General Beaupuy
(See pp. 297 and 302, [The Prelude], [book ix.])
Professor Emile Legouis of Lyons—a thorough student, and a very competent expounder, of our modern English Literature—supplied me, some years ago, with numerous facts in reference to Wordsworth's friend General Beaupuy, and his family, from which I extract the following:
The Prelude gives us very little precise information about the republican officer with whom Wordsworth became acquainted in France, and on whom he bestowed more praise than on almost any other of his contemporaries. We only gather the following facts:—That his name was Beaupuy, that he was quartered at Orleans, with royalist officers, sometime between November 1791 and the spring of 1792, and that
'He perished fighting, in supreme command,
Upon the borders of the unhappy Loire,
For liberty, against deluded men,
His fellow-countrymen....'Though it seems very easy to identify a general even with such scanty data, the task is rendered more difficult by two inaccuracies in Wordsworth's statement, which, however, can be explained and redressed without much difficulty.
The first inaccuracy is in the spelling of the name, which is Beaupuy and not Beaupuis—a slight mistake considering that Wordsworth was a foreigner, and, besides, wrote down his friend's name ten years and perhaps more after losing sight of him. Moreover, the name of the general who, I think, was meant by Wordsworth, I have found spelt Beaupuy in one instance, viz. the signature of a letter of his, as printed in Vie et Correspondance de Merlin de Thionville, publiée par Jean Reynaud, Paris, 1860 (2'e partie p. 241).
The spelling of proper names was not so fixed then as it is nowadays, and this irregularity is not to be wondered at.
The second inaccuracy consists in stating that General Beaupuy died on the banks of the Loire during the Vendean war. Indeed, he was grievously wounded at the Battle of Château-Gonthier, on the 26th of October 1793, and reported as dead. His soldiers thought he had been killed, and the rumour must have spread abroad, as it was recorded by A. Thiers himself in his Histoire de la Révolution, and by A. Challemel in his Histoire Musée de la République Française.
It is no wonder that Wordsworth, who was then in England, and could only read imperfect accounts of what took place in France, should have been mistaken too.
No other General Beaupuy is recorded in the history of the Revolution, so far as I have been able to ascertain. The moral character of the officer, whose life I shall relate, answers to Wordsworth's description, and is worthy of his high estimate.
Armand Michel de Bachelier, Chevalier de Beaupuy, was born at Mussidan, in Perigord, on the 15th of July 1757. He belonged to a noble family, less proud of its antiquity than of the blood it had shed for France on many battlefields. On his mother's side (Mlle. de Villars), he reckoned Montaigne, the celebrated essayist, among his ancestors. His parents having imbibed the philanthropic ideas of the time, educated him according to their principles.
He had four brothers, who were all destined to turn republicans and do good service to the new cause, though their interest certainly lay in the opposite direction.
...
He was made sub-lieutenant in the regiment of Bassigny (33rd division of foot) on the 2nd of March 1773, and lieutenant of grenadiers on the 1st of October of the same year.
In 1791 he was first lieutenant in the same regiment. Having sided with the Revolution, he was appointed commander of a battalion of national volunteers in the department of Dordogne. I have not found the exact date of this appointment, but it must have taken place immediately after his stay at Orléans with Wordsworth.
I have found no further mention of his name till September 1792, when he is known to have served in the "Armée du Rhin," under General Custine, and contributed to the taking of Spire.
He [took] an important part in the taking of Worms, 4th October; of Mayence (Maenz) 21st October. He was among the garrison of Mayence when this place was besieged by the Prussians, and obliged to capitulate after a long and famous siege (from 6th April 1793 to 22nd July 1793).[A]
During the siege he wrote a journal of all the operations. Unfortunately, this journal is very short, and purely military. It has been handed down to us, and is found in the Bibliothèque Nationale of Paris in the Papiers de Merlin de Thionville, n. acq. fr. Nos. 244-252, 8 vol. in-8°. Beaupuy's journal is in the 3rd volume, fol. 213-228.
...
In the Vendean war, the "Mayençais," or soldiers returned from Mayence, made themselves conspicuous, and bore almost all the brunt of the campaign. But none of them distinguished himself more than Beaupuy, then a General of Brigade.
The Mayençais arrived in Vendée at the end of August or beginning of September 1793. To Beaupuy's skill the victory of Chollet (Oct. 17, 1793) is attributed by Jomini. In this battle he fought hand to hand with and overcame a Vendean cavalier. He himself had three horses killed, and had a very narrow escape. On the battlefield he was made general of division by the "Represéntants du peuple." It was after Chollet that the Vendeans made the memorable crossing of the Loire at St. Florent.
