But the ink was scarcely dry on the treaty when Filippo, either repenting of what he had done or pursuing his secret intentions, with the certainty of forever losing Brescia if he executed the treaty, invited Carmagnola in person to take possession of Chiari, a fortified town forming a strong outwork to that city on the road to Milan. Niccolo Tolentino, suspecting treachery, dissuaded his general from doing so notwithstanding orders from the Venetian seigniory, and his counsel was soon justified by information that the detachment sent on this duty was surrounded and cut to pieces within the walls. Visconti followed up this by the equipment of a large flotilla on the Po, the augmentation of his army with disbanded soldiers from the allies, and a sudden renewal of hostilities. The astonished league almost immediately took the field with what troops remained, the general having orders to make fierce war while a strong armament was preparing to meet the enemy afloat and attack all vulnerable points on the left bank of the Po.
The first encounter was at Gottolengo. Carmagnola had assembled his military cars (which in those days were an indispensable portion of all armies for the rapid movements of infantry), and filling them with crossbowmen attempted to surprise the enemy. The Milanese, however, were too experienced for this and mustering their whole force attacked him unexpectedly while in some confusion on his march, and nearly defeated the whole army; Carmagnola, however, rallied his people, and after restoring order began an obstinate contest.
The heat was excessive, the dust intolerable, the visors of helmets, the eyes and nostrils of the combatants were all choked up so that respiration became almost impossible. The Milanese were supplied with wine and water by the female peasantry, but such was the dust and obscurity that friend and foe seemed alike unknown and many of the allies received refreshment even from the hands of their enemies. Numbers fell from their horses overpowered by heat and dust; the plain was strewed with lances, shields, and wounded men; horses were galloping wildly about the field, some with saddles, some without; others had them turned under their bellies, and many men threw off all their armour to escape suffocation. Piccinino was conspicuous beyond the rest in knightly daring, and his lance’s point was felt throughout the throng; for this battle excepting amongst the infantry seems to have been a confused mass of single combats, more like the mêlée of a tournament than a scientific fight of disciplined soldiers; but the footmen, in firm well-ordered battalions, with lowered spears, charged and withstood the charges of the men-at-arms, killing both them and their horses. When the struggle had lasted some hours and the allies were ready to give way, the marquis of Mantua, hitherto deceived by false reports from a cowardly fugitive, came suddenly up with his followers and dashing forward saved all the cavalry and restored the day. The retreat was simultaneously sounded on both sides; each host had been three times broken, all but the infantry, who seem by their discipline to have preserved the rest.
The ducal forces throughout these two campaigns were smaller in numbers than the allies, but better soldiers and with a greater number of more able commanders; yet they were unsuccessful for want of a common chief, while Carmagnola was implicitly obeyed, and all his advantages were gained by bringing superior numbers against the weakest points of the enemy. To remedy this, Visconti appointed young Carlo Malatesta of Pesaro as his captain-general; a youth of no experience, but whose high rank and family reputation were likely to restrain the continual bickering of the chiefs.
Victories of Carmagnola
Meanwhile Carmagnola, angry at the somewhat disgraceful affair of Gottolengo, conceived the idea of surprising Cremona—a thoroughly Guelfic city and disaffected to every Ghibelline authority; with this view he took up a strong position at Sommo close to the town, entrenched and fortified his camp with a thousand war-cars as was his custom, and trusted to those within the city for ultimate success. Filippo, for the above reasons, became alarmed; wherefore, assembling a large force and instantly embarking on the Po, he at once occupied and saved Cremona. A council of war was of opinion that the enemy should be attacked because Cremona secured their own safety in case of defeat, and a victory would almost insure the fall of Mantua. To protect that place the army was encamped in an open space about half a mile wide, contained between the city walls and the surrounding ditch, called Le Cerchie di Cremona, the defence of which involved that of the city itself; but as the circuit was large, a continual stream of armed peasantry came pouring in at their prince’s call, ranged under various flags and banners and augmenting the aggregate of both armies to full seventy thousand combatants. The allies were superior in the number of regular troops, the Milanese in experience and discipline, and held themselves fully equal to their antagonists independent of the peasantry; these, however, in the unsettled state of that time and country well knew how to handle their weapons though despised by the condottieri, who represented them to Filippo as useful to fill up ditches and as convenient marks for exhausting the adverse missiles and sparing the regular troops; however, their vast numbers would, it was said, excite fear, “the true harbinger of defeat.”
