time their commander-in-chief, Marshal Tallard, and several other officers and many men, were made prisoners.[29]
While this regiment was pursuing the French horsemen towards the Danube, another part of the army surrounded the village of Blenheim, where twelve squadrons of dragoons and twenty-four battalions of infantry were forced to surrender themselves prisoners of war. At the same time the Germans on the right, under Prince Eugene, were also triumphant. Thus a victory was achieved which shed lustre on the British arms, and the record of these events forms a page in history of which every Englishman may be justly proud, particularly the corps whose valour delivered the empire from impending ruin, and whose fame resounded throughout Christendom.[30]
The Fourth Horse had Lieutenant-Colonel Fetherstonhalgh and Cornet Ordairne killed; also Captain Armstrong, Captain Shute, Lieutenant Dove, Cornet Forester, and Cornet Stevenson, wounded. Of the private men killed and wounded no return appears to have been preserved; but in the War-Office books the regiment is stated to have had forty-seven horses killed in this action.
Having passed the night after the battle on the field, the Fourth Horse followed for several days the rear of the defeated army, which repassed the Black Forest, and retired across the Rhine. On the 6th of September the regiment was at Kirlach; it passed the Rhine on the same day to attack some squadrons which appeared on the rising ground near Philipsburg; but, on the advance of the English horsemen, the French retreated across the Queich, and made preparations to defend the passage of that river: they, however, quitted their ground on the advance of the allies on the 9th of that month, on which day the Fourth Horse forded the stream, and were afterwards encamped on the banks of the little river Lauter, forming part of the covering army during the siege of Landau, a strong town situated in the beautiful valley near the Queich. After the surrender of Landau, which terminated this splendid and memorable campaign, the regiment commenced its march back to Holland, while the infantry sailed down the Rhine in boats to Nimeguen.
1705
The winter was again passed amongst the Dutch villagers; and in April 1705 the Fourth Horse quitted their cantonments, and marching to the vicinity of Maestricht, erected their tents in the early part of May on the banks of the Maese, near Viset, where they were reviewed by the Duke of Marlborough on the 14th of that month. Leaving this place on the following day, they marched in the direction of Coblentz, and from thence through a wild and mountainous country to Treves, and were encamped beyond that city on the 26th of May. After crossing the Moselle and the Saar, on the 3rd of June they passed through the difficult defiles of Tavernen and Onsdorf, following the course of the Roman causeway over the heights, then emerging into the more open ground towards Tettingen, continued their route to the vicinity of Syrk, where they passed the night under arms; and on the following day encamped on the open grounds near Elft; at the same time the enemy occupied a strong position a few miles in advance. The Duke of Marlborough was desirous of carrying on the war in this direction, and the German Princes had agreed to co-operate with his grace; but their arrival was so long delayed that his designs were frustrated, and as the French were making rapid progress in the Netherlands, he was induced to quit his position and march to the assistance of the Dutch.
Accordingly, a little before midnight on the 17th of June, during a heavy rain, the army struck its tents, and the Fourth Horse, composing part of twenty squadrons destined to cover the movement, formed up to confront the enemy, while the army commenced the retreat, which was continued throughout the night without interruption from the French, and it re-crossed the Saar and the Moselle on the following day. On the 19th the retreat was resumed, and on the 25th the Fourth Horse and other cavalry arrived at Duren, in the duchy of Juliers. At the same time the French troops, near the Dutch frontiers, ceased acting on the offensive, and retired in a panic to Tongres.
After this long and difficult march, the Fourth Horse crossed the Maese near Viset, and were subsequently employed in covering the siege of Huy, which the enemy had retaken during the absence of the army up the Moselle.