At Laval and Château-Gonthier (Oct. 26) a terrible defeat was inflicted on the Republicans, owing to the incapacity of their commander-in-chief, Léchelle. The whole corps commanded by General Beaupuy was crushed by a terrible fire, He himself, after withstanding for two or three hours with 2000 or 3000 men all the attacks of the royalists, was disabled by a shot, and fell, crying out, "Laissez-moi là, et portez à mes grenadiers ma chemise sanglante." His soldiers thought he was dead, and then the error was spread, which was repeated by Wordsworth, Thiers, and Challamel. Wordsworth's mistake is so far interesting, as it seems to prove that very little or no correspondence passed between the two friends after they had parted. Beaupuy, moreover, had too much work upon his hands to give much of his time to letter-writing.
Though severely wounded, Beaupuy lived on, and less than six weeks after the battle of Château-Gonthier, he was seen on the ramparts of Angers, where he required himself to be carried to animate his soldiers and head the defenders of the place, from which the Vendeans were driven after a severe contest (Dec. 5 and 6).
On the 22nd of December 1793 he shared in the victory of Savenay with his celebrated friends, Marceau, Kleber, and Westermann. After this battle, which put an end to the great Vendean war, he wrote the following letter to his friend Merlin de Thionville, the celebrated "représentant du peuple.""Savenay, le 4 Nivôse au 2'e (25 Dec. 73).
"Enfin, enfin, mon cher Merlin, elle n'est plus cette armée royale ou catholique, comme tu voudras! J'en ai vu, avec tes braves collegues Prieur et Eurreau, les débris, consistant en 150 cavaliers battant l'eau dans le marais de Montaire; et comme tu connais ma veracité tu peux dire avec assurance que les deux combats de Savenay ont mis fin à la guerre de la nouvelle Vendée et aux chimériques espérances des royalists.
L'histoire ne vous presente point de combat dont le suites aient été plus décisives. Ah! mon brave, comme tu aurais joui! quelle attaque! mais quelle déroute aussi! Il fallait les voir ces soldats de Jesus et de Louis XVII, se jetant dans les marais ou obligés de se rendre par 5 ou 600 à la fois; et Langrénière pris et les autres generaux dispersés et aux abois!
Cette armée, dont tu avais vu les restes de la terrasse de St. Florent, était redevenue formidable par son recrutement dans les départements envahis. Je les ai bien vus, bien examinés, j'ai reconnu même de mes figures de Chollet et de Laval, et à leur contenance et à leur mine, je l'assure qu'il ne leur manquait du soldat que l'habit. Des troupes qui ont battu de tels Français peuvent se flatter ainsi de vainere des peuples assez lâaches pour se réunir centre un seul et encore pour la cause des rois! Enfin, je ne sais si je me trompe, mais cette guerre de brigands, de paysans, sur laquelle on a jeté tant de ridicule, que l'on dédaignait, que l'on affectait de regarder comme méprisable, m'a toujours paru, pour la république, la grande partie, et il me semble a present qu'avec nos autres ennemis, nous ne ferrons plus que peloter.
Adieu, brave montagnard, adieu! Actuellement que cette exécrable guerre est terminée, que les mânes de nos freres sont satisfaits, je vais guerir. J'ai obtenu de tes confreres un congé qui finira au moment où la guerre recommencera.
Le Géneral de Brigade Beaupuy.I think I can recognize in this letter some traits of Beaupuy's character as pointed out by Wordsworth, not excepting the half-suppressed criticism:
'... somewhat vain he was,
Or seemed so, yet it was not vanity,
But fondness, and a kind of radiant joy
Diffused around him ...'Passing over numerous military incidents, on the 26th of June 1796 Beaupuy received seven or eight sabre-cuts at Jorich-Wildstadt. But on the 8th of July he was already back at his post.
He again greatly distinguished himself on the 1st of September 1796 at Greisenfeld and Langenbruck, where the victory of the French was owing to a timely attack made by Desaix and himself.
He was one of the generals under Moreau when the latter achieved his well-known retreat through the Black Forest, begun on the 15th of September 1796, and during which many battles were fought. In one of the actions on the banks of the Elz, Beaupuy was killed by a cannon-ball, while opposing General Latour on the heights of Malterdingen. His soldiers, who loved him passionately, fought desperately to avenge his death (Oct. 19, 1796).
One of Beaupuy's colleagues, General Duhem, in his account of the battle to the Government, thus expressed himself on General Beaupuy:"Ecrivains patriotes, orateurs chaleureux, je vous propose un noble sujet, l'éloge du Géneral Beaupuy, de Beaupuy, le Nestor et l'Achille de notre armée. Vous n'avez pas de récherches à faire; interrogez le premier soldat de l'armée du Rhin-et-Moselle, ses larmes exciteront les vôtres. Ecrivez alors ce que est vous en dira, et vous peindrez le Bayard de la République Française."
