Out of the many contemporaneous accounts a portion of a private letter from the duke's cup-bearer to his sister is added:[14]
"Very dear sister, with a very good heart I recommend myself to you and to all my good friends, men and women in our parts, not forgetting my beaux-pères, Martin Stephen and Dan Gauthier. Pray know that, thanks to God, I and all my people are safe and sound. As to my horses, one was wounded and another is sick in the hands of the marshals at Namur, and the others are thin enough and have no grain to eat except hay. The weather, has, indeed, been enough to strike a chill to the hearts of men and horses. Since we left Burgundy there have not been three fine days in succession and we are in a worse state than wolves.
"You already know how we passed through Lorraine and Ratellois without troubling about Salesart or other French captains, nor the other Lorrainers either, although they were under orders to attack us, and were no more afraid of us than we of them. As we approached the territory of Hainaut, M. the duke sent Messire Pierre de Harquantbault[15] to us to show us what road to take. He told us that the duke had made a treaty with the king, who had visited him, news that filled us with astonishment....
After skirmishing for several days we reached the faubourgs of Liege and remained there three of four days under arms, with no sleep and little food, and our horses standing in the rain with no shelter but the trees. While we were thus lodged, the king and the duke with a fair escort arrived and took up their quarters in certain houses near the faubourg. [... Constant firing was interchanged for several days. Sallies were essayed and men were slain.]
"Finally a direct attack was made on the king and Monseigneur and there were more of their people than ours and that night Monseigneur was in great danger. The following Sunday at 9 A.M. we began the assault in three separate quarters. It was a fine thing to see the men-at-arms march on the walls of the said city, some climbing and others scaling them with ladders. The standards of monseigneur the marshal and monsgn. de Renty who had been stationed together in the faubourgs, were the first within the said city which contained at that moment sixteen to eighteen thousand combatants, who were surprised when they saw their walls scaled.
"In a moment we entered crying 'Burgundy' and 'city gained.' Ever so many of their people were slain and drowned in their flight. We flew to reach the market-place and the church of St. Lambert where a number of prisoners were taken and thrown into the water. Our ensign stood in the midst of the fray on the market-place, in the hopes that they would rally for a combat but they rallied only to flee. While we held our position on the square several were created knights.... All the churches—more than four hundred—were pillaged and plundered. It is rumoured that they will be burnt together with the rest of the city. Piteous it is to see what ill is wrought.... [The king] stayed in the city with Monseigneur two or three days. Then he departed, it is said for Brussels to await my said lord. It is a great thing to have seen the puissance of my master, which is great enough to defeat an emperor. I believe the Burgundians will shortly return to Burgundy.
"I paid my respects to my said lord, who received me very well. At present I am listed[16] among those whose term is almost expired and I am ready to follow him wherever he wishes until my service is out, which will be soon. I would have written before had I had any one to send it by. Pray write me about yourself by the first comer. Praying our Lord, beloved sister, to keep you. Written in Liege, November 8, 1468.
"JEHAN DE MAZILLES."
This sober letter and other accounts by reliable witnesses agree as to the terrible havoc wrought in the city by the assault on October 30th and by determined and systematic measures of destruction, both during Charles's ten days' sojourn for the express purpose of completing the punishment and after his departure. Yet the result assuredly fell short of the intention. The destruction was not complete as was that of Dinant. Vitality remained, apart from the ecclesiastical nucleus intentionally preserved by the duke.
Having watched the tongues of flame lap the unfortunate city, Charles turned with his army towards Franchimont, that rugged hill country which had proved a nest of hardy and persistent antagonists to Burgundian pretensions. Jehan de Mazilles is in close attendance and gives further details of the pitiless fashion in which Charles carried out his purpose of leaving no seed of resistance to germinate. Four nights and three days they sojourned in a certain little village while there was a hard frost and where, without unarming, they "slept under the trees and drank water." Meantime a small party was despatched by the duke to attack the stronghold of Franchimont. The despairing Liegeois who had taken refuge there abandoned it, and it was taken by assault. A few more days and the duke was assured that Liege and her people were shorn of their strength. When the remnant of survivors began to creep back to the city and tried to recover what was left of their property, many were the questions to be settled. Lawsuits succeeded to turmoils and lingered on for years.