Battle being resolved on, a corps of light-armed troops was sent forward to begin, but these were quickly driven in on the main body by Taliano Furlano, one of the adverse chiefs who, seeing the Milanese cavalry already formed and the whole country as far as the eye could reach covered with banners, instantly turned to give the alarm. Carmagnola was soon in his saddle and personally directing the defence of a narrow pass protected by a broad and deep ditch, which the enemy would be compelled to win ere his main body could be attacked. This was quickly lined with veteran soldiers and the road within it flanked by a body of eight thousand infantry armed with the spear and crossbow, and posted in an almost impenetrable thicket closely bordering on the public way. This pass was called La Casa-al-Secco, and Agnolo della Pergola first appeared before it with his followers, supported by a crowd of peasantry; the ditch was deep, broad, and well defended, and an increasing shower of arrows galled his people so sorely that he at once resolved to use the rural bands as a means of filling it. Driving the peasant multitude forward, he ordered the regular troops to put every luckless clown to death who turned his face from the enemy; so that these wretches with the spear at their back and the crossbow in front fell like grass under the scythe of the husbandman. But they were more useful in death; by Agnolo’s command both killed and wounded, all who fell, were rolled promiscuously into this universal grave, covered up with mould and buried all together.
Here were to be seen distracted fathers with unsteady hand shovelling clods upon the bodies of dead and wounded sons; sons heaping earth on their fathers’ heads; brothers covering the bloody remains of brothers; uncles, nephews; nephews, uncles—all clotted in this horrid compost! If the wretches turned, a friend’s lance or dart went instantly through their bodies; if they stood, an enemy’s shaft or javelin no less sharply pierced them; alive, they filled the pit with sons and brothers, dead or wounded, with themselves! They worked and died by thousands; even the very soldiers that opposed them at last took pity and aimed their weapons only at armed men. “And as a reward for this,” exclaims Cavalcanti, “God lent us strength and courage.” Nevertheless, so many were thus cruelly sacrificed that the moat was soon filled to the utmost level of its banks with earth and flesh and human blood, and then the knights giving spurs to their steeds dashed proudly over this infernal causeway! It was now that the fight commenced: fresh squadrons poured in on every side and all rushed madly to the combat, for on this bloody spot the day was to be decided. “Here,” says Cavalcanti, “began the fierce and mortal struggle; here every knight led up his followers and did noble deeds of arms; here were the shivered lances flying to pieces in the air, cavaliers lifeless on the ground and all the field bestrewed with dead and dying! Here too was seen young Carlo Malatesta, himself and courser cased complete in mail, and a golden mantle streaming from his shoulders! Whoever has not seen him has not seen the pride of armies! Here was store of blood, and lack of joy and fear and doubt hung hard on every mind! Nothing was heard but the clang of arms, the shock of lances, the tempest of cavalry, and the groans and cries and shouts of either host! The sun was flaming, the suffering dreadful, the thirst intolerable; everything seemed to burn, all conspired against the wish of men, but the Cremonese women brought refreshments to our enemies.”
The whole battle appears to have been concentrated in this pass, so that numbers made but little difference on either side; nevertheless the Milanese chivalry were severely handled by the veterans in the wood, who kept up a continual discharge of arrows on horse and man from the moment the ditch was passed, or else ran in with their lances and speared them. As many died from exhaustion and suffocation as from blows, for the battle was fought early in July and lasted from two hours after sunrise until evening; others it is said expired from the stench of carnage rapidly corrupted by excessive heat. Carmagnola, forced by circumstances into the thickest fight, was unhorsed, and a hard conflict between those who tried to save and those who wished to take him prisoner soon concentrated all the knightly prowess of both armies round his person; he was remounted, and dust and confusion saved him more than once, as they did Niccolo Piccinino, besides other leaders on both sides, from being recognised and captured. The squadrons charged and recharged in dust and darkness; no standards could be seen; the voice alone revealed a friend; and when a retreat was sounded whole troops of cavalry ranged themselves under adverse banners in total ignorance of their own position. One attack was made by a strong detachment upon the baggage and for a while placed the allies in great danger; but being finally repulsed with the loss of five hundred prisoners a retreat was sounded; the captives were equal, yet the victory of Casa-al-Secco was fairly claimed by Carmagnola.
Filippo previous to this battle had endeavoured to balance his ill success by a naval victory; the Venetian armament on the Po had been extremely active, and to check it he placed a strong squadron under the orders of Pacino Eustachio of Pavia with instructions to lose no time in bringing the enemy to action. The latter, commanded by Francesco Bembo, did not shun the encounter, which took place near Brescello; but losing three galleons in the commencement, Bembo, doubtful of consequences, with that rapid and bold decision that marks a superior mind, suddenly discontinued the contest and withdrawing all the crossbowmen from his remaining galleons manned them with the crews of others armed only with spears, swords, spontoons, battle-axes, and short arms of every description. These he placed in the van, while the galleons thus emptied were manned with crossbowmen alone and stationed close in the rear of his first line, with rigid orders under the penalty of death to kill either himself or any other man that should turn from the enemy. He then renewed the attack.