[Such] bombastic style was then common, but what we have seen of Beaupuy in this sketch shows that he had through his career united Nestor's prudence[B] with Achilles' bodily courage and Bayard's chivalric spirit,—to use the language of the time.
General Moreau had Beaupuy's remains transported to Brisach, where a monument was erected to his memory in 1802, after the peace of Lunéville.
In [short], Beaupuy seems to have always remained worthy of the high praise bestowed on him by Wordsworth. His name is to be remembered along with those of the unspotted generals of the first years of the Revolution—Hoche, Marceau, etc.—before the craving for conquest had developed, and the love of liberty yielded to a fond admiration of Bonaparte as it did in the case of Kleber, Desaix, and so many others.[C]
N. B.—The great influence which Beaupuy exercised at that time on Wordsworth will be easily understood, if we take into account not only his real qualities, but also his age. When they met, Wordsworth was only twenty-one, Beaupuy nearly thirty-five. The grown-up man could impart much of his knowledge of life, and of the favourite authors of the time, to a youth fresh from the University—though that youth was Wordsworth.
Emile Legouis.
'He perished fighting, in supreme command,
Upon the borders of the unhappy Loire,
For liberty, against deluded men,
His fellow-countrymen....'
"Savenay, le 4 Nivôse au 2'e (25 Dec. 73).
"Enfin, enfin, mon cher Merlin, elle n'est plus cette armée royale ou catholique, comme tu voudras! J'en ai vu, avec tes braves collegues Prieur et Eurreau, les débris, consistant en 150 cavaliers battant l'eau dans le marais de Montaire; et comme tu connais ma veracité tu peux dire avec assurance que les deux combats de Savenay ont mis fin à la guerre de la nouvelle Vendée et aux chimériques espérances des royalists.
L'histoire ne vous presente point de combat dont le suites aient été plus décisives. Ah! mon brave, comme tu aurais joui! quelle attaque! mais quelle déroute aussi! Il fallait les voir ces soldats de Jesus et de Louis XVII, se jetant dans les marais ou obligés de se rendre par 5 ou 600 à la fois; et Langrénière pris et les autres generaux dispersés et aux abois!
Cette armée, dont tu avais vu les restes de la terrasse de St. Florent, était redevenue formidable par son recrutement dans les départements envahis. Je les ai bien vus, bien examinés, j'ai reconnu même de mes figures de Chollet et de Laval, et à leur contenance et à leur mine, je l'assure qu'il ne leur manquait du soldat que l'habit. Des troupes qui ont battu de tels Français peuvent se flatter ainsi de vainere des peuples assez lâaches pour se réunir centre un seul et encore pour la cause des rois! Enfin, je ne sais si je me trompe, mais cette guerre de brigands, de paysans, sur laquelle on a jeté tant de ridicule, que l'on dédaignait, que l'on affectait de regarder comme méprisable, m'a toujours paru, pour la république, la grande partie, et il me semble a present qu'avec nos autres ennemis, nous ne ferrons plus que peloter.
Adieu, brave montagnard, adieu! Actuellement que cette exécrable guerre est terminée, que les mânes de nos freres sont satisfaits, je vais guerir. J'ai obtenu de tes confreres un congé qui finira au moment où la guerre recommencera.
Le Géneral de Brigade Beaupuy.
'... somewhat vain he was,
Or seemed so, yet it was not vanity,
But fondness, and a kind of radiant joy
Diffused around him ...'
"Ecrivains patriotes, orateurs chaleureux, je vous propose un noble sujet, l'éloge du Géneral Beaupuy, de Beaupuy, le Nestor et l'Achille de notre armée. Vous n'avez pas de récherches à faire; interrogez le premier soldat de l'armée du Rhin-et-Moselle, ses larmes exciteront les vôtres. Ecrivez alors ce que est vous en dira, et vous peindrez le Bayard de la République Française."
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[Footnote A:] His bravery shone forth at Coethen, where he was left alone in a group of Prussians. He fought with their chief and disarmed him. A few days after he was named General of Brigade.—8th March 1793.
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[Footnote B:] The pacification of Vendée was for a great part owing to his valour and prudence.
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[Footnote C:] Beaupuy is said to have united civic virtues with military talents. A good son and a good brother, he showed in many a circumstance that true valour does not exclude humanity, and that the soul can be both strong and full of feeling.
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These notes (B and C) are taken from Biographic Nouvelle de Contemporains.